As a member of the pet care industry, your dog daycare or boarding facility is likely aware of the need for quality pet care. Owners want to give their dogs the best quality of life possible to keep them safe, happy, and healthy—even when they might be at work or on vacation.
That’s where your business comes into play. Owners entrust you with their furry friends, hoping that you’ll be able to care for them as if they were your own. Prioritizing proper kennel management is the best way to make sure you deliver top-tier pet care, keep staff members safe, and demonstrate that your business is worthy of its customers’ trust.
To help you do so, we’ll walk through our top tips for successful kennel management. Before jumping into what you need for your facility, let’s start by brushing up on the basics.
What is kennel management?
Kennel management is the practice of systematically organizing and overseeing a facility that cares for animals, typically dogs, cats, and other pets. Kennel management is a necessary skill used by pet daycares, sitters, veterinary clinics, groomers, and more.
The goal of kennel management is to ensure that animals within the facility remain safe and receive proper care like regular feedings, access to clean water, necessary medical care, and clean areas to relax in. Additionally, proper kennel management ensures that staff know how to care for the animals, ways to keep themselves and others safe, and what to do in case of incidents and emergencies.
Why Proper Kennel Management Is Essential
There are so many moving parts you have to consider as a business owner, whether you’ve just started a dog daycare or have been operating for years. For example, you’d never overlook processes like vetting staff before hiring, properly managing your finances, and promoting your business to your target audience. Kennel management should fall in line with these important practices as one of your top priorities.
Here are the key reasons why your organization must properly manage the animals in its care:
- Animal welfare. Kennel management should consider all aspects of animals’ care, including nutrition, hydration, exercise, socialization, behavioral and emotional needs, and more. Monitoring each of these factors gives you a solid overview of each animal’s health, personality, and unique needs so you can give them tailored care.
- Health and hygiene of staff and animals. Proper sanitation and hygiene practices minimize the spread of diseases, parasites, and infections. This promotes a clean and safe environment for your animals and staff, ensuring you don’t send anyone home sick.
- General safety and security. Implementing protocols that promote the safety and well-being of staff and animals will prevent injury, escapes, and other incidents. This includes standards for securing enclosures, techniques for handling and restraining animals, prepping for emergencies and incidents, and more.
- Client satisfaction and trust. When you show that your business is prepared, organized, and qualified to care for animals, your clients can rest assured that their animals will be safe and happy at your facility. Proper kennel management will help you share updates, remain transparent about your operations, and respond promptly to any concerns.
- Compliance with legal requirements. You may need to meet certain sanitation and safety requirements to retain your kennel license. Some states, counties, and even cities have strict requirements for how many animals can remain under your care given the size of your facility, number of staff members, and other factors. Get familiar with your area’s regulations and kennel management best practices.
Having a clear set of established rules and procedures also improves staff efficiency. Your employees will know exactly what to do in most situations, taking guesswork out of it. As a result, your animals will receive more consistent, quality care.
What do you need to get started with kennel management?
Secure Facilities
This is the most important thing you need to run a successful daycare or boarding business. Whether you’re in the process of choosing a facility or want to improve your current one, there are a few important things to consider.
First, your facility should include three areas that are separated by doors or gates:
- A front-facing, secure drop-off and pick-up area. This is where customers will enter to leave and pick up their pets. To make a positive impression, make sure it stays clean and neat.
- Areas for playing, socializing, and group activities. You may have multiple rooms and outdoor spaces available for this. Think through the layout of these areas to ensure all pets get a chance to play, whether by themselves or with other pets.
- A quiet room or zone. Some dogs, like seniors, might prefer to relax and nap the day away rather than play. Additionally, some may need quiet time to avoid becoming overstimulated.
Make sure you have enough indoor kennels or cages to secure all of the dogs in your care in case of situations like severe weather or other emergencies. Additionally, outside spaces should always be secured by escape-proof, well-maintained fences.
Knowledgeable, Trained Staff
When caring for animals, you are responsible for a living, breathing creature with physical and emotional needs. This is why it's so crucial to find employees that are the right fit for your facility. Finding staff who are willing and able to provide care that goes above and beyond will check all of your kennel management boxes and satisfy pet parents.
When hiring staff for your daycare or boarding facility, you can set future kennel management practices up for success by looking for:
- Past experience working with animals, such as working for another boarder, assisting a vet, volunteering at an animal shelter, or even farm work.
- A basic understanding of kennel operations, including cleaning, feeding schedules, and safety procedures.
- Practice managing various settings and situations, like handling groups of dogs with various personalities and temperaments.
- The right level of physical ability and fitness to take on everyday kennel management tasks. This could involve restraining and handling various species and breeds, lifting heavy bags of food, and long periods of standing and walking.
- Great customer service and soft skills to make your clients feel at ease and confident that staff can care for their pets.
- The ability to work well in teams, ensuring they’ll fit in with your other staff members. They should be able to follow directions, contribute to the team during busy periods, and accept any feedback they receive.
- A clear background check and strong references from past employers that show the potential employee has a positive track record.
Note that you may need to hire one or two more qualified or skilled employees depending on the services you offer. For example, you may need someone with experience with exotic animals if you plan to care for pets other than dogs and cats, such as hamsters, bunnies, chinchillas, ferrets, birds, or reptiles. Or, you might hire a trained groomer if you want to start offering grooming services.
A Detailed Onboarding Process
Even qualified staff members need guidance to be excellent kennel managers. Plan out a detailed onboarding process where you’ll teach new staff how your facility operates, walk through everything they’ll need to do for their role, and give them firsthand experience and feedback.
Some of the topics and activities you’ll need to include in onboarding are:
- A tour of your facility, including any storage areas that hold extra supplies. You can also take this time to introduce them to other staff members.
- An overview of the tasks and responsibilities the staff member will need to perform. Consider having an existing employee walk through a day in their life.
- Extensive instruction and training for each staff member’s daily tasks. Have them practice these tasks with a manager or other leader to correct any inconsistencies.
- An overview of your emergency response plan for situations like storms, fires, chemical spills, accidents, and escapes.
- Specific instructions for health and hygiene practices to ensure each staff member is cleaning effectively. For example, walk through how to sanitize kennels versus just wiping them down.
- A demo of your technology so staff can manage things like books, check-in/out, pet report cards, and more.
Staff will likely have questions throughout this process, so make sure whoever is leading onboarding is equipped to answer them. Additionally, you can use the onboarding period to feel out how the new employee meshes with the rest of your team and gauge their animal handling skills.
Necessary Supplies
You’ll need quite a bit of supplies to effectively manage the animals in your care. While you can always encourage owners to bring their pets’ food, blankets, beds, and toys to make them feel at home, you’ll still need to be prepared to provide everything pets need.
To ensure you can deliver the best care possible, always keep these items in stock:
- Food and treats for each species you care for
- Plenty of clean water
- Bowls for food and water
- Blankets and towels
- Bedding
- Litter boxes, litter, scoops, and bags for animal waste
- Pet toys, ideally ones you can easily sanitize (e.g., plastic balls or frisbees)
- Accessories like leashes, harnesses, and collars for various breeds
- Pools, sprinklers, tunnels, hurdles, and other outdoor toys
- Cages
- Medical supplies such as bandages, gloves, and antiseptic
- Training supplies, like clickers and target sticks
- Security equipment (e.g., locks, baby gates, cameras, etc.)
These items should help you provide quality care to most animals, but you may need more specialized equipment, medications, and enclosures for certain pets. For example, diabetic or asthmatic cats and dogs typically need to receive daily injections or treatments to manage symptoms. During intake, make sure to ask clients to relay any special conditions like illnesses, allergies, or disabilities and provide the supplies needed to care for their pet.
A Screening Process
You’ve taken the time to carefully screen any new hires, but what about your fluffy, feathered, or scaly clients? Screening potential boarders can help you rule out or make special accommodations for pets with behavioral or health issues. This can greatly reduce the risk of injury and spread of diseases.
When screening potential pets, consider:
- Their behaviors. Watch for red flags like growling, snapping, and excessive dominance. For example, some dogs may exhibit resource guarding and possession aggression with toys and food. On the flip side, extremely anxious and fearful dogs that pant, hide, or tremble may not adjust well to a daycare environment.
- Their health. Pets should be up-to-date on all required vaccines and be spayed or neutered to prevent aggressive and roaming behaviors. They should be free of any open wounds or signs of illness like cough, sneezing, lethargy, etc. Check for any visible signs of parasites like fleas or worms as well.
- Their unique needs and preferences. Ask about any special diet, medications, physical limitations, or behavioral triggers the animal has. Additionally, watch for how the pet acts in group settings and consider any special accommodations you’ll need to make. For example, more shy dogs might prefer to be cared for by the same staff member each day so they can build a relationship.
It can be difficult and awkward to turn a dog away, but this decision is usually in the best interest of your business and other boarders’ safety. To minimize the negative impact of rejecting an animal, try to communicate with the potential client as early as possible, be honest about why you can’t accept their pet, and offer alternative solutions. For example, you could refer them to a trusted home sitter if their dog becomes reactive in group settings.
Fun Activities
In addition to providing food, water, and shelter for your animals, you’ll need to offer them fun and enriching activities! Ideally, these activities should keep animals from getting bored, encourage them to socialize and exercise, and even teach them something new. Our list of dog daycare ideas covers some of the top options—check it out to find the ones that work for your business and the animals you care for.
Remember that safety should always come first with these activities. Prepare for them well in advance and never attempt an activity without the proper equipment and enough staff members to supervise. It’s also best to communicate with owners ahead of time about what activities you have planned. This not only gives them a chance to approve things like snacks but also encourages them to get involved in their dog’s care, even when they’re away for work, school, or vacation.
Gingr’s Specialized Kennel Management Software
It’s obvious that there are many components to thorough, organized kennel management. So, how do you juggle it all while managing other business needs?
The answer is high-quality software that’s designed specifically for pet businesses. At Gingr, we offer targeted solutions for dog boarding facilities to make kennel management, reservation management, and staff scheduling a breeze. With Gingr, enjoy features like:
- Online, self-serve booking for customers to make service scheduling simple
- Automated pricing that considers early check-in, late pick-up, weight, and age
- A lodging calendar with drag-and-drop functionality to manage kennel occupancy
- Built-in digital agreements
- Pet report cards that give pet parents a fun snapshot of their animal’s behavior as well as a pet parent mobile app
- Automatic immunization reminders to keep everyone happy and healthy
- A comprehensive dashboard that stores everything about pets and their parents, from vaccinations to photos, in one place
- Gingr PreCheck, a tool that allows pet parents to skip the check-in desk by registering in advance online
- Employee management tools to handle scheduling, time-tracking, and daily checklists
Want to see how these tools could benefit your business and streamline everyday tasks? Book a demo with our team today to see what Gingr can do!
Additional Resources
Successful kennel management doesn’t just keep your animals safe and your business organized—it will help you build a reputation as a competent, trustworthy steward of four-legged friends. Choosing software like Gingr takes the burden of bookings, capacity management, and pricing off your plate while streamlining tasks like vaccination reminders and client communications. To learn more, book a demo to see our software in action.
If you’re looking for more resources for your pet business, check out some of the other resources from our blog:
- Powerful and Efficient Pet Business Software by Gingr. Want to learn more about what Gingr can offer your pet business? Read on to explore the features and benefits.
- Safe Swimming Practices for Dogs. Swimming is a great way to entertain your pups, especially in the summer heat. See how to do it safely in this quick guide.
- Worldwide Trends in Dog Training and Behavior. Provide enrichment for your pups and impress their owners by teaching them these trending tricks.
