“The USA wins the gold! The USA wins the gold! The USA wins the gold!” Those words rang across the grooming world as, once again, GroomTeam USA won first place in the World Team Grooming Championships in Barcelona, Spain, this past October.
My last two columns covered comments from both sides of the grooming table: the judge’s side and competitor’s side. There was a lot of good banter, and I’m sure there was some eye-opening all around. Thanks to everybody who sent me their comments. I would like to revisit those columns with a little more feedback that did not make it into the first two versions.
Industry Forefathers
Recently, someone referred to me as an “industry old timer.” I wonder when, and how, I had become an “old timer.” Silly as it sounds, I still feel like a newbie in some areas. My first certification was back sometime in the early 1980’s
Pet groomers work so hard year round and these long days are just compounded by the busy holiday season. Dogs you only see once or twice a year mysteriously reappear this time of year and their owners, with a straight face, insist on a prime-time appointment.
What happened to the year? It seems like just yesterday that we were all wondering if the country was ever going to be released from the grip of that never ending winter. I walked into Costco the other day and saw Christmas decorations! (Mind you, I am writing this column in early September!)
“Please don’t make him look like a Poodle.” This is a line that just about every …
A few issues ago, I devoted this column to the subject of the history of the professional grooming industry. Shirlee Kalstone and I have collectively wondered why no one has ever attempted to document how far the art of grooming has advanced in the past few decades from their modest beginnings. Shirlee recalls years ago in the mid-1970’s, while at the All-American Grooming Show in Chicago, that she was shocked to read a blurb in one of the Chicago papers that in the scheme of things “dog groomers were placed slightly above garbage collectors” who were on the bottom of their list.
There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that social media has carved out a place in our modern day lives. It keeps us in touch with our friends, family, our businesses, and the industry. Facebook, Twitter, and other social media sites (including message boards) have become extremely useful tools in the grooming industry with pages devoted to grooming critiques,