431: Counting the Costs with Jill Jaffe
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How much does it cost you to walk a dog or stay overnight in a client's home? While we typically consider expenses such as gas, insurance, and experience, what else should we include? Jill Jaffe, owner of "Fur Paws' Sake," joins the show to discuss why she's so passionate about offering "almost overnights" instead of actual overnights to her clients. Jill draws on the lessons she learned from her spirited little pup, Lily, emphasizing that running a business involves more than just financial costs.
Main topcs
From freakout to freedom
Stopped overnights
Understanding the costs
Giving alternative options
Main takeaway: Don’t let clients or your business dictate what you should sacrifice in your own life.
About our guest:
Since childhood, Jill Jaffe has had a deep passion for animals and a strong desire to provide them with professional care. Despite her career as an executive administrative assistant in the entertainment and financial banking industries, fate led her to follow her true calling.
Before her corporate journey, Jill eagerly immersed herself in animal care while in college. She began pet sitting for neighbors and referrals, gaining extensive experience with a variety of domesticated pets and even helping rehabilitate wildlife. Her volunteer work at the Los Angeles Wildlife Waystation in the Los Angeles Mountains included caring for orphaned baby raccoons, opossums, squirrels, crows, turkey vultures, sparrows, and finches. During her time at Moorpark College from 1992 to 1994, she studied diverse courses within the Exotic Animal Training and Management (EATM) program, focusing on exotic animal behavior and diversity, particularly big cats and primates at the school’s zoo.
After facing two corporate layoffs, Jill decided it was time for a change. In the summer of 2013, she founded Fur Paws Sake Pet Sitting and Dog Walking. She quickly acquired CPR and Pet First Aid training, joined the Pet Sitters International Association, and secured business liability coverage and bonding. These measures assured her clients that their beloved pets would always be in capable hands. Starting from scratch, Jill built her client base through social media, a website for online visibility, and traditional networking efforts to spread the word about her exceptional pet care services. She cherishes the opportunity to earn the trust of every pet owner and takes great pride in delivering top-notch service in the pet sitting and dog walking industry.
With over 30 years of experience, Jill has been responsible for a wide range of animals, serving friends, extended family, neighbors, and referrals. Her responsibilities include daily feedings, administering medication, potty breaks, cleaning small pet enclosures, watering plants, conducting routine home security checks, and providing companionship to pets. Pet owners consistently appreciate her meticulous attention to detail and unwavering dedication, knowing that their non-human companions are in good hands and their homes are well-maintained upon their return.
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
clients, pet, dog, overnights, pet sitters, visits, schedule, hours, call, work, cost, sleep, offer, long, animals, started, good, service, business, sitter
SPEAKERS
Collin, Jill J.
Collin 00:02
Welcome to petsitter. confessional today we're brought to you by time to patch and the National Association of Professional pet sitters. How much does a dog walk cost you to do? How much does it cost you to stay overnight in somebody's home? These are things that as businesses, we have to fully understand to make sure that we can run a successful business and, and be here tomorrow, and the next day, and then next year, and then the year after that. But do we fully understand what it means to cost us and that's the conversation we're super excited to have with Jill Jaffe, owner of for paws sake. In honor of Lily. Let's get started.
Jill J. 00:41
My name is Jill Jaffe. I'm based out of Dallas, Texas, however, I'm originally from LA County, born and raised, moved out here back in 2005. And I've been here ever since. And I own and operate my own pet Sinan company, including dog walking for paws a pet sitting. And yeah, started about Gosh, actually 10 years ago this month, I used to work at a the largest banking and mortgage firm in the country. And actually, I survived one layoff. I was laid off and then rehired by the same company. And the second time around. They asked me and the other people in my in my group to work from home. So we started working from home, this was the beginning of I think 2012. And in the midst of that my best friend who owns a company in Los Angeles, and she's been doing this now 13 years, she kind of started pressing me to pets it. And I told her I just couldn't leave my job, you know, because I have benefits. Well difficult to you know, get benefits when you're working for yourself. So. So yeah, so, you know, she planted the seed in my head. And so I put an ad up on Craigslist. And I got my first dog walking client three times a week for a nurse. And so I would do that during my lunch hour, my my hours with my full time job was pretty flexible. As long as I did my full day's work, it wasn't that big of a deal. So my hour lunch became like an hour and a half, maybe including the triking. But I would work later in the day and my my record job. And then it kind of escalated, I started getting a few more inquiries. So it was it was becoming a little bit more difficult to just stay within that hour, hour and a half. So try to do walks before my regular hours at work. And and then after. And then about three months into working from home. I started hearing rumors within the company that there were going to be layoffs again. And I had the sick feeling in my stomach. And sure enough, I got the call from my manager. And and I was let go. And you mean had a nice severance package. I wasn't upset. So I packed up all my stuff. That day that I got my call. I sent it back to the main office. And I sat down on my chair and had a little freakout moment. And I said, You know what, I think I'm going to do this. I'm going to start petsitting. And so that's what happened. I just kept putting ads up on Craigslist, you know, because they kind of drop off after maybe a week or two. So I had to keep reposting them. And I would get more inquiries. And then I said to myself, why not just build a website? So I did, I built one of those basic websites through I think it was Weebly. And oh, my goodness, it just exploded. I was getting a lot of calls. Not always in my area. But the thing is back then, you know, we all do this, when we start pet sitting is that we want to take on every client that comes away. And that's what I was doing. I was going 1015 20 miles away, which here in Dallas can be a little strenuous with the traffic. Yeah, so yeah, so and especially with the explosion of of people coming in from other states to move here. It was becoming a little bit harder to get to my clients on time. So I had to shrink down my area. But yeah, so that's how I started petsitting. You know, I was working for another company got laid off and decided I I could work for myself. And it took probably a good six months to really see kind of like, you know, a steady enough income where I can actually pay my rent without worrying or, you know, completely using up my severance package. I mean, at that point, probably six months, and I did but I wasn't stressing as much.
Collin 04:50
Take us back to that moment where you said you had that little freakout period in your living room. I mean, how are you processing that?
Jill J. 04:58
Yeah, I mean, I really freaked out for, for quite a while actually. I mean, as I was packing up my stuff, because but I also felt this sense of relief, because I knew it was coming, I just didn't know when. And because I already had this mindset, like, at some point I'm gonna get laid off, because it's happened before three years before I was laid off, because there was another merger, you know, with a smaller company being taken over by the bigger one, you know, I felt like, if I don't make this transition now, then I'm gonna have to work for somebody else again, and I didn't want to, I was done, actually, you know, having a boss. So I, it probably took about an hour before I settled down and took my dogs for a walk. And then came back and going, Okay, I need to write some little plan out for myself, you know, I called my mother and told her what happened. And she was a little worried about me. And I said, Don't worry, I got this covered, you know, I'll make it work. You know, it's just, I Oh, here was the thing that said, I had to learn how to price. You know, my rates. And the thing is, like we all well many of us do this is that we all, you know, find out what other pet sitters are charging in our areas, and based off of that, and that's kind of what I did. But I also did what my best friend was doing the prices in LA at the time were actually about the same here in Dallas. So I kind of worked off of her model, just because I didn't know and she was three years into this. But I didn't like exactly how she she had her set up. So I made some tweaks, tweaks, tweaks to this. But yeah, so you know, it didn't take long to recover from getting that phone call from my manager that I was being laid off. You know, I mean, he was very sweet about it. And I think they helped calm me down. And yeah, I just move
Collin 06:45
forward. Well, it sounds like kind of already having this side thing in the works helped a lot with that transition for you to know, at least there was, well, maybe I can try this and move forward. But there's all those other thoughts that come in that and but it sounds like you are also pretty resolute of okay, not again, I don't want I don't want to go through that again. So I'm going to make some changes for me personally. And that's a, that's a, that's an interesting place. I think a lot of us reach, especially whenever we're just starting of yes, there's the I want to be with pets, I want to help people. But there's also this personal drive of what am I getting out of this, right, there is a particular freedom that comes from this that a lot of us are seeking after when we make this decision to go in into business for ourselves.
Jill J. 07:30
Absolutely. And the thing is, is that for, you know, 20 plus years, I was always working for somebody else on their hours on their schedule, and their demands. Whereas here I can work off of what's going to make me comfortable and the clients comfortable. And their pets, their pets are my number one priority. So in order to make sure that everyone's happy, I have to make sure that I can do things under how I want to structure it. Of course, you know, bending a little bit with what the client needs. But ultimately, this is this is going to be for my benefit. Because if I'm not happy, then no one's going to be happy.
Collin 08:13
Right? Right. And that is the interesting driving force behind a lot of our schedules. You know, many of us say, oh, I want to, I want to go into this for the flexibility and the freedom and then we find ourselves with no flexibility and no freedom because of what we take on. So how have How have you managed to keep those boundaries up. Because in this, it's so easy to suddenly just have 6am to 10pm, seven days a week for year after year after year doing this kind of work.
Jill J. 08:41
And I did that, and I still do at times don't get me wrong, I still. But I do it for certain clients. So you know, again, when I was mentioning before that when we started out pet sitting were ticking on any and everybody in it didn't matter where because we didn't understand how difficult it would be to drive, you know, the driving is a huge factor on a daily basis of of where our time goes. You know, I mean, I don't I don't work on numbers, specifically in this case. But the point being is that, you know, you're you're easily driving 40 to 60 miles a day, on a busy day when you have 10 plus 15 visits a day, you know, and that that was the case from case for me over July 4 weekend, and I mapped everything out. And I couldn't believe I was like, I don't want to go through this again. I'll do it on occasion, but I can't do this, you know, four or 567 days straight. It just is too exhausting. But yeah, so you know, I was offering everything drop ins dog walking and overnight visits. I thought overnight visitors were like, Oh man, I'll be staying in you know, wonderful homes with the most well behaved pets. And you know, the clients tell me that I can make myself at home and eat their food so I don't have to worry about bringing dinner over. You know use use this thought that, you know, the pool, which I don't ever do, right? That's a whole other thing is my brothers instilled it since we were children never to swim alone. So, anyway, so that I never did. But, yeah, so you know, you think that you haven't made that, you know, working 1012 hours, it's not such a big deal because you get to be with animals all day long. And over time, it's, it becomes very exhausting. And, and I cringe every single time I see newer pet sitters, saying I love doing overnights I, you know, I get to be with animals all day. I'm like, but do you realize that your your lack of sleep is going to hinder your performance on a daily basis if you continue to do this? You know, two weeks, I saw someone comment that they were doing 64 Straight overnights, I couldn't believe it. I was shocked. I'm like, How are you sleeping? But then again, everyone's lifestyle is different. You know, I at the time, when I started testing, I had three dogs and one cat and they were they, they didn't have the needs that they do now. Because they were younger, you know, and, and I wasn't in tune with, you know, a schedule. So if they had an accent in the house, it wasn't a big deal for me and their pee pads. You know, it wasn't that worrisome for me. But now with the health issues that my pets have. I'm a lot more concerned, you know, and I'm getting older, you know, I'm asleep. Well, you know, I need my own bed. And even with my own bed, I don't always sleep well, because one of the animals will wake me up, you know? Yeah, so doing these long shifts. I don't advise and and of course, the next step for any pet sitter, which I've done in the past, and we'll be doing again, in the future, if you want to maintain having these full schedules is to hire you know, and it's it can be quite difficult to find people that will truly understand what's all involved you know, it's not just staying with the animal it's all that driving
Collin 12:04
now you mentioned that you you talk about your your services there so you don't currently offer overnights Is that correct?
Jill J. 12:11
I don't I have one client who has requested them and I will do it for her because I've been walking her dog for like eight years. So she's she would be the only one. But no, I it because I know him so well. And I actually take my own dogs with me when I go walk and five days a week when the weather is cooler. So he knows the dogs and my dogs know him. So it's all good. And she's she's okay with it. But ya know, I don't offer overnights anymore.
Collin 12:40
When Megan and I first started that was almost what we did exclusively was was overnight care. And I mean, it was it was just chaos we we took the city we were living in was actually Lubbock, Texas at the time, she took the west side, I took the east side, and we just kind of rotated through visits. And there was a month or two that we didn't really even see each other and we didn't sleep in our same bed. Like we didn't even go back to our apartment all that much. And it was it was it was exhausting. It was exhausting. And the problem was is that it was exhausting. But there was work to be done. And so you get caught in this, this kind of this mindset of well, I guess this is just what this is right? And there's so much work that I'll always be busy and being busy is good. So I should just keep taking these on. So I'm always busy because that's good. And this loop continues. And until you take that step back and go, but what where's my agency in this? What do I actually want to be doing and how do I want to live? Because again, we get into this business to have that flexibility and then we end up going 64 overnights back.
Jill J. 13:47
I think my longest slew of overnights was between two clients, lovely clients, great animals was 17 days and it was over my birthday and I was so upset that I couldn't even celebrate my own birthday. Because my birthday is on on July 3. So you can imagine it's always busy. Yeah, because people are going out of town. Right? And I before I started pet sitting I never worked on my birthday. I always took it off and ever since I began petsitting I've been working so you know there's this rewards of it being you know, of working and you know, the income coming in, but to what cost? That's the thing is what's going to be the cost to you. You know to survive in this industry. You know how many hours do you want to put in so that was one of the reasons why I decided well, there is a main reason why I stopped offering overnights but switching over to almost overnight switching has been a blessing. It really has.
Collin 14:49
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14:54
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Collin 15:14
If you're looking for new pet saying software, give time to pet a try, listeners of our show could save 50% off your first three months by visiting time to vet.com/confessional. Walk us through that decision to finally cut out overnights for you kind of what was the final nail in the coffin? And then I really want to know like, how did you start communicating that to existing clients.
Jill J. 15:37
So my dog Lily, will who many of the people in the pet sitter groups are aware of because I talk about all the time she hurt. She's not a well bred poodle. And thankfully, I you know, someone gave her to me for free. So I didn't I didn't pay for her. But she has been literally the most expensive dog I've ever had in my life. She has a condition, it's a genetic disease called intervertebral disc disease or IVDD. And it doesn't show up right away. And there could be nothing that has happened. And it will just show up or something as easy as tripping over the dog bed. That will it basically it's the herniated disc or calcification along with the spine, which can cause a dog to become paralyzed if it's not caught on quick enough. Thankfully, her first episode happened in 2016. And the vet, the vet didn't give me the severity. Like I'd never even heard of what this was. And so she recovered. And I continue to allow her to jump on and off the bed on off the couch and going down the stairs. She couldn't she couldn't go up the stairs, but I would let her go down the stairs will happen again, a few days before I was set to do a week long visit a set of overnight visits at a client's home over Christmas. And this is like the worst time and it's just as bad as Thanksgiving. Because, you know, doctors take time off work, you know, for the holidays veterinarians do. Right. And so my normal vet was open but all he could do is prescribe a couple medications to her but she was not getting better. It was to the point where she was dragging her back legs, that's horrible. And you have to catch us within 24 hours to do something drastic. Unfortunately, you know, I have a good work ethic, I don't cancel on my clients. You know, they have already gone on their trip. And the thing I had to do was leave her at home alone. Um, she couldn't move. So unfortunately, she was having accidents where she was sitting. And I'll come back and you know, the following morning and take care of her. And it was awful for me because I felt guilty for leaving my own animal in pain at home where the medication was working. And I couldn't take her to an ER because they couldn't do anything. She needed a neurologist and the neurologist was not open until December 26. So as soon as December 26 came about, I rushed over there with a referral from my vet, I had to beg them to give me the referral, which was not good. And they took a ride in. Um, thankfully she hadn't really eaten yet so they can put her under for MRI, they found that she was at stage two IVDD and asked me if I wanted to put her to have ever go into surgery. I said, Do whatever you can, I'll write whatever check, I don't care. And once they took her in, and I got the call that that she she did very well under surgery. She was you know, sleeping. And I felt a sense of relief. Like it just washed over me. Because as you can imagine that you know, you've seen an animal in pain or your child in pain, you are out of control you you can't stop it. I wake up every night at my parents house in the middle of the night and realize that my dog was in pain and I couldn't help her and I would just cry myself back to sleep and that was it. That was my that was the aha moment for me. I'm done with overnights. So I still did them occasionally for like three or four clients who've been using me but they allowed me to bring her over when she finally recovered. She did she made a full recovery. She's still kind of we call this in the IVDD community, the drunken walk or WADL. Yeah, she still hasn't drunk and walked. A couple of my clients said you know you could bring her over, it's totally fine. But outside of that, and those clients actually hadn't moved away since since the pandemic, you know of a lot of people have sold their house and moved out or moved here. And so before that happened in, I think it was just before New Years after she got home. Actually, I'll take that back. It was after New Year's. She got back January 5, she got home. One of my clients who I used to do overnights for has a Rhodesian Ridgeback and asked me if I could do overnights. And I asked her I said, Would it be possible we can try a two hour evening visit? Let's just see how it goes with with your dog. And and if it doesn't work out, then I'll do an overnight for you know, I think was like four or five days. She said, Okay, let's try that. And that's first started. So we we did a two hour evening visit, I came like probably like 738 o'clock and stay for two hours to dog in bed and came back the next morning to do an hour morning visit and all was well no accidents, the dog was happy to see me totally relaxed. And it came back into the middle of the day to do the potty break. And I was like, You know what this could work. This could really work. But I was stuck on what to call it. You know? So for a long period of time, I was calling it extended evening. City and I don't even remember what it's called. And now I'm like, you know this just call this something like almost overnight. I went into one of the groups and asked them and they're like, Oh, well, it's not overnight, so you can't call it that it's not the same and you know how you get backlash? What do you want to try something new? Yeah, I was like now I'm kind of stuck on this. I'll call it extended evening of that sort. It was extended evening visits officially on my website. But on precise Petcare I and I tell my clients are called almost overnights and they're two hours and you get three different packages you can choose from, see that the two hour evening. And arrival can be anytime between 630 and 8:30pm. And I'll stay for the two full hours. Sometimes I stay three just because I'm really relaxed and then watching TV with the dogs when they're sleeping on me. Just you know, it all depends, depends on my energy level. And then I come back in the morning anytime between 730 and 9:30am. I really try not to push it to 930 obviously but it because I stay later, I can make sure to take them out for that last potty break. And so they're they're pretty good about holding if I come at eight o'clock in the morning, and and then they can choose a 3045 or 60 minute morning visit and a midday visit. And my packages only include the two hour evening and whichever time to visit in the morning they want the middle of the day visit is separate. And the reason why I did that is because some clients have dog doors and so they don't need or want that middle of the day visit. And what's great about the two hour evening visits if I come a little bit earlier, I can feed them their dinner. Whereas with overnights a lot of the times many I'll say seasoned professional pets that are start between eight and 10pm which we don't we don't want to feed those dogs so late at night. You know we try not to a lot of clients choose the you know doing to drop in visits one late morning or at least my clients did when I was doing overnights they would want to late morning like 11 you know for 30 minutes and then come back in between four and six or two at dinner visit so that way they stay on track but with almost overnight you can really do basically the same thing without having to go was a second time in the middle of the day just to feed them dinner. But that's not always the case. So I have been known to do two back to back almost overnights which I don't always recommend. It can be a little exhausting. But so that would that would make me have to push that middle of the day visit closer to like four ish. And then I'll just give him the dinner then which works out it's just it really is dependent on how old the dog is, you know? And if there's any medications involved, obviously that's going to change things. But yeah, my clients love this. I haven't had pushback and you know when I have had new increase of clients wanting overnights I just let them know I'm not available to do so at this time. I don't have staff to do it at this time. Would you like to try this alternative and see how it goes? And I've had clients do it like how no joke here I just had a client texted me asking me for Labor Day weekend. I just saw the blurb come up. Oh no and I just did. I just did 10 days Two weeks ago of almost overnights and she was she's a new client. I've had her since last year and consistently she's been doing almost overnights every time So and it works out well. So I love doing it. Yeah, it's great. This is why I push it so hard with everybody who's complaining about sleeping at client's homes.
Collin 25:10
You started off there till I mean, I think and I hope people listeners really heard your about the cost that the overnights cost you, right? Do you really count it? And you felt that cost of when Lily was going through that? And yeah, we talked about oh, no, your numbers know the cost to conduct a service and many times it's, how many miles? Is it away? What's the reimbursement rate for mileage? How much is your time worth? What are you expending? What was the training to go get? And how was his insurance being covered with that, that's one aspect of this. The whole other aspect of cost to you is opportunity, cost and peace of mind cost? What is doing something costing you the ability to do other things that you may want to like going into your birthday, or the peace of mind of knowing that there are problems out there that you can't solve, because you're locked away doing this one thing, like those, there's no price that you can put on those. And then obviously, there's the sleeping aspect of it to very much value my sleep and I get it, it's so poor these days. Anyway, I took a lot of risk, it doesn't really help but but when we say no the cost, like what does this cost you, you have to consider those and it's okay to go you know what, it is too costly to my peace of mind to do this thing, regardless of whether it's overnights or whatever it is, the client is asking of you. Your peace of mind and your well being come before the financial aspects of conducting the actual service. And, and to really make sure that we understand that with anything that we're doing in our business, if it costs us too much peace of mind, if it costs us in our health and our well being whether that's spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, whatever that is, if it's costing us too much, we're we're not the person we want to be. No services worth it. And it's okay to say no.
Jill J. 27:02
Amen. That pressure that that pressure from it's not it's not necessarily clients, because clients will accept most of the time what services you will and will not do. It's actually pet sitters, you know, I mean, point blank, I just said this a couple minutes ago, I push almost overnight in the groups, and I do that when I see people complaining that their time is so limited, and they're not able to sleep well. Or the or the pets are unruly, or their, you know, clients are not forthcoming about how much work is really involved with the pets that they have, like, you know, doggy dementia, you know, they hit up all night, and they pace and they how I've done this, they pace it and they howl and they have accidents everywhere that you step in, because you don't know, or the medication that should have been given that clients don't tell you about which could prevent the anxiety that these dogs unfortunate are suffering from. I've kind of went through this and my poor part time siddur oh my goodness, he went through this and I wasn't even aware. So when I talk about offering this type of service, in lieu of overnights, I wish the sitters in newer ones wouldn't feel so offended by offering the alternative to better your own life. That's what it comes down to it if your life is not in a good place, if you're constantly waking up tired and achy, and you're feel frustrated, because you can't be with your own animals who are aging, or your or your significant other because you're not home at night. But because you've committed to a client because you want to appease them, then you need to reevaluate, and it shouldn't have taken my dog going down with a paralyzing disease to offer something else they shouldn't have. But that's what it came down to. That was a catalyst because if it didn't happen, I would still be doing overnights to this day.
Collin 29:12
Yeah, well, because it's not a problem until it is a problem. And many times then we're too late. We hit this we get this feeling of well, I've already invested so much. This is the only thing that my clients like there's no way that goes. So I must I just have to trudge through that sunk cost fallacy of well, this I'm already this far into it. I might as well keep going. And especially whenever we we think well we we are at the beck and call of our clients and that we must do whatever they ask of us. And a lot of that time that's because sometimes it's our personality. Sometimes it's because we are desperate for the business. It could be any number of reasons. But when you put to not be afraid to just have a little bit of pushback and say oh, hey, I know you're asking for overnights, let me tell you of how I can help and presenting something As a different option, and then leaving it up to them to decide, but then we have to be okay with the decision that they make. And knowing, hey, at my peace of mind my sleeps not worth this client, at the end of the day, it's just not worth it and being okay with that, when, Joe, when you when you talk to people about almost overnight do they do the clients? Do they kind of get it pretty quickly and see the value? Or do you kind of have to walk them through why it's okay for somebody not to be there the full time overnight.
Jill J. 30:31
So I have a screening process on my website, it's a form for the clients to fill out. And if they make any notation that their dog has a medical condition which causes them to go get up in the middle of the night to let them out, then I'm not going to be the sitter for them. So I wouldn't even offer alternative overnights almost overnight to them, because it wouldn't suit their pet. If it's anxiety. That's another one who say the it sounds to me that you probably do need someone to be there all night. Yeah, and I'll tell them, I'd say unfortunately, you know, I don't think I'm going to be the right sitter for you. Because it sounds to me that what your pet needs is something that it's just not something that can offer, it's not gonna be conducive to their lifestyle, you know, and I don't want you to feel frustrated that, you know, coming in every morning, and there's a lot of accidents that are that are, that wouldn't have happened if the pet sitter was there all night. So you know, I now refer them out I network with a lot of pet sitters all over the DFW of Dallas. And and we'll pass clients on to each other if we feel that we can't service them because they're out of our area and number one, or if it's a service that we don't offer. And it's okay, I've come to the realization that I'm not going to be the right fit for everybody. And clients may not be the right fit for me only because of the services I offer or don't offer. And I'm okay with it. I wasn't before, I used to get very bothered when a client would tell me Well, your rates are a little bit, you know, out of our budget or or, you know, I I need you to stay longer, or whatever it is. And you know, it's like that I want to people please, and I, I'm at the age now it's like I need to try to please myself first to take care of my needs. And my pets before I can if people tell you this time again, if you don't take care of yourself, how are you going to take care of others? Right? And unfortunately, it's taken me seven, eight years to figure that out into the business. That's okay. It's totally okay, I just want to present it to other pet sitters that may be listening, that you don't have to be tied down. Just because this is what the client wants, it's really going to be depend on what the pets really need. Look at it that way. What did the pets need first? Before the client just assumes that this is what they need? You know, because we all do this, we all walk into a client's home. And I do this I scan the entire home going How do I need a puppy proof this house? You know, I know I need to block things off. So the dog doesn't go into the cat litter box? Because my dogs do this is why my litter boxes are upstairs. You know, you know so you assess things for scoring. Okay, you know what it looks to be that most likely your your dog is probably going to need something that I can offer. And that's okay. Let me refer you out. I'm happy to help you. I don't want to leave them hanging, you know, and they're so appreciative that they don't want to be left behind, you know, if I'm calling in for services, and they're like, well, we can't help you like, Well, can you refer out? No, okay, well, that's that's not how I want to be. I've always worked prior to being a pet sitter, I've worked in the customer service industry and some format, I was always told, help them out, even if you personally can't help them, guide them into a direction that will help them because they'll remember that. So and I get a lot of responses from those that I do have to decline. Thank you so much for providing this link to so and so that's the Oh my God, you've been a lifesaver. They it. It makes me feel good knowing that, even if I can't service them, at least I've helped them in some fashion.
Collin 34:22
You had that phrase there of don't start with what the client wants. Start with what the pet needs. That I think that's incredibly powerful. Because while we are in a service industry, and I've said it time and time again that no point over the last 11 years has a dog ever reached into their pocket to pay me after a visit. It's always a client right so we client's needs are important. But when we are looking at how our services can best fit them and solve their problem, we start from the pets and that's where our recommendations come from and that can give us a lot of peace of mind in turning down potential asks when we go know that I can't serve that pet need, or you're asking this, here's what I'm seeing and how I can help meet this specific need that you're mentioning. And redirecting it back to that with the hope and trust that every pet parent that's contacting us wants the best for their pet. They just may be misinformed not understand or have different expectations that they're bringing into it and are kind of needing us to guide them along that decision tree to get them to the point of whether they're going to use you or not. And and that that's okay. But walking along that path is a little bit easier for a lot of us to go okay, pet first, let me focus on them. And then let me talk to the to the owner about those needs and start meshing these wants with the pets needs and having that conversation with them.
Jill J. 35:43
Absolutely. I mean, you couldn't have said it any better. I totally agree.
Collin 35:47
Before we continue, I want to tell you about our friends at the National Association of Professional pet sitters. Naps is the only national nonprofit professional pet sitting association dedicated to raising and abiding by industry standards. NASA provides pet sitters with the tools and resources to own and operate successful pet sitting businesses and they have their in person Pet Sitter conference coming up. It's called the bloom and grow your business and it is March 1 through third 2024 in the beautiful city of Savannah, Georgia. Their goal is to bring together industry leaders with session topics that are ideal focus in on a wide range of subjects to foster learning inspiration and provoke conversation that matters. Registration is still open until February 19 of 2020. Ford, you can get that for $225. For that entire conference, visit the NAPS website at Pet sitters.org for information regarding naps, membership, certification and complete conference details. Now I know one thing that comes to my mind, Jill about dealing with the almost overnights is, I am curious about how scheduling works. Because many of us book our days in 30 minute chunks or maybe 45 minute chunks, we may have an hour here or there where we're at a client when you are booking out to two hours, sometimes three, right? If it's a really good TV show and the dogs really sleeping. Yes. How does How do you schedule that around maybe other petsitting visits that you have in the evenings
Jill J. 37:19
I really try not to overbooked myself and I made that mistake last Labor Day weekend. That's why I was laughing when my client just texted me that she wanted Labor Day weekend again. Because what happened was that it's they're not always, you know, you know, clients say they're not always that proactive and planning ahead. Some of them do. And that's totally fine. Wow, it's crazy. Right? Um, but I'm also saying that these these clients who I adore, I love their dogs and what's crazy that they allow me to bring my puppies over, which helps me tremendously. And I'll get into that with it. The hours that you were talking about is that some clients who do plan ahead and like, oh, great, I got a two hour slot at night for five, five nights. That's great. And then bam, you get in two weeks before Labor Day, here comes another 1.0. Okay, I'm gonna have very late nights. So why do I work those 2am But I really try not to take on any more clients with dogs that do the standard 30 minute drop ins, I may do one more. One. Because I know the routine well enough, I will not take on new clients if I if I see that I've got a really heavy evening schedule, which means I have a very heavy morning schedule. I don't I won't take on more than I can handle because not only do I have to wake up much, much earlier, like 435 o'clock in the morning. I have to take care of my own animals. And it takes me I don't think I mentioned this but I've got six dogs and two cats. Okay. Right, right. Well imagine that the biggest, strongest 15 pounds so the smallest one is four pounds. So they're you know, they don't take up a lot of room but it's a lot of work you know with the feeding arrangements and the Food Prepping and you know all that in them walking them and taking them out in the yard. You know it it takes time. Right so so I have to were didn't years ago. That's the thing when I started my almost overnights, I only have one dog at the time. So now it's a little bit here, right? So it's a little bit more like oh my god, I have another kid I need to wake up earlier. Right? So yeah, scheduling can be a little tricky. I sometimes forget to look at my schedule before I say yes. But then when I look at going okay, that's doable. I can take care of it's not a big deal. But I'll I'll really put a block on my schedule so that when clients try to submit requests in, you know themselves so lot of them will just schedule themselves or try to, which is okay, that's what I want, I may have to decline them, if they're dogs, if the cats who normally want to time today I'll say I only have time for one, and I really would love to do two, but I can only do one. And they're so okay with that, because they know at least their pets are still getting cared for, you know, they don't want to have to go to another pet sitter, and start all over again, building that trust. And that's the biggest thing is the trust factor. So they know I'll make it work, I will make it work. I just won't sleep. But it's only a short time. It's not like it's not like, you know, doing those overnights on top of 14 Drop in visits a day that I used to do that that was in and still going home in the mail that day to take care of my pets. So yeah, not again.
Collin 40:48
Well, I think it's important to note there of going okay, this does take knowing your limits. And it does take saying no to both existing and potential clients or trying to find a new way to adapt them into your schedule and being okay with that. Because I know if you're like me, when Meghan and I see the request from a client that like we've we've been servicing for the last five years or whatever, and it's last minute and we don't have room for them. We feel terrible, right? We feel we just feel awful that you can't do anything or even if you you knew if you tried to offer something, it's not going to work and, and but at the end of the day, it's not our fault, right. But it is our problem, but it's not our fault. But we still feel bad when we can't take those those people on.
Jill J. 41:34
Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's only so many hours in the day, obviously, you know, if we could literally just take out driving, we would be able to fit probably five more visits in right. Oh,
Collin 41:45
I know. Teleport I
Jill J. 41:46
mean, seriously, we would never have to worry about oh my god, I gotta get there in 15 minutes. And there's a there's an accident. Oh, my God, I have to go around, it's gonna take me another 20 minutes. You know that, you know, it's gonna happen, right? Yep. And clients don't think of that. That's the other thing is that when they start saying, Well, you know, why don't you come here at 305? It's like, well, you know, it's rush hour right now. And there's an accident. So, but they they generally know, it's like, you know, I've given those large blocks of time, I don't allow them to do those one hour windows, you know, I know some centers that did that. Like, why would you do that to yourself, you know, about but you know, scheduling probably, you know, the, the two hour evening visits with 330 minute drop in visits, and then going back in the morning to do you know, multiple 30 minute visit, it's doable, it's totally doable. You just have to know first of all, how long it's going to take you from one client to another, what's involved with each household. This is why I do extensive screening, very important. And then, and then knowing how many hours that you can allow yourself to take care of your own personal needs. If that's it's just it's a juggling act. That's what it is. And I can only I don't have kids but I can only assume that's going to be what parents go through and I don't envy it
Collin 43:08
that's the other aspect of this too. If when you're looking at the schedule going, okay, maybe technically I could fit in more but then I don't have time for me and I don't have time to go see my my how to take care of my pets or I don't have time to go pick up my kids from school or there's just simple things sometimes Joe where it's like women, what am I fitting time in for for an oil change? Or for a haircut? Or for like, some funny
Jill J. 43:31
I don't mean to cut you out. I gotta tell you this before I forget. So I I thought the 13th was yesterday. So I'm scrambling going I gotta get my earbuds in because I'm thinking that our conversation was speed strict. No, hold on a sec. Err on top of that. I was supposed to go do an oil change and brake fluid thing and so I was planning on taking my laptop to the dealership so we can have the conversation there. And you can cut this out of our interview if you want but I had food poisoning yesterday so I'm like oh my god if I don't get get together by 10 o'clock in the morning I'm not able to do this interview and look at the day going oh my God one day all together. So I spent four hours I didn't go to the dealership. I spent four hours at the dealership. Oh I could have done the interview then I'm like oh it'll be nice and quiet wouldn't have any animals
Collin 44:28
well, next time we'll we'll schedule around your oil change that's what we'll do make sure we get that on your schedule. Okay,
Jill J. 44:33
for my time okay.
Collin 44:37
But yeah, it's you know, going mad. Can you believe it took four hours or you know, however long you were at the dealership to get an oil change and many people are now thinking of trying to find four hours in their day for literally anything else. And going and you know
Jill J. 44:53
how I look at this. That's for drop in visits cuz that's how I look at time. And it's, it's weird. It's really weird. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off go. No, no,
Collin 45:07
it really it really, I mean, that gets exactly to the point of what I was saying of going there. This is again about those costs that we're, we keep coming back to have, I could have a much fuller schedule. But I have no time for the oil change, or to go grocery shopping like who like that's a luxury for a lot of us have, like I've got, I've got 35 minutes, Quick Start the timer. And it was in my report when I'm done with my visit at the grocery store. But it's, it's going like those are important to write and they have to get done. Because if we don't do them, if you don't get your oil changed, your car will not work to run the business that you want to be running. Like, that's just oh my gosh, yes. Right. And so we have to take care of these things. And yes, they're a nuisance, and yes, they eat up time. But that's part of it. But that's a necessity that we have to do.
Jill J. 45:55
Absolutely, yeah. And, you know, speaking of time, so, you know, majority of my visits right now are midday visits, you know, I do have the vacation visits, but I've had a big block of midday visits. And I think myself, if I go home, to let my own dogs out, which are really good. They don't need me to come home, like at one o'clock in the afternoon, because obviously, I'm talking when am I going to get lunch, right? Because my dogs are all over me, they want my attention. So now what I'm having to do is I have to go out to eat, that's the only time I can a lot myself, because it will take me 30 minutes just deal with my own animals, if that is usually an hour, and then to go try to have lunch at home, that's not going to work. So I have to schedule myself 30 minutes just to eat by myself before I take care of my animals and then go right back out for the afternoon and evening visits. Time is precious. And I hope that other sitters that listen to this really think about what how do you want to dedicate your time going forward, if you if you want to dedicate it to 1012 hours sleeping at a client's home, haven't had it, bless you. But I think over time, it does get a little tiresome, you know, just not being at home with with, you know, your own loved ones, whether it's your own pets or your or your family. You know, here's the other thing a lot of us have to, you know, say no to our family events. It's it's that especially around the holidays, right? You know, a lot of us have had to say, now we got to work, you know, we're committed to these jobs, you know, and we don't want to say no to our clients, because one is extremely busy time. So that's good for our business. And financially, it's really good, right? But at what costs, how many years are we going to go through this? I mean, thankfully, there have been times I've had been able to rush over to do a Thanksgiving dinner because I have that block of time, like four hours, which is fantastic. But we can't schedule that every single year unless we say no to clients. And that's okay, if you want to do that. Or if you want to say yes to everybody. You know, that's whatever makes it work for you. But if the end result is that what's most important to you as far as time goes, because you're never going to get it back. Never
Collin 48:19
jail, I really want to thank you for coming on the show today to talk to us about counting those costs and understanding where our priorities lie and how that manifests itself on our schedule. And what we do say yes to, I know that this is something that you've been working on that that you have kind of struggled your way through. And so if people want to reach out, pick your brain on this, or how to structure almost overnights to get some time back in their day, how can people get in touch with you and follow along with your work.
Jill J. 48:50
Um, they can go to my website, I have my phone number, they are free to text me I would prefer texting. Or they can send me an email, though. They can do so through the contact form just in this section where it says leave notes. They can tell me who they are. Or through Facebook. I'm in a lot of groups. And I'm very vocal in them. So yeah, they're they're more than welcome to reach out. I've had many people do so privately, and I appreciate it. And I'm very grateful for the communities that I'm a part of, I mean, without any of them and my best friend, I have to give a shout out to valley pet sitting in LA. Sure when it ski runs it. If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be where I'm at today. So I'm going to give my love to her for that. Yeah. So yeah, I hope that people do reach out. I'd love to talk to them about it. It really will make everything so much better.
Collin 49:46
Right. Well, Joe, I have thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. I really can't thank you enough for taking your valuable time and talking to us about it today. So thank you, thank you so much.
Jill J. 49:55
Thank you for reaching out. I really appreciate it. It was lovely speaking with you today.
Collin 50:00
What does it cost you to do that service? How much does it cost to you to stay overnight in someone's home? This conversation is really brought to us by Lily, who unfortunately, lost a long battle with cancer in September of 2023. She taught Jill a lot of lessons about priorities in life. And she's taught me and I, hopefully you about finding those priorities, and actually making them a priority by dedicating our time and attention to them. That ultimately, is a cost that we all have to take into account. When running our business. Sometimes we can't avoid it, we have to spend time away to put food on the table to pay the bills to keep the lights on, that is a fact. Now how do we balance that out and against with a life that we want to a need to live outside of our business? That is a cost. We want to thank today's sponsor is time to pet and the National Association of Professional pet sitters for making today's show possible. And thank you so so much for listening. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your week and we'll be back again soon.
