00:00:00 Speaker 1: Hello, groomers. You found the groom pod. Welcome to our virtual salon. My name is Suzy and I'm your host. I'm a mobile groomer from Seattle, Washington, and anybody who knows me will tell you I love to talk, especially about my job in. One of my favorite people to talk to is my friend and mentor and the co-star of the show, the curator of ingredients, Miss Barbara Berg.
00:00:35 Speaker 2: Whoo hoo! That would be me. So, Suzy, what have you been up to?
00:00:41 Speaker 1: Oh, I've just been stuck in the house because it's been raining, so I run to that from the house to the trailer, and I work, and then I run from the trailer to the house, and I come home. It's just been miserable and yucky. And these are the darkest days. It's dark at about four twenty and its light at about eight thirty in the morning, so we don't have a lot of daylight. It starts really darkening up, especially if it's raining at about two thirty or three in the afternoon.
00:01:10 Speaker 2: Wow.
00:01:11 Speaker 1: Yeah. Which is why we have so many people with seasonal affective disorder in the northwest. Are these super dark, constant raining days. But, you know, that's what brings our green in the springtime. So welcome to episode four hundred sixty six of The Green Pod, recorded on December seventh, twenty twenty five, in Snohomish, Washington and Greenville, South Carolina. This podcast is brought to you by our kind sponsors. Best shot show season precision sharp grew more and stasko. And if you guys would like to support the show, which we really appreciate because it is expensive to host this show, you can do so at our website. Com and use the donation button to send Barbara some money so that she can do some fun experiments with neat stuff. Or you can join us on Patreon and support the show monthly. This week we're reviewing our Groomer to Groomer December twenty twenty five issue. What's new is brought to you by Groomer Software. Are you a professional groomer looking to spend less time on paperwork and more time with your clients? If you haven't found grew more, you're missing out. Groomer is an all in one software solution built specifically for your grooming business. Whether you run a single mobile unit or manage multiple shops, they've got you covered. Imagine having twenty four hour online booking, simple forms, smart routing for mobile stops, and integrated credit card processing. Plus, it includes automated reminders and seamless integration with Google Calendar and QuickBooks. Everything you need. And the best customer service around. Stop juggling systems, go mobile, go house, call or go to the shop. Grew more handles at all. And because you're a listener of the show, groomer is giving you a free month. Just enter the coupon code Groom Pod twenty two at checkout. Checkout grew more today and simplify your business. Happy anniversary. Happy anniversary. Happy anniversary. Happy anniversary. We're starting our twelfth year.
00:03:10 Speaker 2: Woohoo!
00:03:11 Speaker 1: So impressive that we continue to put out content after twelve years. That's cool. I'm impressed. Here, Pat on the back for us.
00:03:20 Speaker 2: Yep. I'm going to take that. I'll take that pat on the back.
00:03:24 Speaker 1: Pretty cool.
00:03:25 Speaker 2: I know it requires a commitment. We like to make it look easy, but it is a job.
00:03:31 Speaker 1: Yes. And constantly changing. Which is good because it keeps me growing new neural pathways in my brain by having to learn how to do new stuff.
00:03:39 Speaker 2: Oh, you know what? I think that's one of the secrets to my healthy old age, is that I keep learning something every day.
00:03:47 Speaker 1: I agree. I absolutely agree. And you're my model for how to age gracefully. So I'm well, okay, how to fight it with a good bit of verve. Yeah. No, you're my you're my example. So I wanted to ask you a question. Barbara. Okay, we're circling back to funky poodle. Secret sauce. Hair oil stuff.
00:04:10 Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:04:11 Speaker 1: I've been messing around with it and all kinds of different ways. And the thing that I like the most about it is I love the way it smells, right? Usually my regular detangler is status quo oatmeal protein spray that smells like apple. And then I put some extra the max in there. Can I put hair oil in to smell up the max for my extra bottle of non smelling? You know I have the non smelling one, I carry both, I keep the one bottle of a little bit extra conditioning type of a spray and then the bottle of just the max. Could I do that. Could I put the two together. What do you think. Would it give me a little extra conditioning? I know it smells fantastic.
00:04:58 Speaker 2: You want to make the secret sauce into a detangling sauce?
00:05:04 Speaker 1: Yes.
00:05:05 Speaker 2: Just put. Yes, you can do that. So you can try. Now you're going to try. Because here's the thing. Might blow up on you. Well it's not going to blow up, but just might not work because the secret sauce is an oil base and the max is a water base.
00:05:25 Speaker 1: Okay.
00:05:26 Speaker 2: So you might need something like polysorbate twenty or lecithin to be an emulsifier to emulsify the max into the oil system. Water into oil. I can research that for you a little bit, but, uh, yeah, I think that's what's going to happen, is that you would have to just be shaking it up all the time. And that would hurt your hands, you know.
00:05:58 Speaker 1: So I've got a fluorescent bottle, and I filled it with the max with my normal dilution, you know, a little bit of the max and some water. And then I just took a squeeze of the funky hair oil stuff, the funky poodle stuff, and it's a little brown. So it turned the entire mixture brown when I shook it up just slightly, you know, I wouldn't call it brown. I would say ecru. I mean just a little tiny bit of off color. And I sprayed it on the horse's mane right after I shook it because I did. Um, then I set it down and it didn't really separate out, although I could see it was kind of heading in that direction, but it was not separating immediately. So then I brushed her mane out. And unlike when I put too much of it in the very first time I tried it, combining it with the silicone did a great job on her mane, and it's been raining on there. And she lays down and rolls around in all the gunk on the ground. And she has not had a dreadlock since I did that, but I don't want to use it on somebody else's pet unless I make sure that it's an okay thing to do.
00:07:03 Speaker 2: What was your base.
00:07:05 Speaker 1: Water in the max.
00:07:06 Speaker 2: What might work is to take some off the shore season. I'm giggling because we're combining sponsored products all.
00:07:16 Speaker 1: Over the.
00:07:16 Speaker 2: Place.
00:07:18 Speaker 1: All over the place.
00:07:19 Speaker 2: But that's what groomers do. And if you take some show season hypo conditioner, use that as a base and the oil and the max to that and shake it up. The emulsifier in the conditioner may just roll up the oil.
00:07:45 Speaker 1: That makes sense. So I'm excited because today we're going Christmas caroling on horseback, and I stunk her up real good yesterday when I brushed her out. She is. Her mane is so flowing and beautiful. The products that we advertise, I really believe in all of them, and I use them on my horse and I use them on our cats, and I use them on everybody else's pets. But they're really good products. And boy, I can tell, I can tell that I'm using good stuff on her and we're gonna stink up everybody behind us. They're all going to go, what is that smell? And I'm going to say, it's us. We're the air freshener. It's us.
00:08:24 Speaker 2: And you, they actually be freshening the air outside.
00:08:29 Speaker 1: If they don't like it, it's not too much.
00:08:33 Speaker 2: Too bad. I'll have to go to the rear of the pack. Yeah. Okay, well, good luck with that. Let me know I will.
00:08:43 Speaker 1: So my second update. Yeah. Is the shampoos I got from nature's specialty I really like them. I don't want to kick them out of bed, because they include every ingredient that's ever been in the product, in the history of the product, on their label.
00:09:01 Speaker 2: I think that's what they do.
00:09:02 Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's what it seems like when I read the label and I look at it. But I'll tell you what, the Sugar Pop fairy actually has a smell. I must have had a snotty nose that day, and it's delightful and people are commenting on it, so I know that they're noticing, and that's all I want. I just want to do something different for the holidays. So I'm going to give my seal of approval. And I also realized I listened to I was listening to some other podcasters talk about podcasting or actually radio broadcasts. If the hosts agree on everything, it's not fun to listen to. So I've decided I'm going to be a proponent of the Stinky Nature Specialty shampoo so that we can disagree on something because we really don't disagree on very much.
00:09:52 Speaker 2: We don't disagree on very much. But that's that's why we're such good partners. But you know, we do have different fragrance preferences for sure. Like the kind of simple and food related type fragrances and and.
00:10:12 Speaker 1: Okay.
00:10:12 Speaker 2: I'm twelve.
00:10:13 Speaker 1: What can I say.
00:10:14 Speaker 2: Sophisticated perfume fragrances. Well, speaking of fragrance, and I know we're going to get into the issue of groomer to groomer. You know, I once again, every time I, I read the groomer groomer, I get drawn in to the ad for the Pistachio Dream shampoo and all the more so now because I browsing BuzzFeed. BuzzFeed does a lot of, uh, like reviews of different things. And they did a review that had a pistachio body lotion in it that they said was going to sell out, and it was like really hot on. Oh, help me Susie.
00:11:02 Speaker 1: Tick tock, tick tock.
00:11:05 Speaker 2: It was really.
00:11:06 Speaker 1: How did I freaking. Okay, wait a minute. You have to recognize that I pulled that out of the air for you. Good. Thank you. I had no idea where you were going. Thank you. It just came by. Yes. I love it.
00:11:20 Speaker 2: You are such a good partner. I know you can just, like, feed my brain just what the little blank areas need. So. Thank you. Tick tock. This was a a product that was very popular on tick tock, so normally that wouldn't sell me on something. It was noted for its great fragrance. And it's a pistachio have fragrance? So I bought the lotion and. Oh my God.
00:11:51 Speaker 1: Really?
00:11:51 Speaker 2: I love it.
00:11:52 Speaker 1: Mm.
00:11:53 Speaker 2: And I, I use it as a hand lotion a lot. I do it like, on my hands before I go out and people smell it and they say, what is that? And I say, oh, that's my pistachio lotion. It's really good. So I saw that, that ad again to the For the Pistachio Dream shampoo. And I thought, oh, maybe I'll get it this time. Okay. So I went there. It was a big no for me because their ingredients, they're completely descriptive ingredients, contains a surfactant, contains co-surfactant, contains a amphoteric surfactant.
00:12:40 Speaker 1: That's no good.
00:12:41 Speaker 2: You know it just like, describe the whole thing, and not a single identity of, uh, except for the fragrances in the additives at the very end. And I thought, no, I cannot in good conscience buy that. So there it's called Crown, and it's really a, a brand that features long lasting fragrances. And I know that's important to some people.
00:13:14 Speaker 1: Why, yes. Um it is.
00:13:19 Speaker 2: But getting back to the funky poodle, I think having a hair oil, especially a light oil like sunflower oil that just like, immediately absorbs into the hair and doesn't leave it stringy or greasy, uh, if you use the right amount, I, I think having another means of fragrancing. After grooming is valuable. So instead of spraying with a Cologne, you would pour a few drops of the funky poodle secret sauce in your palm, rub them together, and then just rub your hands over the dog and you fragranced your your grooming.
00:14:05 Speaker 1: I have a whole delusion of now calling them up and ordering like ten different fragrances to use for oils, but I know I can't use that much, but I'm definitely going to place an order. So yeah.
00:14:20 Speaker 2: Well. But sometimes you need to please yourself. Yes, because you you having fun while you're grooming is really a part of success model. You know, having fun on the job just makes the biggest difference on your survival.
00:14:44 Speaker 1: So true. It also attracts really good clients. If you're having a good time and it shows and you've got joy in your heart every time you come back, in my case, to the house with the dog, and I tell a story over what happened in the grooming trailer, and it brings great joy to them. And it's it's like addictive. And then then you're dealing with people who are sharing in the joy of what you do because you're doing it with their special person, their special little friend. So very cool. What I think we should do is move into our first appointment where we discuss our reading of the groomer. The groomer?
00:15:23 Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so. Let's go.
00:15:26 Speaker 1: We've been doing this for like three or four months now, so I'm going to look back and see how the listenership is on these episodes and see if people like it or not, because nobody's commented about it. So I'm not sure if they go, oh, it's the groomer, the groomer, and just pass it by. Or if they're listening intently and joining us in our discussion, I'm not sure what's going on. So.
00:15:48 Speaker 2: Oh yeah. Are we just like, masturbating over here or we.
00:15:54 Speaker 1: I'm willing to take a look, a hard look to see if we want to keep doing this.
00:15:59 Speaker 2: We always want listener opinions, even though we might laugh at them, you know, like, yeah. You want you like what we're talking about. Um, although sometimes there are some people for whom it doesn't matter at all. They just want to hear us talk. Okay, so, listen, I, um, I thought this was a very kind of a lightweight issue.
00:16:27 Speaker 1: Okay. Hang on. We have to pay our bills. Okay? We'll get right on to our first appointment after this.
00:16:37 Speaker 2: Hey, groomers, It's time to have some fun with fragrances. Show season will help the holidays happen with their crazy selection of holiday smells. Get several bottles of spray and let your clients choose. Fragrance sprays include Christmas Spice and Merry Cranberry, holiday Hug and Hot buttered rum. Sugar cookie and pumpkin spice come with their own matching shampoos. Pick up a bottle of Sparkle Spray for your party animals and some aromatherapy for your entryway. Show season has you covered. Make show season your holiday headquarters.
00:17:20 Speaker 1: Did you know that Stashko has come out with a couple of new products? First, there's the Stashko Oatmeal Protein Conditioner. This conditioner provides exceptional body and manageability and super shiny finishes, and it has a wonderful apple scent that I love. Great in the recirculator too. And they have a new matching protein conditioning, spray de matting, antistatic conditioning and finishing all in one just like the original spray, but with that delicious apple fragrance. Look for these new products at trade shows and your favorite distributors like Cascade Grooming Supplies. Ready groomers. Here comes our first appointment. All right, it's on to groomer to groomer. The first thing I noticed was and I'm not picking on this person per se, but sometimes you need to stick in your lane, talk about things that you actually have known experience in. And our friend and buddy, doctor Cliff, came in with the dreaded drudgery of the holiday season article, and I don't think I know he's had a vet hospital, but I'm not sure he's ever had a grooming shop. So I'm not sure why he's talking about business stuff. It's it was confusing to me. So what did you I mean, I know we're not huge fans of his, I get it, but I try to go in with an open mind. And the first thing I thought is, why is he writing about this? Did you have an opinion on that?
00:19:02 Speaker 2: I didn't have an opinion on that because I didn't notice who it was written by, but I. I passed it as a man. It just didn't seem to reflect a real groomers experience. Unlike Chris Barrie Anthony's article, you could tell she's been through it.
00:19:28 Speaker 1: Yes.
00:19:29 Speaker 2: She reflected my experience, but the article by doctor Cliff, It just sort of felt like just some kind of a bullshit. Excuse me, but that was it. I, you know, I did. I did like the Measuring Success article by Amanda McGrath.
00:19:52 Speaker 1: Yes.
00:19:54 Speaker 2: I mean, it was about measuring success of holiday add on services.
00:20:00 Speaker 1: Yes.
00:20:01 Speaker 2: Measuring success is important in having a successful business because if you're not keeping track of what's selling, what's working, what services are are in demand, what's a what's a, you know, like you you can't reshape and evolve your business forward. This was a good exercise in doing some measuring of success and I support that article. I thought it was good. I could have used some more examples, but that was okay. It was fairly comprehensive, so I kind of looked up Amanda McGrath because. So I did. So it's like I read the article and then I said, oh, who wrote that? You know. And so I go back and I said, oh, okay. So she said basically a feline groomer and.
00:21:06 Speaker 1: Yep.
00:21:06 Speaker 2: And she has an Etsy business that's called House of bones. I looked for House of bones all over the internet and finally found her on Etsy, where she has some really cute. Bumper or wherever stickers that are, you know, like shed happens. Brush it off. I love that I'm going to get a shed happens brush it off and stick it on my car. You know, because it's a philosophy of life. Kind of a message. I like that.
00:21:44 Speaker 1: Well, I'm a big proponent of doing the math, and this is basically what this whole article is about, is knowing what things cost you so that you can effectively use them in your business to be successful. And I think any time you can measure that, any time you take a magnifying glass out and look at your numbers, I think you get valuable information about your business and I totally am into that. So I saw a shirt on the internet with, uh, the girl. Wow. I don't know her name. Hang on. She does the all the different dog breeds. Her last name is like, canola.
00:22:19 Speaker 2: Oh, I know she makes them up. You mean. Yeah. It's got long hair.
00:22:23 Speaker 1: Yes, and she's real cute. And she's clever. And I like watching her videos. Um, although sometimes they get a little repetitive, but she gets my vote. Definitely. She had a shirt on that says kiss your dog for me on the back or something like that. And I love that because I tell everybody when I'm talking to them on the phone. We'll say, we'll give a kiss to Jose for me or whatever. So I thought that was a really cool shirt. It's fun to have that kind of stuff. And I don't know if that was like her work shirt or whatever, but very cool.
00:22:54 Speaker 2: I'm going to get a bunch of stickers even though I don't have a salon anymore. I'm going to put some on my car and put some on my refrigerator because I think that's cute. I have a couple of more things to say about that article, and one of them is we're going to find the big crisis is is in time spent upselling an add on service. And I suggest that if you're going to have staff soliciting add ons, that you have practice sessions so that staff can develop a little script for themselves. Each person ought to write their own script and then just get used to saying it and not saying a whole lot of other stuff.
00:23:47 Speaker 1: That's where I fail.
00:23:50 Speaker 2: I had one of those, um, sand hourglass timer things that were like two minutes timer. I used to use those things at the front counter to make sure that I was, like, not spending enormous amounts of times with customers, which was a which was a problem that I would have. And I'd say, oh, my time is up. I really got to get to grooming your dog. But I think that that's going to be a critical factor. And I think that if you practice on how to swiftly Cell, which is, you know, like, just get to the point. Present the point. Embellish the point and sell it. Or don't and move on. Um, I think that's going to be a critical thing.
00:24:44 Speaker 1: On that note, I like to have a board with the holiday specials, you know, like you do in a restaurant. And you can point to it. And yeah.
00:24:52 Speaker 2: I like the menu idea, too. I used to do that. And if your salon has a receptionist, what you might do have the receptionist sell the add ons and give him or her a cut of the profits and and and you can do that with the whole staff. If you give a two percent cut, staff are going to do more selling than if it's just taking time out of their grooming. So you it has to be an incentive for the staff to take the time to sell the add on. Um, but those are just a couple of things that I thought about in regards to that.
00:25:38 Speaker 1: I'm an all inclusive model. I do just one price for whatever. So if I'm adding something in, it better not be taking me any extra time or costing me anything when I'm doing an add on because I'm not going to sell add ons, I don't. I don't have time, I have stories to tell and jokes to write and dogs to groom and people to placate. So I don't want to spend my time selling. I'm not a good salesman anyway in that respect. So I tend to lean towards looking to the Christmas tip season, and it's been good so far, but it's definitely something that I enjoy. I'm talking up my potential continuing education so that people know what their money goes to, or in my case, actually a trip down to the amusement parks because everyone likes to support me on those adventures as well. And that's coming up. So I'm sharing that stuff. And instead of add ons, I kind of go for hoping that the Christmas tips are going to be good. So yeah. What what what do you like next? What's your next choice or should I do it?
00:26:42 Speaker 2: Yeah. You take a turn.
00:26:44 Speaker 1: I guess you could probably officially put me in the. I'm a fan of Daryl Conner camp because every single week I'm like, oh, I really like Daryl's article. Well, I really like Daryl's article again. I thought it was very useful. Tips. It's for tips on how to make your grooming life easier. And I really thought that they were valuable tips. And let's just talk about them real quick. And the first one is make gradual adjustments in the grooming. And this is one that I am an expert on. I get handed a dog from somebody like, I have a friend in Bellingham who sent me a really neat little Japanese name, Sully. And when the dog arrived and I looked at the first room that was done by my friend Cass, I went, she's hand scissoring those legs. Oh my God, I can't do that. That's just the worst for me. I just pick away at it and I make them too short. And all these excuses running through my head at how I cannot do that groom the way she did. So I very slowly have taken away the fluffy legs and kind of evened them out a little bit so I can do the groom better, and I'm not sure they ever noticed. They love the way he's groomed. They send me a thank you message every time after the grooming. So I think I'm okay because I did it so gradually. Actually, what I did is I made a mistake on one of the legs and I had to take it down and they never noticed. Oh, I know, but over the years, when we're trying to get people to brush at home and encourage that, and I always said that I would rather adjust the haircut so you don't have to brush. I know you have more things in your life that you want to do, other than sitting here and brushing your dog every day. So I will shorten a haircut very slowly, just a little bit, a little bit and a little bit. Maybe I shorten the jacket and leave the legs long, and then the next time I even it up a little bit. But those gradual adjustments have made it so that my client base is tailored to my ability, and it makes it far less stressful that I'm not biting off more than I can chew or extra stress. So I think that was a great tip. For. The next tip she has is to think outside the box, and I think you're an expert at that. Ways to do things in a different way that will help you achieve the goal. So I think that's great advice from everyone. Barbara's my favorite of hers is using the client to help with the cats. That's an out-of-the-box solution.
00:29:16 Speaker 2: See that's in my box. That is a requirement for me. I gotta have somebody here that the cat trusts to kind of create the mood. And then, you know, those cats. Sometimes it seemed like they couldn't tell whose hands were doing what. I love doing cats that way, but it seems to be an out of the box thing for everybody else. And it was just like a a natural thing. Well, you know, I had Ivana as a, as an assistant then and she just said, I won't do I won't help you with any cats.
00:29:51 Speaker 1: Really. Thanks.
00:29:52 Speaker 2: I should have said.
00:29:54 Speaker 1: Don't let the door hit you in the behind.
00:29:58 Speaker 2: But I didn't, you know, there's several times I could have said that.
00:30:02 Speaker 1: Her third tip was pre-book your clients. I am a huge proponent of that one.
00:30:07 Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a tip number one. I mean, I think it's going to make such a difference when you go crazy or not. You know, I used to tell little white lies like you might not have an appointment if you don't, you know, like, I hate to be the meanie, but we're really booking up for it.
00:30:27 Speaker 1: And it's scary to start doing that. If, you know, you mention it and they say no and you let them go out the door. What I do is I make their next appointment after they've set a pattern of a few appointments. So you know what their regular appointment space is. Then you just give them the next appointment on a card and you say, hey, I'm getting busy. Just like you said, if this doesn't work for you, call and let me know. Otherwise, let's just make this appointment now and then. It's already said and done, and I've never had anyone argue with that. I do keep a few loosey goosey so that I can fill spots with cancellations and people that don't get done as regularly, but every single appointment gets the next appointment at appointment time. And in secret, my grew more software has them repeatedly booked out thirty appointments. So I mean way out ahead so I know where they're going to be if I'm planning a vacation two months from now, I know where my standing appointments fall that way, but they don't know I have them booked out until the end of the pet's life. I just keep that one to myself. And the last thing that is of course always valuable is continuing education. Invest in continuing education. And Barbara and I were talking about before we came on how important continuing to learn is as you age and how exciting life can be when you're learning new stuff. And not to forget that you're capable of learning new stuff. You can teach old dogs new tricks. Barbara and I are both living examples of it. Kudos to Daryl. She writes a mean article, I loved it. We want to welcome Randy and Cheryl Lowe from Precision Sharp, and invite you to check out their website where you can see their newest precise cut shear called links. It's a patented design featuring a thumb ring that slides the length of the handle. For perfect ergonomic placement of your thumb, slide it and lock it into position to get your best groom on. Check it out at Precision Sharp.
00:32:31 Speaker 2: I also want to acknowledge the article on, um, the boss versus the the inspirational teacher.
00:32:41 Speaker 1: Right? Boss versus leader?
00:32:43 Speaker 2: Yeah, boss versus leader. And you know, like what I noticed is that I intended to act like an inspiration and a leader. And I often had people working for me that were used to having a boss, or I would act like a leader. And then if I had to make a decision like a boss, there would be like a freaking uprising.
00:33:11 Speaker 1: Yeah, totally.
00:33:15 Speaker 2: And then there was my weakest, weakest, weakest link becoming their friend.
00:33:23 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we're a small industry with small shops.
00:33:28 Speaker 2: But it was back again. Excuse me? It was my life.
00:33:34 Speaker 1: Yes.
00:33:34 Speaker 2: And I didn't. I just didn't want to be so impersonal in that huge portion. That was my life.
00:33:43 Speaker 1: Yep, I get it.
00:33:44 Speaker 2: And having that business reduced other social things. Although I'll tell you, for a couple of decades, I had a double life where I worked during the day as a groomer, and then at night I was a musician. And, um, that had its good and bad.
00:34:08 Speaker 1: Yeah, I have a hard time with not blurring that friend line as well when I was promoted in my previous career. Not just other jobs I've had, but I had a career before this and I was in an import corporation, and they took me from a warehouse worker to becoming an executive, and they actually pulled me into the office and sat me down and said, you can't hang out with your friends in the warehouse anymore because you're no longer a warehouse worker. We need you to be an executive. We need you to act like an executive, and you need to cut the ties. And I thought that was really harsh. Looking back, I completely understand it now. Why I couldn't be that person that I was before. Because all of a sudden, I was paid way more than they were. And I was way more responsible for things than just the person who was ringing people up in the warehouse. And I think that I am a boss with leader tendencies. I really am structured and I like to have people follow the structure and routine is important to me, but I find that when things aren't going the way I want, I can't just go and reprimand people. I just show them by action what I would like it to be like. And I hope that they can follow my lead or whatever. So I'm kind of a weird mix.
00:35:26 Speaker 2: I'm not a bossy boss. I'm just not built that way. I like to be clear about expectations. I like to do a good job of training, and then I like people to take responsibility for themselves, and it generally works pretty well. And anyway, I liked that article in concept, but what was lacking was examples. It was too much AI and not enough, uh, grooming shit. You know.
00:36:00 Speaker 1: Um, we're in an interesting age right now where we're just getting the introduction to AI. We don't know how to use it. Like every picture on the internet. You have to look at it. Is there hair on it or not? Is it cut out in the background? Does that hand go backwards because it's from a different picture? You've got to analyze every single bit of information because so much of it is fake right now. Is is generated like the song that I'm going to make up for our first appointment, which is going to be cool. I haven't done it yet, but I'm working on it. I'm writing a song, then AI is going to write the melody for us, and we'll have a little bit of a stinger for us that's made for us that I've written the words to, but I can't write a melody if my life depended on it. So we've just got to figure out where this AI thing is going to fit in to our lives. And I have friends who are very reluctant, oh, we don't want this. This is horrible. And I keep reminding them that that genie is not going back in the bottle, that it's not going to we're not going to go backwards from here and either embrace it and learn how to use it, or you're going to get left behind like the old people. When we were young, they were really old people. Now when they're old, they're not really old anymore because they're still active and their brains still work, and they still have interactions and they still give back to their communities, but they will alienate themselves if they don't get on. The AI is here to stay bandwagon. So I'm going to get off my soapbox now.
00:37:26 Speaker 2: I think it's true. I think AI is here to stay, and I think everybody has to find their own relationship with it. But, uh, I mean, I can remember where I was against email.
00:37:40 Speaker 1: Boy, that seems like a decade or two ago.
00:37:43 Speaker 2: Hey, I'm not going there. I think you want to eat me. You want to mail me? You mail me. Call me up. What do you mean, email? Chat? Oh, boy. I just worked that real quick. And having the first at the groomers lounge, uh, email group that broke me of that resistance. I've done a lot of. I've had a lot of funny resistances in my life. Um, but wait a minute. I'm not quite finished with this issue yet. So I get drawn by the advertisement. Did you check out that app for intake? It's really interesting. It's one of the other new things.
00:38:28 Speaker 1: I looked at it briefly, but I didn't really look into it.
00:38:32 Speaker 2: I looked into it. I in fact, I contacted them and I kind of introduced myself as a half of a very important podcast. And, I mean, I asked them, how do you know that Groomer's going to be able to do the style that like, how do you adjust for individual abilities and styling stylistic differences? Um, I'm just curious as to how that can fly without a little bit more individualization, I wanted to try it on. I you know, I want to see like, can I pretend to be the customer and see what what I'll get, you know. And what about mixed breeds? And so I had some questions and I sent them an email asking that. And we'll see what happens. But I think here again, I'm, I'm just going to take a soft position because this might be the beginning of something. And I think there is a value for helping some people have better, clearer communication. This it's a medium.
00:39:57 Speaker 1: Especially going forward. Yeah.
00:39:59 Speaker 2: It's a way of communicating with customers. If you're not good at communicating I'm good at communicating. You're good at communicating. I'm not perfect, but, um, for the most part, the communication with me is pretty effective, and I don't know that I would need to do that, but I would like to see the styles that they come up with. And I and I would like to see it work. And they say we can connect it with your groomer software. And like if you make these adjustments, for example, you would have what you later, what your little progression looks like and what what the dog is that she last accepted.
00:40:47 Speaker 1: I think it's tricky in all of the ways you say it's tricky. And for me, as a person who worked at a vet hospital where I did not always get the opportunity to check in my own dogs, oh boy, is that a subjective thing. Checking in dogs and how the style is and what questions you ask so that you can understand what the client needs. It's such a nuanced dance back and forth between you and the client. And, you know, the puppy cuddle. I want a puppy cut. And I say, well, what in your mind? What do you think of when you think of puppy cut? And you you don't get that back and forth.
00:41:30 Speaker 2: See, that's what that app does. It gives you a visual. It comes up with a visual of what the customer has said. And you can say, this is what that would look like. And they would say, oh, that's not what I meant. I meant more like a teddy bear, you know? You know, I mean, that's what it's an intermediate.
00:41:57 Speaker 1: So it makes a physical representation of what you're describing in the haircut. Yeah.
00:42:03 Speaker 2: It gives a visual representation of what the client is asking for.
00:42:12 Speaker 1: Okay.
00:42:12 Speaker 2: So it's an intermediate in between you and the client. I don't know, I there was a point where I had photographs of my grooming and people would could go through the photographs. Yeah. Oh I want him to look like that. Okay. So it's like that, but it's like an AI generated photo album.
00:42:32 Speaker 1: Yeah, I like it.
00:42:33 Speaker 2: You know, now, the the question is, how do you make sure that you're suggesting grooms that the groomers can achieve.
00:42:43 Speaker 1: Right, both on the dog and or with the skill?
00:42:47 Speaker 2: Yeah. So, you know, like there's that there's that. I'm for this.
00:42:54 Speaker 1: I think it sounds good.
00:42:56 Speaker 2: Yeah I think it has potential. Oh, and so another thing Cosmo bathing system. They had a great ad where it's where they say froth to the moon or something like, I don't know, it was like frothing. So since I've become more accepting of frothing, I was inclined to look at the Cosmo bathing system and I looked and it's freaking tanks. Yeah, each product needs a tank. No. Yeah, yeah. No, that's UG. I don't care that the stainless and they don't grow bugs and everything, but UG, I didn't like the tanks. It was a it was a oh, let's take a look. Oh never mind.
00:43:46 Speaker 1: That was.
00:43:49 Speaker 2: So that was that.
00:43:51 Speaker 1: I'm not a fan of the shampoo delivery system. I'm definitely a fan of the bathing beauty Recirculator type system. More for me because I've got fourteen different shampoos in my trailer and I cannot live with limiting my choices there. I really like the choices.
00:44:07 Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't limit my choices either. I know there are other systems out there, so we need to take a look. Then finally, I actually took a closer look at the English Setter tutorial.
00:44:22 Speaker 1: I did too.
00:44:23 Speaker 2: Because I haven't had much tutoring of, uh, the setters, and I did some setter grooming, and I think I did all right, but I thought it was, uh, helpful in in most ways. Pictures eleven and twelve were a little confusing for me, and the idea of using thinners on the edge of the ears made me cringe. I can't see doing that. And I wanted to add, be sure on these sporting breeds, be sure to ask owners about the whiskers. Do you want whiskers or.
00:45:12 Speaker 1: I don't take whiskers off, except for standard poodles that have a clean face. I never take whiskers anymore. Or a cocker I do on cockers if there's a need to, but if there's really not a need to, I'll leave them now. I used to cut off all the whiskers off my horse. Now I understand more about how whiskers function and what the function is with the horse. I would never do that.
00:45:35 Speaker 2: If your English Setter is basically a couch potato that goes to the dog park, I don't think you really need whiskers. I think whiskers are very healthy as dogs age and lose sight.
00:45:52 Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:45:53 Speaker 2: Because then their sensory mechanism is is input that's needed. Um, but if the dog doesn't have a need for, uh, sensory input around the mouth. My dog personnel.
00:46:08 Speaker 1: Yes. We disagree on this, too. All right. God damn.
00:46:13 Speaker 2: It. Take it off. Smooth that face. I want that line.
00:46:19 Speaker 1: I'm doing more natural on that. The whisker situation.
00:46:22 Speaker 2: I yeah, okay, well that's cool.
00:46:24 Speaker 1: There's a million ways to groom.
00:46:27 Speaker 2: So, you see, even though we went into this issue saying it was kind of a may issue, we got some real value from it. And we we're grateful to groomer to groomer for bringing that to groomers and and not suing us.
00:46:46 Speaker 1: I personally get something out of discussing it with you, even though we're not like reading the article out to everybody, but we're putting our opinions on their good topics. It's fun to read it. I love the pictures. I'm all on board. I did want to mention one more article myself, and that's the one about taking a good picture. And I can't stress enough how helpful photography is in assessing your own grooming. And she has some tips on how to take a good picture, how to clean your background up, and all that stuff. And with all the new AI programs, you can make super cool holiday pictures for your clients. With your pictures you take on your table again. I mean, back in the day, well, I can't because I'm in a fog bank in there, but most people that have the opportunity to take some cool pictures and turn them into neat holiday pictures.
00:47:39 Speaker 2: Even some not perfect pictures. I used to really just love to take a picture of the finished dog on the table. Um, looking happy and sending that along with their pickup notice we're done. And this is what he looks like. If they were mopey about photography, I pass.
00:48:04 Speaker 1: All right, well, I think this was a fun episode, and I'm with you. This. I didn't think much of it. And then we talk about it and we learn more, and. Yeah, I think it's good.
00:48:16 Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:48:16 Speaker 1: Yeah. All right.
00:48:18 Speaker 2: I think so. I think it's a good thing.
00:48:20 Speaker 1: As a listener, I would like to hear us talk about it. So that's what I'm saying.
00:48:25 Speaker 2: Next week I'm going to talk a bunch about Korean beauty.
00:48:31 Speaker 1: Oh, that'll be cool.
00:48:33 Speaker 2: Korean beauty comes to barber bird.
00:48:38 Speaker 1: We're going, we're going Christmas caroling, folks. I'm so excited. I'll put a picture up if we get a good one.
00:48:44 Speaker 2: Have a happy time.
00:48:46 Speaker 1: Thank you. Barbara. Thanks for listening. Happy grooming everyone. See you next time on the groom pod. Bye now.
00:48:52 Speaker 2: Take care of yourselves because we love you.
