The physical demands of maintaining a rural property with land are quite a consideration.  Running a kennels requires stamina and high level of physical fitness as you will be cleaning units, preparing meals and delivering them, providing fresh water (some dogs will also love to play with water and splash it around!), grooming, administering medicines, scrubbing and disinfecting between occupants, working outside (if you haven't included an inside play barn/area in your design) in hot and cold weather.

And one of your goals will be that dogs will be walked and played with every day.  Not only does this higher level of service mean clients will be more attracted to your kennels, but the most important thing for dogs is to get out of the kennels and have social contact every day.  You can easily see how providing this more personal level of service will be much more satisfying and fun for you - rather than running so many kennels that you just about have time to feed and water the dogs and clean the kennels.  It is easy to guess which service clients will pay more for!!!

You will be taking complete responsibility for your clients' dogs, including their care, comfort, safety & LIVES.  Never forget you are dealing with people, not just dogs.  Some customers will be nervous and afraid of going on holiday and leaving their dogs, some won't go on holiday convert these customers so you will become their first port of call by winning them over with your wonderful kennels, considerable knowledge and caring attitude).

Working with people requires good communication skills, patience, and an ability to listen.  You need to be confident, knowledgeable, caring, professional & PASSIONATE about your kennels.

On the business side, there is paperwork, administration, computer inputting & dealing with emails, telephone, bookings, vet visits, health cards, web cams, forms and letters, correspondence... the list goes on.

Demands on your time, early starts and late finishes, 24 hour cover, living on site, avoiding taking your own holidays during peak times (Easter, summer, Christmas), and taking breaks when there are quiet times such as February. 

A big tip is that being a 24 hour business, you might consider employing staff -however, rather than entrusting staff with dogs in your care, why not get a cleaner/ gardener?  Their services should be less expensive than employing good quality kennel staff.

A quality caring kennels with high occupancy will be very busy and make more demands on your time as your reputation grows.

Is it right for you?

Running a kennels is a hands-on, physical, practical job.  You need to understand as much about dog care and handling -- and especially dog welfare and behaviour as you can.  It is a responsibility to look after your own dogs, and even more so when you are professionally looking after someone else's.

As you start looking deeper into the possibilities, you will be faced with several dilemmas.  These can vary from being concerned about moving house or starting up a business, finding out if it's what you really what you want to do - and whether you will make a good kennel and business owner.  It won't suit everyone!

You may start out thinking you want or need X amount of kennels to make a good income, wonder if your ideas for starting a kennels that is high quality are financially feasible, or imagine you have to do ‘what everyone else out there is doing'.

The one thing you can expect is to have your expectations changed!

If starting a kennels is for you, or you have a multi-dog family yourself, then you will find it easy to throw yourself into books and websites, and start to understand just how important social contact, physical activity, environment and living space is to dogs, and how to improve it.

At the moment, you don't know what it is you don't know!

However, the people who create a successful business ‘just know' that it is right, want to do it well, and just need to know where to get the information to create the best kennels they can.

Source: Kennel Design The Essential Guide by David Key