My Story

Before I started my Daycare business I was bumping along picking up the money in a corporate job and not being fulfilled, personally or professionally. I became a first time dog owner at my wife’s insistence two years before I started my own business. This dog was called Stan, he changed my life, I realised I loved dogs so much. I wanted to have a career with the canines.

I knew leaving my job security would be a huge risk, for me and my family. I was made redundant and I bought a dog walking company to learn the doggy ropes. The plan was always to move house, find a place with land and open my own daycare.

When we started Tails of the Lake, we had the wrong dogs, difficult to control, hard to manage and I realised I had to do things differently to make this service a success.

I had to improve my facilities, make them more engaging for the dogs, I had to build my experience through investing in myself through working with existing daycare experts. I invested in my team’s training and hired motivated highly trained people to deliver on what we wanted to be. 

I didn’t want to be like all the other daycares, my facilities, the quality of our people, the level of service for both our dogs and their owners had to be equally impressive and important.

I didn’t want to be offering daycare in my backgarden, I didn’t want to be cheap and cheerful, everyone else does that. I wanted to be better than that.

I wanted to offer the best service, for the owners to be delighted in seeing their dogs flourish and the dogs to have the greatest experience with me and my team. Fantastic facilities that no one else had. Great activities for the dogs with my team and make sure the customers could see this every time their dog came to my place.

Today at Tails of The Lake, we have personalized care. My team knows all the dogs intimately, the dogs know my team like part of their own family. That’s what I wanted, that’s what we have today.

You want your dogs to come when you don’t know what to do with them, you want to pay peanuts and get the best service, you want your poorly behaved/aggressive dog off your hands for a day, that’s not me.

Phil