Episode 115: How Your Pet Business Can Support Your Life Goals

Carrie Wallick is the owner iCare4pets. She has been in business for 4 years and started using employees for almost a year and a half. Carrie was a former teacher for 8 years until she decided she wanted a career change and began brainstorming ways she could use her passion for animals to support her life goals. 2-3 months later, Carrie was using Facebook groups and word of mouth to get pet sitting clients, and her business was born. Learn more about Carrie's business at icare4pets.com Biggest Takeaways You Don't Want To Miss: When first starting your business, it's really important to determine a set service area. You want to know if your model is going to be expansion vs. saturation. Expansion would mean that you cover many different areas of the city (or even multiple cities). Saturation would imply focusing on one specific city or even area within a city and honing in your marketing efforts to that region. Carrie describes how that after driving for hours on end every day for months, that she quickly decided that saturation and micro-targeting an area was going to be the best fit to support her life goals. Which model do you think would support yours? Sometime it can pay to be picky! We often think that we have to say yes to every person that calls or emails us - but this is not the case. In fact, a lot of the times you will be spending MORE time and energy on "problem clients" than you're gaining. Be picky not just geographically, but make sure your clients fit your client avatar/buyer persona. Accepting only the clients that fit your business model will end up being MUCH more worth it in the long run. Show Highlights Who is Carrie Wallick and how did she start iCare4Pets? [1:00] What were your initial goals for your business? [3:00] What was a typical day when you first started your business? [4:00] How did you decide that covering a huge area wasn't an option for you? [6:00] What advice would you give to yourself when you were first starting out? [9:00] How did the stress of starting out affect your home life? [10:00] Why didn't the IC route work for you? [14:00] How do you fight and push past your demons? [18:00] What was it like adopting your new baby? [20:00] How did your business adjust during Hurricane Irma? [22:00] Share The Show Did you enjoy the show? We would love it if you subscribed today and left us a 5-star review! Click this link – Bella In Your Business Click on the ‘Subscribe’ button below the artwork Go to the ‘Ratings and Reviews’ section Click on ‘Write a Review’ Transcript: This is episode 115 of Bella in Your Business. The next series is going to be a bunch of interviews with amazing pet sitters that I know that will also motivate and inspire you and your business. From time to time, I interview incredible pet sitters who have been through or faced some really amazing challenges that have inspired me, therefore I know will inspire you. If you know of anyone who has an amazing story to share, who is a pet sitting or dog walking business owner, I'd love to hear from you. Just go ahead and email me at [email protected]. Until then, enjoy this next episode. Welcome to Bella in Your Business, where Bella will discuss anything and everything about your pet sitting business to help you land on target. So get ready, Bella’s got your chute. Let's jump. Welcome to Bella in Your Business. My name is Bella Vasta from Jump Consulting, and today I have Kari Wallach with me. She is a pet sitter in Florida and the owner of I Care for Pets. We’ve known each other for quite a few years now, and Kari’s story has been really interesting and inspiring to me as I’ve seen her grow and change through so many different life changes. I really wanted to bring her on because I know there are many people listening who will connect to her story. Kari: Thank you. Glad to be a part of the show. Bella: Why don’t we start from the beginning? Tell me where you're located and what made you start this business. Kari: I am just outside of Orlando in Longwood, a little suburb. I was a teacher for eight years and wanted to get out of teaching but didn’t know what to do. I figured I’d find a way to use my passion for animals and live off of it. After going on vacation a few times and using my brother to take care of my dogs, I thought there had to be a way to give this service to people because it just wasn’t working with family. I wanted to be able to trust someone and provide that for others. Bella: Awesome. So how did you get started? Did you start putting flyers up, get a website? How did it all work? Kari: I started with community websites and Facebook groups. We had a big one—15,000 members—in my town and the one nearby. I started there, then moved to Thumbtack, and it grew from there. Word of mouth became big. When I moved, I started my own Facebook group since there wasn’t one. We’re now at 3,000 members, and I literally got three clients from it just yesterday. Bella: So when it started growing, you were running around by yourself. Tell us about home life—kids, family—and how that influenced your goals. Kari: At the time, I had an eight-year-old stepson. I started by substitute teaching while building the business, but that lasted only two months because I couldn’t do both. My visits were in the middle of the day. Eventually, I could take summers off to be with him. It was hard at first trying to balance work and family, but I knew I wanted another child. We ended up adopting a baby last October. Bella: Nine months ago—congratulations! So when you left substitute teaching to go full time, what were your days like? Kari: Really hectic. I was putting about 500 miles a week on my car. We were living in one city, temporarily in another, and moving to a third. I was taking clients in all three places. I’d be gone from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Driving took most of the day. I spent my whole day driving even though I didn’t have that many clients. But I knew I needed to build where I was moving. I made connections with pet sitters in different areas, which helped, but I learned quickly that I didn’t want that lifestyle. Bella: What about it got old? Kari: The driving, the rushing, trying to make it to clients 25 or 35 minutes apart. That was why I left teaching—too stressful to enjoy. I decided to keep clients in one area so I could maintain quality. I once got a call from a potential client in downtown Orlando, 35 minutes away, who said she’d pay anything. But I told her no—it wouldn’t be fair to her or my other clients. That was when I realized I needed to get more done in less time, not less done in more time. Bella: So it sounds like the first step was realizing you weren’t enjoying it anymore and needed to narrow your area. Kari: Exactly. And I’ve learned to say no—to hoarding situations, poor pet conditions, or clients with unrealistic expectations. We can be picky now. We have a reputation, and these animals depend on us. Not just geographically picky, but also about the clients we take. Bella: If you could give yourself advice back then, what would it be? Kari: I’d focus on building in the area we knew we wanted to move to instead of spreading myself thin. But I learned a lot from that time—different types of dogs, different situations. There’s no substitute for experience. You can tell people “don’t go outside your boundary” or “don’t lower your prices,” but sometimes you have to live it to learn it. Bella: When you were living that 500-mile-a-week lifestyle, what did that do to your home life? Kari: It was stressful financially, but my wife was very supportive. We still managed vacations. The hardest part was my own dogs being home alone more. The money stress was tough, and we couldn’t even think about having a child until I brought in a certain amount of income, which seemed impossible at first. Bella: There was a crossroad where you decided enough was enough—you were going to hire. Hiring isn’t easy, but you did it. Tell me how that happened. Kari: My biggest motivation was wanting to have kids and survive financially. I first tried using independent contractors, but that didn’t go well. Florida’s one of the top states for audits, and I was terrified of misclassifying workers, payroll, insurance—all of it. But once I figured it out, it wasn’t scary. My accountant handles payroll, and I got the handbooks from you. I realized that, weirdly, when you hire more employees, you get more clients. Bella: Exactly—every person you hire represents growth potential. Kari: Right. Once I realized that, it made sense. I started with employees to cover vacations, and it grew from there. My first big test was my honeymoon to Costa Rica. I had one or two employees, and even with spotty reception, it worked. That success made me confident. Bella: I love that. So you learned that delegating gave you freedom. Your mindset seems really strong. How do you stay positive? Kari: I just refuse to be stuck. I’ve seen people stay miserable in jobs because they’re afraid to change. If something’s not working, you fix it. If you have a goal, figure it out—no one else will do it for you. Bella: That’s powerful. Let’s talk about adopting Bodhi. You didn’t even have nine months to prepare—you had a few days! Kari: We started the adoption process in September, after Hurricane Irma. We got approved in October and were told it would take six months to a year. Less than 30 days later, we got a call—there was a baby in Arizona. They called Wednesday; we were in Arizona by Thursday morning. We stayed 10 days while waiting for approval to leave the state. I was in the NICU taking business calls and passing clients to another local sitter for coverage. Having those connections was a lifesaver. Bella: That’s amazing. I want mompreneurs to hear that—you can do it. Balance is a mythical unicorn, but you make it work. Speaking of the hurricane,