Groomers Guide

Those Weren’t The Good Old Days: Poor Practices that the Grooming Industry has Outgrew typography with a vector graphic of a man in water with a plant growing out of it
by Jennifer Bishop Jenkins
For those of us who have been around for a few decades, taking a look back at how grooming used to be, we can say that the “good old days” don’t look all that good in the rear-view mirror when it comes to grooming technology and know-how. In hindsight, our equipment wasn’t great, and many of us were doing a lot of stupid stuff simply because we didn’t know any better.
Outdated and Dangerous Techniques
The groomers who I learned from were very good people who loved animals and cared about doing the best they could, but they were also doing some questionable, even harmful, things that we now know are not acceptable practices, which include the following.
Ear-Hair Plucking
I was taught to take a hemostat, gather all the ear hair up in it, lock it down tight with the clamp, twist it, and then yank. I now cringe at what that must have felt like to the dog. That painful technique, which was once thought to be correct, is now associated with causing microscopic bleeding in the ear, opening the entire blood stream to infections, and causing more ear infections. I was also taught to dump ear powder into the ears.

Now we know better to only put ear powder on our dry fingers and then gently pull out the hairs in the ear that are in telogen/exogen phase—the hairs ready to come out. Then, lightly trim down the rest, leaving the firmly rooted hairs to continue to do their job of keeping debris out of the inner ear.

Flea Dip
Essentially we were pouring poison on dogs. It came in these brown glass bottles and smelled strongly like the pesticide that it was. The bottles had to be disposed of as toxic waste. After dousing dogs in this cancer-causing soup, we would flush it down our drains and into the city water systems where it contributed to further harm and increased cancer rates among humans. An even worse idea—killing fleas on a dog by pouring motor oil on them—was, and sadly still is in some places, a common practice.

I wish everyone knew then, as we know now, that fleas die from simple shampoo left on the dog to soak for a while, and that the way to treat flea infestations is just keep the dog clean and to treat the dog’s environment—the grass, carpeting, etc.—where the flea spends most of its life cycle.

Hot Oil Treatments
This fad didn’t last long, thankfully. It was supposed to be a cutting-edge, luxury spa service to offer to pampered dogs. I did see one or two clients that came in with burn scars on their backs, but mostly just greasy, clogged follicles.

We paid big bucks for these trendy oil warmers, but had no idea what was in those oils; ingredients were never discussed. They did not seem to be the light oils, like Argan or Emu, which we know today to just rub in with our hands or work in with boar-hair bristle brushes after the bath for smooth-coated breeds like Boxers.

Hot-Air Cage Dryers
One of the most deadly and ill-informed things we used to do was to place hanging dryers with heating elements onto the cage bars of a metal enclosed crate, as high-velocity dryers were in their infancy. A few dogs died, some brachycephalic breeds suffered heat stroke, and many others were de-hydrated and stressed. Thankfully, we know better now.
Protecting Ourselves
No one told me to wear hearing protection during blow-drying, so I now wear hearing aids and have a constant ringing in my ears from tinnitus. To prevent others from suffering, my employees are mandated to wear industrial-strength hearing protection while blow-drying.

Groomers Lung is a real condition that many groomers suffer with. It is now common practice to wear N-95 masks during blow-drying, brushing and clipping to prevent microscopic particulate matter from getting inside our lungs. Thankfully, we now regularly talk about self-care in our industry.

Bringing the Industry Together
When I was a baby groomer in the 1980s, life was very different. There was no internet, industry publications, podcasts or social media, and the culture I experienced in the grooming industry was one of competitiveness and suspicion—not collegiality and mutual support. I was taught to be suspicious of sharing ideas and techniques. I remember how hard it was to learn grooming techniques and how socially hostile the groomers in my immediate area often were with each other.

Nowadays, there are countless education outlets and groomer platforms bringing us together and advancing groomer education and support for a booming industry. Grooming competitions, trade shows, websites, podcasts and online education abound, and the pet industry is now broadly considered recession-proof and one of the best businesses to be in.

Better Pay and Business Models
Groomers often worked for cash under the table in those days, but this really hit hard when it came to retirement. One 60-year-old groomer I met had been working for cash for 40 years and had no savings. She said she was looking forward to retirement so she could collect Social Security and Medicare. She needed a knee replacement and was in constant pain, but had no health insurance. She was planning on retiring and using Medicare to get it done. However, she did not know she had to pay into the system to receive these benefits; that it was part of paying taxes as a legal employee.

Most groomers I knew in the 80s groomed alone. Healthcare and retirement benefits did not exist at that time for groomers working at giant pet superstores. There were few grooming schools and fewer Certified Master Groomers. Groomers rarely had their own commercial space for formal salons, so many worked from home on a subsistence wage. Groomers often undercharged for their value, skill, hard work and time—which is still a problem today.

The pay-by-commission culture is still with us, but the more professional salary or wage model is growing in our industry. The commission-based salons with multiple groomers often developed an “everyone-for-themselves” environment, as opposed to a culture of teamwork. Now, many shops pay either hourly or a hybrid commission-based W-2. That is at least legal, as the laws regarding contract employees have changed.

A Change in Pet Owner Culture
Pet ownership did not used to be the cultural touchstone that it has become. Some people still carried outdated views of dogs as being “unclean” or scruffy flea-bags, and they were not allowed to sleep inside, much less sleep on our beds. There were only three or four national brands of dog food, which were all kibble. Sadly, pets weren’t as nearly well-treated as they are today.

Thankfully, pet food choices are now much better, and pets are welcome more places, even being integrated into workplaces and schools. It is normal to be an animal lover today, and that has been good for our industry.

Improved Equipment
If you are as old as I am, you probably remember the A2 clipper that came before the A5 models that we have today. We did not have changeable blades that we popped off and onto our clippers—we had to unscrew the whole motor end of the clipper head, with the blade screwed in place on the top half of the clipper. We had to buy multiple A2 heads, screw on the blades and completely change half the clipper for a different blade length.

The high-velocity dryer was also in its infancy, and most of us used swing-arm heating stand dryers for the entire drying job. We did not have super-absorbent towels. We did not know about frothing. We did not have large-headed, long-tined, curved, soft slicker brushes. Shears and equipment were not ergonomically designed. We did not have the many choices in products and equipment as we have today.

Worst of all, there were no electric tables that went up and down at the tap of a foot. Our grooming tables had to be manually adjusted for height with bolts on each of the four legs. This meant most of us also have back problems because we rarely would adjust the table height during the day.

Today, things have gotten better in many other aspects of our work: product choices, techniques, animal handling, self-care, collegiality, education and so much more. We also now know that science matters. Learning about how things work and why they work makes a difference. Groomer certification and credentialing is growing, and the many industry trade shows are truly wonderful, inspiring and tons of fun. Now we can truly say together, “These are the good old days!”