And while we’re on the subject of being the “eyes in the field,” I will tell you about Caesar, a male Persian who we have been grooming for a number of years. Caesar’s mother loves him to pieces and has been very diligent about having him groomed regularly ever since she first “tried us out.”

Prior to that, Caesar’s mom had been combing and brushing his coat out at home. Up until then, he had never had a bath or blow dry. It took some convincing for his owner to give us a try. And it was actually my daughter, Olivia, who finally got Caesar into the salon for the very first time. But once we got our hands on Caesar and transformed him into the fluffiest of cats, his mom was hooked! She’d never seen him look (or smell) so good! And Caesar strutted his stuff when he returned home from his day at the kitty spa.

Olivia has been grooming Caesar so regularly that she knows this cat inside and out. During his most recent visit about a week ago, Olivia discovered a small lump on Caesar’s neck. When his owner returned for pick up, Olivia alerted her to the lump and showed her exactly where it was. A vet visit was in order.

The other day I called to follow up with Caesar’s mom. Diagnosis still undetermined. More testing will be done, and it may take some time to figure out just what the cause of this lump is, and what treatment can be provided.

Caesar’s owner thanked me for following up with her and thanked Olivia for paying such close attention to her cat as she groomed him. I thanked Caesar’s mom for being so diligent to have him groomed regularly, which gave Olivia the opportunity to find something out-of-the-ordinary in the first place. And I thanked my daughter for doing her job and doing it well!

I recently did an interview with Lori Soard from Love To Know Cats website on various aspects of both professional and at-home cat grooming.

Check out the interview here. And while you’re at it, take time to look around the Love To Know Cats website. You just might find some helpful information there. It’s a great resource for your clients, too!

Below is a testimonial from one of our CFMG grads.

“Hello friends. I just wanted to tell you how much my life has improved since completing my CFMG class less than ten months ago. When I decided to enhance my grooming skills and become an educated feline groomer my life became so much easier. I had been grooming cats prior to discovering NCGIA but my knowledge and confidence in my skills fell way below the line for what I expect of myself in my chosen profession as a groomer.

When I attended dog grooming school I was taught how to do a lion cut on a cat. When I asked questions the responses were limited because I think the knowledge of cat grooming from the instructor was limited. This is not a criticism. It just made me realize that the information on feline grooming did not exist. Then I met Danelle in Atlanta at the Pet Fair and now my knowledge, skills and bank account are beyond what I ever imagined.

I have over 70 cat clients without doing any kind of advertising. People will call and say “I hear you are the cat whisperer.” Although this is certainly good for the ego what it really says is that I have the necessary skills needed to handle cats in a gentle way. When I learned to assess temperament, carry the right tools and have the confidence to handle any potential situation I became the local expert. What people (including veterinarians) are amazed by is that I don’t use any sedation. The myth that cats hate baths is truly a myth. Like any breathing being, cats like to feel clean and they respond to groomers who understand how to assist them in this process.

I have learned that having a skill that the majority of people in the field will not pursue puts me in a position to achieve huge success. No one is more appreciative of the work I do than my cat clients. Although I charge more for cats than most dogs the tips I receive for cat grooming far outweigh my other tips. Why? Because finding an educated cat groomer, who honestly loves to work with cats and who produces quality cat grooming, is like looking for one flea on a Great Pyrenees.

By this time next year I intend to have one mobile unit just for cat grooming and to transition most of the dogs I do to a motivated and skilled dog groomer. Cat grooming will definitely prolong my grooming career and I owe my success to Danelle and her team for enlightening me on the joys of cat grooming.”

Robyn Warner, CFMG AL, 1.26.33  

(NOTE: the 3 numbers Robyn lists in her signature are also on her Certified Feline Master Groomer certificate. The first number represents her CFMG rank by state. Robyn is #1 in the state of AL. The second number represents her CFMG rank by her country. Robyn is the 26th CFMG in the US. The last number represents Robyn’s rank in the world. She is the 33rd CFMG in the entire world. As of this writing, we have over 60 CFMGs, and growing by more each month. Robyn, however, will always be the 33rd in the world and the first in Alabama. Sweet bragging rights!)

We are the “eyes” in the field for our veterinarian friends.  I’ve been told this by more than one DVM.  And I believe it.  After all, it is the groomer that spends the most time with a dog or a cat and is privy to seeing every inch of the animal’s body. When these creatures are groomed on a regular basis, we have the awesome opportunity to notice both slight and significant changes in an animal’s appearance, weight, disposition, and over-all appearance of health.

It is our duty, as professional pet groomers, to notice these things and communicate what we observe during our time spent with a client’s pet.  This gives the pet owner the opportunity to seek expert vet care in a timely manner.

That means we need to know our “stuff.”  We need to be aware of common health issues, diseases, and viruses that can affect the animals we are working with.  The appearance of a particular symptom that is caught by an observant groomer can lead to early detection and sometimes save the life of an animal.

I was reminded of this recently when I groomed a Persian named Nutmeg.  Only recently has Nutmeg begun receiving regular grooming care.  His owners are like so many cat owners that I know who acquired a long-haired breed of cat and did not know it would require regular, professional grooming to keep in proper condition.

We first saw Nutmeg a few months ago, when he came in with a matted coat.  We were able to salvage the coat and present Nutmeg back to his owners, free of mats and sporting a luxuriously fluffy coat.  We also explained to Nutmeg’s parents what causes the matting and how to prevent the same situation in the future.  Being the good owners that they are, Nutmeg’s parents pre-booked their next appoint one month later.

During each of Nutmeg’s grooming visits, he was extremely laid back, docile and seemingly content with the whole process.  Until two weeks ago.  Midway through Nutmeg’s most recent grooming visit, he began to pant.  Panting is a sign of stress in a cat and can be caused by aggressive behavior, nervousness, and underlying health conditions such as HCM (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy). Due to Nutmeg’s age (two years), temperament, condition, and other factors, including how we handled his groom at the first sign of stress, I was very concerned that Nutmeg had a heart condition, most likely HCM.

We alerted Nutmeg’s owner right away and recommended a vet visit.  A few days later, I called to follow up.  Initial testing has shown a thickening of the wall of the heart, most probably HCM, as per the veterinarian.

During the follow-up phone call, Nutmeg’s owner expressed gratitude toward my concern for Nutmeg and for alerting them to a potentially fatal problem that would most likely have gone undiagnosed for a very long time, possibly until it was too late.  I thanked Nutmeg’s owner for keeping up with a regular grooming schedule., without which, I would never have had my eyes on her precious Persian.

We’ve got a tremendous responsibility, folks!  Let’s not take it lightly.

Many of the NCGIA members and graduates are in the process of creating or recreating their business websites. And many are struggling with how to structure the sitemap as well as how to write the content of each page.

Well now the National Cat Groomers Institute has a solution!!

We now offer a generic cat grooming biz content and sitemap template, complete with all pages necessary to get your website up and running. This is not actual website design and construction, but rather the content that fills up each page of the website, with a thorough and efficient sitemap layout of the necessary pages. It can be customized as per individual needs. It is intended for use by a professional website designer (we even have one we highly recommend that offers a very affordable payment program to our members and graduates! learn more via the link below).

This template is based on what I used for my Catty Shack Feline Spa and Resort for many years.  I know it worked to solicit and retain clients, based on the information contained on the website.  I saw the evidence every day!

I have used my old prototype as a foundation, improving it to keep up with the times and current needs of those just entering the cat grooming market or seeking to build on their existing client base.  Working with students over the past couple of years has given me insight into how to better construct such a site.

Remember, that it is completely customizable.  It can be tweaked to meet your needs and takes all the guesswork, planning, and writing out of the website construction process.

To see more about this product, click here.

Monday, February 21, 2011 – en route from Moscow to Atlanta

I’m sure you are wondering what dinner and tattoos have to do with each other. In America, nothing. In Moscow, everything.

You see, Friday evening, Amy and I went out to dinner with Umberto and Kitty, some colleagues of ours from Italy and Belgium, respectively. We sat at the table nearest the kitchen, where all the servers and wait staff hung out.

Each of us ordered from the hotel restaurant menu. In fact, Umberto, Kitty, and Amy each ordered the same thing. And each of us pointed to our menu item, which was listed in both Russian and English, just in case the waiter did not understand English.

Approximately 30 minutes later, Umberto received his meal. Umberto ate his meal. The ladies watched Umberto eat his meal. All by himself.

Some time later, when Umberto was scraping the last bites off food from his plate, my dish arrived, but was set down in front of Umberto. After some discussion about this new item that Umberto did not order, the four of us determined that it was actually my meal that had been placed on the table in front of my companion.

I ate. All by myself, while the others watched and wondered where their food might be. By now, all of us have flagged down the waiter and attempted to ask where the remaining meals were. Were they actually catching the cows before they could cook the steak? The waiter did not understand this question. He did not speak a word of English nor did he recognize any of the English menu items listed on the hotel restaurant menu, the place in which he worked as an employee. None of us spoke Russian.

After much signaling, asking, demanding, and repeating, Kitty’s meal finally arrived. So Kitty ate. All by herself. By this time, we had been sitting at the front table, nearest the kitchen and server station, for nearly 1 ½ hours. Two of us have completed our meals. One is now eating, and the other is still waiting. We literally asked for Amy’s meal about 25 times. Still no meal. No explanation. Nothing.

By this time, all of the wait staff are now ignoring us on purpose. Like maybe if they don’t look at us, we won’t really want that last meal. Umberto, being the man of the table, acted gentlemanly and went to the counter to see about Amy’s meal. Still no meal. Some time later, a man we have not seen before comes to the table and says, “I’m sorry, but he did not understand what you ordered.” And then he leaves.

In order to prevent having to explain to Amy’s husband and children why she is still behind, in Moscow, in prison, I took her upstairs to our room where she ate a biscotti in a wrapper. Not entirely equal to a steak, but food nonetheless.

The next evening, we experienced a nearly similar dinner event. At this point I am just waiting for someone to jump out from behind a fake tree and shout, “SMILE! You’re on Candid Camera!” But no one ever did.

On the third evening we did things a little differently. Amy rolled up her shirtsleeves. You see, Amy has a tattoo on each arm. And on her trip to Russia (via the later plane because of a missing passport) she learned from a fellow passenger that tattoos in Russia are typically a sign that the wearer is either in the Russian mafia or has been in prison.

We wondered how a Russian mafia member or convict might be treated in our little hotel restaurant where good service was seemingly non-existent. We found out within minutes the difference a tattoo makes!

Amy not only received her meal, but she received it rather quickly. And she was offered cigarettes and an ash tray by other patrons as well as a box of fruit juice by the coach of the Russian football team who was clearing out the last of the team’s belongings after a big buffet meal served exclusively to them. Whatever Amy asked for she got. And then some.

Next year I’m getting one of those 5 or 6-day tattoos. Either on my hand or my neck, so it will be visible all the time. Amy is taking shortsleeved shirts to wear to dinner.

Sunday, February 20, 2011 – around midnight, Moscow time.

We started out the morning with very little product left, which was a great thing. Easier packing for the trip home. Because of the language barrier and the fact that we did not have an interpreter on the last day, not much dialoguing went on with the attendees.

Amy judged the Creative Competition, which was done in-ring. During the Creative, I popped over to the TICA show next door and checked out the cats. I really like those Bengals! Or Bengali, as they call them in Russia. Exquisite little creatures, despite the fact that they are short hairs.

We took a late lunch with Natalia, our gracious host. The late lunch turned into a several-hour long conversation about future lectures and ideas for Zoo Russia in the coming years. So many ideas, so little time. And with the jet lag, well, I know I, personally, needed some sleep before I could figure out the rest of the world’s cat grooming problems.

I had a little surprise as we were packing up our gear. Two American CFA judges, Carla Bizzell and Jan Stevens, showed up at my booth. Both were in town judging yet another cat show (CFA) that same weekend, somewhere else in Moscow. Fancy that! I had not seen either of them since my show days of long ago. It was good to catch up and talk some cat talk. Running into English speakers in Moscow is always a bonus. Running into English speakers from America who are into cats is even better!

At day’s end, we hustled the six very cold blocks back to the Aquarium Hotel and started the repack for the trip home. Our time had come to an end, and it seemed as though we had just gotten there.

I am homesick by now. I miss my husband and my kids so much! And I miss having at least one cat on the bed with me at night as I go to sleep. Actually I miss the night, when I go to sleep. With or without a cat. I miss my Truman. I skyped my family tonight and Truman stood in front of the computer screen, listening to my voice, wondering where I was. I gave him commands such as “sit” and “down” which he did so obediently. I have a dog that will obey my commands coming all the way from Russia! Good dog. The only command he had an issue with was “come.” When I said, “come” he just looked at the computer, tilting his head back and forth, as only a Standard Poodle would do, wondering how the heck he was going to obey that particular command. Smart dog.

Tomorrow morning we head for the Moscow airport and then the long trip home.

Saturday, Feb. 19 – almost midnight, Moscow time

Tonight we joined a group of veterinarians from France and Scotland for a tour of Moscow city.  This is the second time I have taken the tour so I was much better prepared for the event.  Last year, I found it impossible to pay attention and enjoy the sights and accompanying historical information due to the fact that I was fighting desperately to stay alive in the elements.  (read last year’s blog entry)

This time around I had thick, warm boots, wool socks, and a down coat with the biggest, furriest hood ever.  In fact, when my coat was zipped to the top, my entire head was lost inside a pile of fur.  This severely inhibited my ability to see more than 6 feet in front of me and removed any prospect of utilizing my peripheral vision, but it kept my head warm.  Top priority, keep head warm.  I had even brought toe and hand warmers with me, just in case.  Amazingly they stayed in my pocket, in their wrappers, never used the whole time.  Of course it helped immensely that the tour guide had been scolded by show management after last year’s excursion and was warned explicitly to NOT allow any of the foreign speakers die a cold death while on the tour of Moscow.  I am happy to report that the tour guide followed instructions.  This was a good thing for her because I, having been on the tour before and suffered a terrible experience, would have picked her up and carried her back to the bus myself had she even thought about keeping us out there in the coldness of the night for more than 5 minutes at any one time.

While standing in Red Square listening to the history of Russia’s government and the Kremlin,  I had to give the tour guide a “hint” that it was time to go back to the bus.  It was a subtle but clear hint.  I started hopping on both feet and making sounds in my throat that indicated we might be on the verge of getting frost bite.  The hint worked because the tour guide said, “Are you getting cold?”  The entire group proclaimed “YES!” in unison.  ”We should head back to the bus, then,” said the tour guide.  She is a smart woman and saved me a lot of effort in trying to pick her up and forcibly carrying her back to the bus.

Moscow is a beautiful city with some of the most amazing architecture.  Its oldness is way beyond anything we have in America.  One of these days I will find the time to venture into the city center (the Kremlin sits at the very center of the city) and take a tour of the Kremlin and the surrounding museums.

Tonight we visited Victory Park, a commemorative park celebrating the end of WWII, Swallow Hill that has a spectacular view of the city below, the sport arena and sky jumps where the Olympics were held back in the 80’s (if I remember correctly), a beautiful convent where some overly powerful and threatening women of Russian history were banished in order to make things easier for the men who were in control in those days, and Red Square and the Kremlin.

Saturday, Feb 19 –  late evening Moscow time

Saturday it was Amy’s turn to lecture.  She started out talking about creative grooming in the salon and then moved on to a demo with a tiny little dog already made into a Panda.  She transformed it into a pink panda, being limited to no hair removal of any kind.  Before long, previous competitors who were in the audience started handing her their competition dogs to her, up on the stage, for her to creatively transform them as well.  This went on for hours, with many dogs leaving the seminar in some new creative design.

I hung back at the booth because someone had to be there to sell product each time Amy demonstrated a particular item.  It was the strangest thing.  If she used glitter, folks immediately ran to our booth and pointed to glitter.  I grabbed what they wanted from out of the glass display cash and a quick exchange of rubles for product took place without a single word being spoken.  After each purchase, the ladies would run back to the lecture, just down the aisle, and watch until Amy demonstrated yet another product or tool.  At that point they would sprint back to our booth to buy that item.

I could tell what product she was demonstrating, after the first customer came over and pointed to the glass case and we identified what it was they were looking for.  I knew at that point that I should then get out all remaining stock of that one item because others would follow within minutes.  The same thing had happened yesterday during my lectures.  Amy manned the booth then and sold cat grooming items while I demonstrated on stage.

I have been doing trade shows for several years. At all other trade shows, I engage in lengthy discussions about the ins and outs of cat grooming, speaking on all manner of topics related to the actual grooming and handling aspects as well as the business end of things.  But not at Zoo Russia.  It is much simpler here.  Most of the time not a single word is uttered during a transaction.  And if words are exchanged, they usually boil down to “how much” and then a price quotation.  There is no real “selling” that goes on. No convincing or instructing.  Just a simple point, grab, write down ruble price on a scrap of paper, exchange of cash and product.  And that is the end of it.

In some ways the language barrier is hugely frustrating.  In other ways, it forces everyone to cut to the chase and get down to the rock bottom question: is the cost of the item worth it to me?

Sometimes there is a lot of pantomiming and charades that take place.  It gets rather interesting.  Imagine trying to communicate, without any words, how to shave a cat’s butt.  Or how to apply semi-permanent dye and glitter to a dog’s coat and explain how long it will last.  To the casual observer, watching from afar, I would imagine they think we are all nuts.  But when it comes down to it, where there is a will, there is a way.  And over the past 2 days we have found many ways to explain many things.

I will say the hard part for me is that I know the groomers here need so much information and education when it comes to cat grooming.  And I want so desperately to share that with them, and yet am unable to do so because of the language barrier.  So I leave here at the end of the day feeling like I haven’t accomplished what I came here to do.  There is so much to be done here, in the field of cat grooming. The question is, do I want to tackle the job, as enormous as it is.

Friday, Feb 18, late – Moscow time.

Friday, the first day of the show, started out for me at 3:30 am. Amy had been awake since 2:30.  The two of us were beyond tired, but still found it impossible to sleep due to the 8 hour time difference (for Amy it is a 9 hour difference). So we chatted in the darkness until our wake up call arrived at 7am.

An hour later we rode the elevator to the 1st floor of the Aquarium Hotel for the complimentary buffet breakfast.  One glance at the food reminded me that last year the breakfast selections where not on my “favorites” list.  To keep my blood sugar up, I forced down 3 pieces of salami, 2 slices of tomato, and a half cooked piece of bacon that I picked apart in order to separate the meaty-looking parts from the blubbery fat.  I washed it all down with one of the strongest cups of coffee known to mankind, not because I liked it but because in 2 hours I would have to deliver 3 1/2 hours of lecture and was feeling, at the time, mostly like I’d been hit by a really big bus.  I needed the caffeine.

We then gathered our things, bundled up like Eskimos and walked the 15 minutes to the Crocus Exposition Center. I knew the drill this time, therefore no pantomiming was necessary to pass security without a speaker’s badge.  This year I had a booth to tend to, as did Amy.  Once we had the booth set up, it was time for my lecture to get underway.

Midway through the lecture, we took a short break so I could gather my tools, change into grooming clothes and find the demo cats that I needed for the demonstration.  I literally met the two Scottish Folds on stage as I pulled them out, one at a time, to groom them in front of the audience.

That’s when things got really interesting.  The female Fold was in heat.  I could tell as soon as I put her on the table.  Cats in heat are not nice.  They can’t decide whether or not they want to be bred or they want to kill someone or something.  It’s kinda like PMS on crack, with a bipolar disorder.  It’s best not to be anywhere near the back parts of cat who is like this.  And particularly not good to be near their back parts with a pair of clippers.  Especially in front of an audience in a noisy show hall.

Upon further handling of the cat, I could tell that she had recently been bred.  The evidence of male dominance was clearly present.  This only made matters worse.  And I was supposed to do a creative design on this particular cat.  Well, that wasn’t going to happen.  I asked Ann Marie, the interpreter, to please explain the cat’s condition to the audience, and that I would be moving along to the other cat instead.

The 2nd cat, a male, was an agreeable participant, for which I was most thankful.  I wondered if his agreeableness had anything to do with the male dominance marks that existed on the back of the female’s neck.  He seemed awfully happy about things.

I took his lower back area down really short and then carved in a simple pattern and topped it off with some sprayza colors. Afterward, there were questions from the audience, which always take a tremendous amount of time to be relayed both directions, through an interpreter.  I do find the language barrier to be a real nuisance.  At the end of day 1, I am more determined to stick to the plan of learning Russian in the near future.  I will be speaking in Ukraine in May, where this particular skill would come in quite handy.  Is it possible to learn a difficult language in less than 3 months?

Right now I’m too tired to think about it.  Falling to sleep…………I’ll have to write about our dinner experience later………