Dog walkers

[duckers26]

I'd have thought that one of the main attractions of having a dog is taking it for a walk. Having been at home for the last couple of days I noticed that everyone seems to have dog walkers even if they are at home!

Looking at this website http://www.homealonehounds.co.uk/index.html it would appear to cost about £30 a day for two walks and two dogs. Perhaps if you were out to work it seems a reasonable idea but to sit indoors while it happens seems a bit excessive!

[dmulally]

Keeps a motivated somebody in a job and the dogs wouldn't GAF who did the walking with them, so it's win win.

If I were hard up I'd go letterbox dropping offering dog walking services and walk a whole stack at once.

Mush mush...!

[jaybirduk]

No different paying someone to do your housework or wash your car.

It's also a great option for those that find themselves physically less able to walk their pet for whatever reason.

[Karyn]

I often think I'll go into dog-walking... quids in!

[condor]

I'm a dog walker/pet sitter The going rate is £10/hr to take an individual dog out.

My regular dog that I walk Mon-Fri mornings is owned by an elderly gentleman that can't give the dog the exercise he needs. With the recent cold spell I've also taken the dog out Sat & Sun morning as the owner was concerned he might slip on the ice. He doesn't have much money so I only charge him £5 for an hours walk, plus I feed the dog and give him any medication he needs.

I don't expect to get rich from it

[BoRED S2upid]

condor said:

I'm a dog walker/pet sitter The going rate is £10/hr to take an individual dog out.

My regular dog that I walk Mon-Fri mornings is owned by an elderly gentleman that can't give the dog the exercise he needs. With the recent cold spell I've also taken the dog out Sat & Sun morning as the owner was concerned he might slip on the ice. He doesn't have much money so I only charge him £5 for an hours walk, plus I feed the dog and give him any medication he needs.

I don't expect to get rich from it

How did you go about advertising for this? we go walking without a dog as we both work full time and it wouldn't be fair on the poor hound but would love a dog to walk. We used to borrow my parents but we live too far away now. Getting paid to walk a dog would be easy money as were walking anyway!

[Spiffing]

You could always approach a charity and walk their dogs if you don't fancy doing the advertising etc... 2 friends walk dogs, one for the RSPCA, the other for Dogs Trust.

[condor]

BoRED S2upid said:

How did you go about advertising for this? we go walking without a dog as we both work full time and it wouldn't be fair on the poor hound but would love a dog to walk. We used to borrow my parents but we live too far away now. Getting paid to walk a dog would be easy money as were walking anyway!

I used to walk the neighbours dog occassionally when I had a full time job and some free time - I was made redundant over 3 years ago and decided I would become semi-retired and set up a dog walker/pet/house sitter business as an income means. I won't be eligible for a pension for some time yet

I have a simple website ( free hosting) with an e.mail address and phone number for anyone to contact me. I prepared some leaflets ( with phone and website addy) and printed them myself - did a few leaflet drops around my village where I knew dog owners lived ( that didn't generate any leads).
I meet up with friends in a pub once a week in a nearby village and they have a notice board where my 2 leaflets are displayed - there's a village notice board opposite the pub and my leaflets are displayed there too. This is all free advertising. I've had one pet/house-sitting job, last summer, due to the pub and one 2-day puppy care job due to the village notice board. Nothing has come via the web-site.

[condor]

Spiffing said:

You could always approach a charity and walk their dogs if you don't fancy doing the advertising etc... 2 friends walk dogs, one for the RSPCA, the other for Dogs Trust.

Indeed - There's a lot of local dog care charities that need volunteer dog walkers to help out

[dmulally]

BoRED S2upid said:

How did you go about advertising for this? we go walking without a dog as we both work full time and it wouldn't be fair on the poor hound but would love a dog to walk. We used to borrow my parents but we live too far away now. Getting paid to walk a dog would be easy money as were walking anyway!

If you put on your best smile, I would ask to put up a notice (with those rip off numbers at the bottom) where caring pet owners would be. The groomers, the vets and dog parks. Would be far easier than leaflet dropping.

As for working full time, there are dogs that don't care if you do and are happy to be alive. The laziest fosters I have ever had were greyhounds. It was all they could muster to get off their lazy arse to come and say hello.

[e320dave]

My other half does dog walking/sitting/boarding and as far as getting business goes, we set up a website and paid for google adwords. We got a fair chunk of the business from that. The other place we advertise is on a couple of the local facebook pages i.e. buy and sell etc. This has also given us a lot of business. Notices in pet shops/newsagents etc has brought in no business and was a waste of time.
For some reason Thursday is the busiest day and we can now no longer take any more dogs on that day. It does help that where we live, there are a lot of commuters.
We will never be able to retire on the money she makes, but she should earn this year nearly as much or just a bit more than she earned in her previous job.