There is very, very
little in the way of appointment scheduling training. However, John
Stazko at www.stazko.com has a
special appointment book based on the "unit system." For
example, each type of grooming has "x" amount of time
units it takes. Perhaps you can groom 24 time units in one 8 hour
work day. Each time unit is perhaps 20 minutes. So, a Standard
Poodle could be 6 units, or 2 hours, and in your appointment book
you fill in 6 units of time for the Standard Poodle. A Chihuahua
would be about 1 unit, right? If you have an interest in this system
check it out a John's website and let him know you heard about it
here please.
Many one groomer
businesses simply know they can groom 5-8 dogs on their own in one
work day. They know their customers and the time it takes for each
dog and will simply take only as many appointments as they can
handle. If 2 Standard Poodles are booked, and they normally do 8
appointments in general, they would likely book only 5-6
appointments to compensate for having to do 2 Standard Poodles. One
person businesses are far less likely to worry if they work a little
overtime, whereas employees are more concerned about clock in and
out times.
Many people think that
our very large business must have a complicated appointment system.
On the contrary, it is so simple most grooming business owners
cannot figure how it works out, but it does and has for 40 years.
Here it is. We used a weekly planning appointment book. At the top
label of each workday, we wrote the number of complete trim and bath
("T") grooming appointments we were willing to book that
day, and also how many bath-only ("B") grooming
appointments we were willing to book that day. For example, above
the word "Saturday" we would write "40 T / 25 B.
Therefore, the receptionists knew to book 40 complete trim pets and
25 bath-only pets before closing off the day as "booked."
Remember, many pet owners have two or more pets, so we don't count
customer names, but total number of grooming appointments.
Sometimes among those 40
T and 25 B there were some pets that would take longer than others
to groom. That's the stumbling block today's grooming business
owners find in this system. They are right unless they are
well-staffed and their staff is generally team-oriented and willing
to do some occasional overtime, or to pitch in and be productive. So
the problem isn't this simple system, it's personnel management, one
of the largest problems in the industry. Based on our 40+ years using
this simple system, this system always worked very well for us. In
truth, it works best with 3 or more groomers, or a small staff when
you can count on to do some extra work without much notice. Don't
wait to be surprised though. The wise owner and/or manager using
this simple system always takes a LOOK at the next day's business
ahead of time and anticipates the work load, and prepares for it the
day before. You become expert at this system only by experience. The
unit system is actually a bit difficult to use in a business of this
size, but it is not impossible.
Many owners know the
limit of each groomer they hire, and simply book the number of
appointments for each groomer based on the groomer's ability. Some
even allow their groomers to dictate how many they will groom each
day of the week, and then that's how many appointments they take.
You will again have to compensate for very large dogs, special care
pets taking more time, tangled hair pets that will be de-matted, and
breed styling demands.
Mobile groomers
typically average 4-5 appointments a day. Travel time is a great
part of their planning. They need to be smart in their daily
planning so they are not running back and forth from one side of
town to the other repeatedly in the same day. It wears out a vehicle
and the more travel time the less pets groomed as a rule of thumb.
Mobile groomers charge more for the same grooming, in essence,
because they must account for their travel time. It's great for them
to serve pet owners with 2 or more pets, as that means they are
likely to travel less and groom more.
In our many years of
experience as consultants we have often been approached by grooming
business owners that love to tell us that they are always booked and
turning away business, and their customers are "trained"
and have to wait weeks if they don't schedule ahead. First, it's a
great that you have built up such a business. Second, it's not good
customer service. Not really. Good customer service provides
flexibility of today's busy pet owners, especially since many are
families and today's heads of households have a hard time committing
too far ahead. Parents know things happen, and changes in their
schedules are a part of life. Changing an appointment shouldn't mean
they have to wait another month or more to get an appointment. We
honor our clients, as the pet doesn't pay us, the owner does.
Clients deserve our always striving to provide better service by
delivering convenience to them. We grew our business continually
adding more staff so that our clients never had to wait more than
5-7 days to get an appointment. We grew our business by offering
extended hours to compensate for traffic delays as our valley become
quite populated. Our client services and convenient appointment
scheduling is why we are grooming the 3rd generation of our original
clients, now 40 years.
Cancellation lists are a
must. If you are booked solid, and cannot work in a client, take a
cancellation list. It's amazing how many times even confirmed
appointments don't show because of a car accident, car breakdown or
whatever. Instead of losing the income from cancellation, we
referred to our cancellation list and rushed someone in. They loved
the service, and they became very loyal in return for the special
care service.
We strongly recommend
you study the Preferred Client Program appointment scheduling
program in the book, From Problems to
Profits. Most groomers today offer a "standing
appointment" where the pet owner may leave with their next
appointment scheduled. Wow! Those are great clients, and you get the
maximum number of appointments a year from them. Some owners tell
us, "We have nearly all clients as "standing
appointments", but unfortunately too often it is not a matter
of management expertise, but the result of telling their clients if
they don't become a standing appointment client, "We may never
be able to get you in again for weeks." In truth, sublime
truth, these clients are being "trained" by threats. It's
not uncommon either.
Madeline Ogle's
Preferred Client Program offers more than a standing appointment
option. It offers clients an "appointment scheduling call"
2-8 weeks AFTER their last appointment. Today, over 1,000 readers of
her book are providing up to 60% of clients this innovative system
of scheduling reminders professionally regulated. Why? Well, if you
have 500 clients that come in 4 times a year that 2,000
appointments, and at about $30 average per appointment, that's
$60,000 a year on the register. Maddie found that be regulating
appointment frequency with the courtesy of a scheduling call, she
got extra appointments out of EVERY client each year. In fact she
nearly doubled her business, meaning those same 500 clients came in
about 8 times a year instead, ringing up $120,000 a year on the
register instead of $60,000. We urge you to use her courtesy
appointment system in From Problems to
Profits, and know that hundreds have come to learn the system in
detail at one of the Madson Group consultations
or workshops. It's a HUGE
trade secret used by more than 1,000 readers. No wonder some first
time grooming business owners liftoff like a rocket because they get
more appointments from the same clients their competitors have!
Smart!
