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For the most part, typical pickup and delivery clients are "older people" that may be a shut-in, or simply at the point in their life where they can't or prefer not to drive, especially in major metropolitan areas known for congested traffic. However, today pick-up and delivery is appealing to growing numbers of two working heads of households, and that means a far greater number of potential clients. For those of you with businesses where Winter can be cold and harsh, encouraging people and pets to stay in more, offering pickup and delivery can perk up your sales of services.

How you add pickup and delivery services is important. Don't lose your present focus and expect that most clients won't drive to you but rely on pickup and delivery. Perhaps only 10% of your business may use pick-up and delivery, but think about, a 10% increase in business each year is very healthy growth.

We suggest you offer pickup and delivery services on Tuesdays through Thursdays. If Saturday's are your busiest day like many groomers, why would you offer it that day. Use pickup and delivery to its best nature and that is to expand your business, especially early in the week. Our attitude in growing a large business was "to make every day as busy as Saturday" and we did, in part due to pickup and delivery midweek only.

You must carefully organize the service and watch your costs.

• Post a street map of your business' market area on a cork board, and mark the location of your business with a push pin. (For those of you following The Madson Management System in the book, From Problems to Profits, you can use the same market map as instructed in Chapter 12). If you plan on offering pickup and delivery 2 days a week, decide which areas to serve on one day of the week, and the other areas to be served on the remaining day. Why? Zig-zagging across your market area, from one side of town to the other, can be very costly and force you to charge too much for pickup and delivery services; gas, mileage and wear and tear out of control and vanish profit easily. Therefore, your pickup and delivery services should be well-organized by areas served on certain days of the week. Make up a flyer you can hand your clients clearly stating what days of the week and hours you serve their area. By the way, some owners setup schedules for large mobile home parks, or walled communities, and and serve them with pickup and delivery on the "first Tuesday of each month." Word gets around and one stop may fill your van. To save mileage our routes did not pickup a pet here, and immediately bring them to the salon, and then leave again. The mileage adds up like your costs. We were so organized in 4-6 stops in the same area on ONE roundtrip from the salon, we would pickup an average of 8 to 10 pets. They were all groomed in a reasonable time, and all were delivered in one run back to their happy owners. Minimum mileage. Minimum expense. Maximum service for about a $7-8 round trip pick-up and delivery add-on fee.

• We suggest you take the point of view that we adopted, "We don't attempt to make a profit on pickup and delivery." We earned our profit from doing volume grooming business. Where some businesses were seeing a client every 6-8 weeks we were getting repeat business from the majority of our clients every 4-5 weeks, and that's often hundreds of dollars more per client at the end of the year. How? Fair prices and lots of convenience. We tracked our pick-up and delivery costs and today still charge less than $10 more for roundtrip pickup and delivery. If the add-on fee approaches the add-on amount that a mobile groomer must add for their transportation time, clients have less reason to use the salon offering pickup and delivery versus the mobile groomer coming to their home. Keep your pickup and delivery costs moderate, and you do that as stated above, a cost-efficient schedule.

• Safety is a major factor in transporting pets. We suggest you use vans without rear seats. We've used portable carriers and constructed framing within the van to hold the carriers tightly in place. The vehicle must be air-conditioned, and don't forget a fresh supply of food and water. You never know if the van will breakdown and having an extra supply of water is vital in such circumstances as well as plenty of strong leads. Don't mix pets of different families, you're risking a fight and they will always be to a degree unpredictable.

• Here's an excellent tip to avoid dogs accidentally breaking free even when on a leash. Our pickup and delivery person, for small and medium dogs and all cats, took a portable carrier into the owner's home. Once the door was closed behind them, the pet(s) was loaded in the carrier and the carrier door shut and locked. There is simply no way the pet could get loose between the home and van. The reverse is true when returning pets. Knock on the door, step-in when invited with the pet locked in the carrier, when the door of the home is closed, release the pet. Well it may seem like a lot of steps and over concern, but we never had a bolting pet, and most groomers have stories about the bolting pet and how their heart stopped when it happened.

• Don't let anyone be your driver. It should always be a reliable employee or family member perhaps of the owner, and with a good driving record and pet handling experience. Make sure their appearance is business like and they are well-mannered. Remember, they are going to your clients' homes and often inside, so respect them by sending a professional employee with pet handling experience.

• Be sure that you have adequate insurance before you ever start pickup and delivery. Almost certainly you will need more than your regular automobile policy. Clearly describe your service plans to your insurance broker or agent and ask them how to protect your driver, the vehicle and that important inventory of pets. Don't take any chances, you must have adequate and proper insurance lest you risk your business investment.

Additional training is available at Grooming Business in a Box®.