What’s Waggin’ – Spring 2024

By: Steven Appelbaum, ABC President & CEO

Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of What’s Waggin! 

Many good things are happening at Animal Behavior College, so let’s jump in. 

First, I want to acknowledge all the pet industry companies that assist ABC.    Cooperation from pet companies is a familiar thing for us. Before ABC, my first company, Animal Behavior & Training Associates (ABTA), handed every one of our students an equipment list. This list contained the items most would need to take one of our group classes or private lessons. At its peak, ABTA conducted 200+ monthly classes in 44 states and Canada. This meant many people got our equipment list each month, leading to companies wanting to know how they could get their names and products on our list.   This led to immediate questions and concerns. I was only interested in products I had tried or had received consistently good customer feedback. The products on any list had to be available in the stores where we were conducting our classes. This was mainly through Petco, so handing clients a list of products they couldn’t get in the stores we were teaching in made no sense.    

By the time ABTA grew to teaching classes nationally, I had already been a professional dog trainer for 16 years, so it’s not like I wasn’t familiar with a great many products; Kong and Coastal were early contributors, as was Charlee Bear and I knew from personal experience and from years of feedback that they made outstanding products.   When ABTA was bought out in 2004, I no longer had any say on which products appeared on the equipment list.   However, my school, Animal Behavior College, was a stand-alone company. After a few years, most of the companies I worked with for the first time rekindled their relationship with my new organization.  

Coastal Pet Products has been a fantastic sponsor of ABC since 2003.

Kong has been a fabulous sponsor of ABC since 2003.

Charlee Bear has sponsored ABC since 2002.

Cardinal made a training treat that most dogs adored called Crazy Dog Train Me Treats!   They sponsored us starting in 2004. When Whitebridge acquired Cardinal, the new entity was also interested in maintaining our relationship. They have been a very supportive sponsor for years.  

Andis and Wahl are both highly supportive sponsors of the college and are committed to educating the next generation of pet groomers. 

Groomer’s Choice not only sends all ABC grooming students their grooming kit but has sponsored the school since 2010.  

Other companies like pawTree, and Fig & Tyler are newer sponsors but equally important.

We also have a working relationship with Jodi Murphy, who offers outstanding continuing education materials for our groomer graduates. 

All of these companies share many of our values. These include a desire and willingness to help pets and the people who love them live their best lives, a commitment to quality, and an understanding of the importance of education and the influence that dog trainers, pet groomers, and veterinary staff have on pet parents’ decisions about their beloved pets.   

Over the decades, I have come to know many people at these companies and was not surprised to find that they are good people who again share our values and desire to help our four-legged friends. 

Our 18th classroom program graduated earlier this year! 

People from all over the nation travel to Southern California to attend this course. We run it twice per year, and it takes students five and a half months to complete. The program is our DOP but condensed into an immersive experience. 

Since the program is approved for Veterans until Title 38, about 80 percent of the student body comprises military veterans looking for a new career to assist their transition into civilian life. Over the years, we have had students from the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines take this program. Our last graduating class featured a student who was the highest-ranking officer ever to take our program. She was a retired Admiral.   Seth Hudson, an Army veteran, loves teaching this class and helping veterans and civilians learn to become professional dog trainers. 

Shifting gears, I want to talk about something on many people’s minds. Inflation. 

We all know what it is, and even when the inflation rates are relatively low, we all notice how our money doesn’t purchase what it used to.   For example, 20 years ago, in 2004, gasoline, which saw a spike in prices that year, was selling for about $1.79 a gallon.  

 I moved from the East Coast to Los Angeles in 1973. My parents drove the family across the country, and I remember seeing gas prices at a scandalous 51 cents a gallon, which was unheard of at the time. I can remember gas at 26 cents a gallon, and I wonder how many readers are old enough to remember that or even less expensive gas. Inflation has always been with us, but the inflation rates of the last few years aren’t anything we’ve seen since the early 1980’s.

Moreover, even when inflation rates come down, it’s not like prices drop. If inflation is 8% in one year and drops to 5% the following 12 months, goods and services are roughly 13% more expensive than they were two years ago. If wages don’t increase at a higher rate, everyone knows what will happen. People can’t afford as many things as they need or want.   We understand this, so at a time when prices are rising, we elected to drop all our main program prices to help people wishing to enter the pet industry follow their dreams. 

Next, I want to thank all mentors and graduates who referred a friend to ABC. Over the last 12 months, we’ve had 158 people take our programs as a direct result of your referrals. If you don’t already know about it, please check out the information on our Refer a Friend website page here: https://www.animalbehaviorcollege.com/refer-a-friend/

Finally, I want to give a shout-out to all the ABC students who, for almost 20 years, have contributed to students saving lives. Our website tracks the number of hours, which was 185,000, in the middle of Q4 last year. We are getting pretty darn close to 200,000 hours’ worth of volunteering at shelters and rescues all over North America. Not only does this program help shelters, but it also helps future generations of pet professionals build relationships with the rescue communities.  

That’s all for now and I will talk with you again in our next edition of this newsletter.  Thanks for reading.