Wagville - We Mean Business: Wagville

Wagville is a Los Angeles doggie boarding and day care facility founded and run by Harvard grad and former lawyer Julie Shine. Like the other WMB subjects, Wagville isn’t making enough money. We quickly learn that:

* The company does little to no retail business, despite having a large (and cluttered) storefront
* Check-in takes minutes on a slow system
* There are no facilities for people, just for the dogs
* Employees are unmotivated and ill-tempered
* Julie cannot motivate staff and may be a micromanager
* There are 27 employees in a business that’s caring for no more than 60 dogs at any time, and the costs add up - in one month, Wagville did $90,000 in sales but had $65,000 in payroll and so couldn’t make a profit
* Julie is focused on providing a service to dogs, not on making profit
* Julie is carrying crushing credit card debt in order to keep the place running

Their Solution

The team moves aggressively to make over the facilities, and designer Peter Gurski redesigns the front of house to better serve the paying customers - the people. With a new seating lounge in the lobby, inventory moved from the cluttered sales area to a storage room (converted from a doggy lounge!), and even an uncluttered office for Julie, it looks a nicer place. Tech maven Katie Linendoll helps punch things up with new self-serve check-in kiosks and a laptop for Julie. Unfortunately, she also slaps in the digital menu and the digital photo display that she gives to everyone. Our host, Bill Rancic, tries to have a little come-to-Jesus with Julie, to get her to prioritize serving the paying customers and earning a profit. Rancic also tries to inspire the staff into contributing meaningfully, offering a commission program to encourage retail sales and even browbeating the man whose job is to scoop up all the poop and who clearly has a limited grasp of the English language.
My Recommendation

The biggest problem is the founder, Julie. It’s not that she’s wrong for the company - her love of dogs is clearly real and meaningful - it’s that she seems to be poorly-matched to day-to-day management. Rancic was on-target to try to get her to think about profit, but she really needs to be exposed to how every organization needs to bring in more than it spends, even non-profits. She also needs to think about whether or not this is the right position for her. It seems that she lacks management experience, and is coming off negatively to her staff. She also seems inflexible - a bad trait in an entrepreneur. In fact, she seems more of a small business owner than an entrepreneur: she’s created a job for herself, not a business (and she’s clearly happy to do that job, working with the dogs rather than managing). This makes me ask if she should bring in a manager from a pet store or vet’s office with some experience in the area. In fact, with money as tight as it is, she should consider taking her Berkeley JD and getting a job as a lawyer again, participating in strategic planning for Wagville and coming in on weekends to spend time with the staff, customers, and, most of all, the dogs, rather than avoiding doing a job she’s bad at all week long.

I have to really disagree with Rancic’s focus on increasing revenue through retail sales. While the numbers seem compelling - he said a 10% increase in retail could make Wagville profitable - retail is a tough business. Is 10% a realistic number, given that big chains like Petco almost certainly have lower prices on everything? And what will Wagville’s customers really want to buy? It strikes me that a focus on regular but small impulse sales, like a special treat or a new small toy to make up for leaving your dog for a weekend, is likely to pay off, but when will Wagville’s customers choose to pay more for everyday food, outfits, or equipment like leashes and bowls? No effort to increase sales will succeed if the product mix is wrong. And getting rid of some highly-valued boarding facilities - the doggie lounge they turned into a storage facility - in order to provide more room for retail sales, which don’t make a ton of money and aren’t the focus of Wagville, seems like a silly idea.

Instead, I’d concentrate on upselling services they already offer, like grooming and night boarding. Why not sell the concept of a “date night” where you don’t need to worry about your dog, featuring pick-up and drop-off? Would they get more overnight customers that way? How about periodic baths and trims, on a set schedule, for regular boarders? Baths and grooming could be sold at a discount if bought up-front with bulk boarding purchases. I’d also look to get more boarders by partnering with vets and pet stores that don’t have the facilities to provide boarding. Wagville could offer discounts to customers referred by these places and even refer customers back - something they can’t do if Wagville is a retail-focused organization.

Wagville should also consider raising its prices. They have 60 dogs around at most times and Rancic even mentions a month in which they grossed $90,000, so they’re doing some business. Could they raise rates 10%? Many companies undercharge, and Wagville’s facilities are clearly super-premium, so I suspect their customers would see value even at a higher rate.

Finally, I’d like to see a real breakdown of headcount. If monthly payroll is really at the $65,000 level, some quick math suggests to me that they have at least 7 staff in the facility at all times - even at night. Could they cut down some? There’s premium care, and then there’s people who aren’t doing much, and Julie needs to figure out the line and be clear about it. For instance, they probably don’t need someone sleeping with the dogs at night, because dogs are probably about as happy sleeping with other dogs as they are with strangers, and, either way, the dogs get a nice, comfy bed to sleep in.
More Thoughts on the Show

I was really happy to see another show that wasn’t about a restaurant. I even found Linendoll less annoying than in the past. And we saw her configuring computers - she’s not just a pretty face! But some problems continue; for instance, it’s time to quit with the digital monitors. Are monitors actually cheaper than chalkboards or pre-printed plastic? The monitor solution has become too cookie-cutter and automatic, and just cheapens the idea of the Dell makeovers.

My TV producer girlfriend is also particularly (and justifiably) annoyed by the camerawork. The cameraman is fine when he’s locked onto a tripod, but, when he’s working handheld, he’s all over the place. This isn’t The Shield - the style here should match the host, and Bill Rancic is a button-down man.

And we’ve seen some disdain towards poorly-motivated hourly workers in a number of shows. Why was Wagville’s poop-scooper unmotivated? Probably because he scoops poop for a living! But someone’s got to scoop all that from 60 dogs! They probably doesn’t pay him enough to care or to have a good attitude, and, guess what, if he got really involved, he probably wouldn’t have time to scoop poop anymore. Let’s appreciate the poop scoopers for the poop they scoop.


Source: wadearmstrong.com