On June 6th I took off to the amazing city of Sydney, Australia with my partner Coleman. After a very long flight and me dying for a fag we finally landed and were whisked off to the hotel. I went to bed straight away as I had to be up early bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in the morning to judge at a show.
The grooming show was put on by the Australian Pet Trade Association and was held in Luna Park. The contest was full of very talented groomers and I had the hard task of picking out the winners. But I pulled in Pammie Carmichael-Hogg to assist as she was there also, demonstrating her Asian Fusion grooming which proved to be very popular. It was a long day and we finally crowned the best in show at 9.30 pm which went to a young girl with a lovely groomed Springer.
After my time judging I spent most of my fun time in Darling Harbour which is just a ferry ride across the water from Luna Park and while sitting with my partner at a bar or a cafe I saw many dogs walking around. All were sporting nice haircuts, most of which were long and not the typical shave-offs. I asked a few dog owners how much they paid their groomers. All three said the same, which was in the 75-dollar bracket (about the equivalent of £43 in the UK). I found Australian groomers all have the same issues everybody else does, which is pricing and getting the respect from their clients.
My seminars consisted of promoting my book ‘What Would Colin Do?’ as well as talking about the importance of good customer service and how to create the easy pet trim so that you are working smarter not harder. The crowd was eager to learn and asked many questions. After three days of talking I was starting to lose my voice but all the groomers seemed to get a lot out of the seminars. I hope they use the tips I showed them to make their passion easer to achieve.
After my 10 days in Sydney it was time to do the pain-staking trip home and yes it was a long one but I was excited as I got to return to my well-missed Jigsaw who most of you know.
Over the year and with all the travel I have began to understand that no matter where I am in the world groomers all have the same issues. And one groomer said something that stuck in my head: “We all are different but no matter what sex we are or colour, we all share one thing and that’s the passion to groom dogs so instead of working against each other we should help one another out and come together more.” Wise words. Colin x
