Photo by Malia Riggs
Calvin Brown trains a dog at Dog U in Homewood.
Get to know Calvin Brown, the co-owner of Dog U, Homewood's newest dog training destination. Brown owns the store with his best friend, Tyler Hill.
Q: How did your passion with dogs and animals start?
Up until the age of nine, I was terrified of dogs. Absolutely terrified. I should preface this, because one of my late neighbors had these two, in my eyes, massive German shepherds. They would chase you, and so I thought that is what all dogs did. Then when I turned nine or 10, we got our first dog. That's when I absolutely fell in love with dogs. I started to absorb everything about dogs. I had every single dog encyclopedia. I made my mom get Dog Fancy, Dog Wear and all those magazines. I just absorbed everything. I absolutely just fell in love with them, even when I went off to college. I majored in finance because everyone was like, "Oh animals, you can't really do anything much with that." And then once I actually graduated college, I got a summer job at a dog daycare boarding/training facility. That's when I really kind of honed my craft when it came to training. So, I've been in it ever since and 22 years later, here I am.
Q: Tell us about the classes and service Dog U provides?
We offer daycare, we offer boarding and then of course training classes, private lessons. We also offer bathing and grooming at our Dog U Spa in Inverness. Classes are more so designed for where I show the owners how to actually, of course, train. Sometimes that doesn't go over so well just because sometimes owners don't have the time or the patience to really actually do the repetitious work that's actually needed. Our education, of course, daycare and our board train programs are our more popular programs. And that is where we, as the trainers, lay that foundation. But it is still important for the owners to then come in the end to do it with lessons. That's kind of where I pass the baton over and say, "Hey, now I'm going to show you guys how to actually maintain all of this training." Those are kind of all of the services that we actually offer. So daycare, boarding, training, classes, private lessons, all those things.
Q: Going into business with Tyler, what has been the most rewarding part of opening up Dog U?
We knew each other very, very well. So even if there's bumps in the road, or if there's disagreements, we are still able to actually work through that because we're friends first, and also we're actually neighbors too. So we're neighbors, best friends, and we're business partners. It is really, really fun when you can share your passion with someone that is your best friend. Work is not actually work anymore. Work is just something that you're coming in and you're just passionate about. I absolutely love it. So every day is a new adventure, and I just love it.
Q: Why do you love training and working with animals?
I think one is when you have a green puppy that doesn't know anything, and then being able to really help mold that puppy into its future. I always tell owners to actually look at your puppy and look into the future to that one-year-old dog or that adult dog that you actually want and start up with molding and working towards that. I always tell people if you plan on having kids in the future, make sure that you’re exposing your puppy to kids in the mean time.
I get a lot of with owners that say, "Hey Calvin, I'm gonna have a baby in like six months and my dog has never been around kids." And I'm thinking, well, if we would have started early in the sense of looking at that puppy for the future, it would be easier. But one thing that I really love is when I'm actually teaching classes, or a lesson there’s that aha moment, when the owner gets it, and I actually see it in their face and I see it in their eyes and then I see them start to really apply it. That is just everything to me because I am so passionate about it.
Q: What is something that would surprise people about Dog U?
I think Dog U's approach— because there aren't really a lot of facilities like ours in the area— in the sense of first and foremost we are a training facility. So we take everything from that trainer perspective, even placing dogs in groups, we just don't throw all dogs out there. We really actually assess the dogs and place them where they would have the most fun and for them to socialize properly. Another thing is that we don't do all day play. All day play I feel is too much for most dogs. So we do timed play sessions throughout the day. I think a lot of people would be actually shocked about how detailed we are when it comes to placing dogs in groups as well as placing them for boarding. We do have different sections within the building. The middle suites, which are a little quieter so our older dogs go there. They can just kind of chill out a little bit more, and then our more bouncy dogs are kind of down the long hall because they all share that same energy. So I think people will be shocked about how much care that we really actually put into our day to day operation, and it takes a large staff to be able to actually do that as well.
Q: Where can customers find you?
Wed: dogubham.com, email: info@dogubham.com, phone: 205-573-468
