How Much Does a Dog Groomer Make? Real Income & Career Path

Dog Groomer 

Are you dreaming about turning your passion for dogs into a rewarding career? Want to know how to become a dog groomer?

In this episode, we sit down with Sarah Gildersleeve, a grooming professional with over 20 years of experience in the pet industry. Discover the essential skills, earnings potential, and the hustle required to thrive as a dog groomer. 

From her first job bathing dogs to perfecting intricate grooming styles, Sarah shares her insights into what it takes to succeed in this fulfilling career path. 

If you’re exploring jobs working with dogs, considering a pet grooming job, or thinking about starting a dog grooming business, this episode gives you the behind-the-scenes realities.

How Much Can I Make? Is nominated for 2026 Women in Podcasting Award!

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Music credit: Kate Pierson & Monica Nation

Transcript

Cold Open: Doodles vs. Poodles

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Doodle people will come and say, Don't poodle my doodle, and poodle people will say, Don't doodle my poodle, and I'm like, I don't know what that you know, like you just tell me what you want and I will do it.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Welcome back to How Much Can I Make? I'm your host, Miravozeri. Ever wondered what it's like to make a living pumpering pups? Today I'm chatting with Sarah Gildesleeve, a dog groomer of many years who turned her love to animals into a full-time successful career. So let's dive right in and hear from Sarah what dog grooming business is all about. Thank you very much for willing to share your experience with us. Absolutely, I'm happy to be here. Tell me what inspired you and how long ago to become a dog groomer.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

So I wanted to work with animals my whole life growing up. I really had thought about being a vet or marine biologist, and then my mom's boyfriend at the time actually put it into my head to be to think about grooming. And I went and visited a groomer, and then I realized the steps that I had to take in order to become a groomer, and it kind of just changed my path a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:08

So, how long ago was that?

SPEAKER_01 1:10

20 years. Oh wow. It'll be 20 years in June. So I'm almost there. I was 25, I'll be 45 in June.

Getting Started And Training Paths

SPEAKER_00 1:17

Do you need any kind of certificate or special license?

SPEAKER_01 1:20

So unfortunately, in New York State, you don't need anything right now. I'm on a grooming association and I'm on the New York Associated Dog Clubs, and we're trying to work with legislatures to establish some kind of licensing or certificate program so that because right now anybody could wake up tomorrow and call themselves a groomer, and that's dangerous, dangerous for pets.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Absolutely. What is the best way for a beginner to get into mentor?

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Go go into a grooming shop and say, I I want to be a groomer, and they'll they'll probably give you a job as a bather. Um, bathing and drying, learning that is like 50% of doing a good job on a on a groom on a dog.

A Day In The Salon

SPEAKER_00 1:59

So this is exactly what I want to hear about. What is a typical day for you?

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Um a typical day starts at 8, 8:30, somewhere around there. First client comes in at 8:30, and then the next one 9, and then 9.30, and it's just kind of it rolls along, and uh my bather will get the first dog in the in the tub and I'll finish doing what I have to do paperwork-wise, but then it just is kind of like a a system, you know, a routine.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

What kind of services mostly do you provide?

SPEAKER_01 2:28

Bath nails and haircuts, mostly. I mean that that's really it. You know, I I will have somebody that comes by just to get their dog's nails trimmed on, you know, a lab or something. Every now and then you'll have somebody that needs to just have their eyes trimmed in between a groom. Um, but mostly people are coming in to get their full groom.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

How do you handle aggressive dog?

Handling Aggression And Reading Dogs

First Hands-On And Mentorship

SPEAKER_01 2:47

You need to be able to read a dog, and I think it takes a little time to learn that skill. You're not just born with that, and you need to be very calm and assertive and confident in your own demeanor towards a dog because anything that you put out, the dog picks up. Like I always say in training, however you are, however you're walking through life with your dog on that leash, it will go right down the leash and into the dog. Did you go through a dog training workshop? I took uh like a six-month certificate program and I got it was online, so I took all the testing online, but there was no hands-on. So then I went, got an internship, and worked for free all summer long. And she threw me right in there and said, Here's a poodle, do some poodle feet. And that was my first, you know, I'll never forget that. I had no idea how to do poodle feet, but I I do now, you know.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

But um is there a certain kind of dog that it's your is your favorite to work on besides from Airedales?

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Um, I love a standard poodle, I love the transformation that you can make, and you can do so many different trims on a standard poodle. Their hair, if they if you have a poodle with good hair, you can do, I mean, it's limitless. You can do just about anything. I do a lot of hand stripping, which is pulling hair out of mainly terriers. You you know, you do a little bit on other dogs, but mainly terriers, it's pulling the hairs out, which is how I groom my aireds for for show. Um, I love doing that because the transformation, I just had a border terrier the other day, and it goes from being this wild crazy to very trimmed and sleek and and and beautiful. I love that.

Show Coats vs Pet Clips

SPEAKER_00 4:21

You mentioned you have you did a show dog, is it different?

SPEAKER_01 4:24

It's very different. Um, so I have airedales, and it takes me about 10 hours to get her into a show coat a week and to keep her in coat. Whereas if I'm trimming an airedale, a pet airedale, and I'm clipping that airedale, it's like you know, a two and a half hour job, maybe. So it's very different.

SPEAKER_00 4:41

Takes you 10 hours?

SPEAKER_01 4:43

Yeah. Why? Because you're pulling hairs on on air on airedales and many terriers to show them, and that keeps the coat structure intact, it keeps the color and the texture, which is what you have to have in order to show them.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

And you learned all that on the job.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

And I learned all that through through a mentor. Through a mentor, my mentor taught me all of that and gave me my first uh my first show dog. And it doesn't hurt the dog when you pull the no because you you lose the the root ball on the end of it. Like when you pull your, you know, when you wax your eyebrows, if you keep doing it and you keep doing it, it gets easier to do it each and every time. It's the same kind of thing.

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Is there any high season for grooming?

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Christmas is usually crazy, right before Thanksgiving is nutty, and then you know, springtime. It's like springtime shaved down. You know, everybody lets their dogs go all winter because it gets cold and they they think they should let them grow all this coat, and then you know, March or April comes and it's mud season, and now they have these hot messes of a dog, and they need to, you know, clean it up.

SPEAKER_00 5:41

I can understand that, but why Christmas?

SPEAKER_01 5:43

For me, I think everybody has to have, you know, when they're having people over, family over, or they're going somewhere, they have to have this beautiful dog.

SPEAKER_00 5:52

What's the craziest client you have? What demands do they have?

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Eyelashes are huge. Um, don't trim their eyelashes. It can be great if you can see them. And if you can't, then it's a totally other thing. Um, doing poodle feet on like a schnauzer. That stuff kills me. Doing like, you know, I mean the the people the you know, the doodle owners, and I know I might get some pushback for that, but you know, doodle people will come and say, Don't poodle my doodle, and poodle people will say, Don't doodle my poodle. And I'm like, I don't know what that, you know, like you just tell me what you want and I will do it. But I don't so there's some funny things, there's some really fun things as well, though.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

Would you say there is a trend in grooming?

SPEAKER_01 6:35

Yeah, you can definitely get into a trend, like right now with all these doodles, and there's many different kinds, you know. You're I mean, they're making burner doodles and sheep a doodles down to you know, a labradoodle, and everybody's got the same quest of like this I want this doodle-looking dog.

Client Requests And Boundaries

SPEAKER_00 6:52

That's funny. Okay, let's talk about money. How much can a dog groomer make?

SPEAKER_01 6:57

So I think when you first start out, you're kind of working really, really, really hard for not a lot. And you know, and as a bather, I think that's probably between 15 and 20 dollars is what a bather is making, I think, right now. I think there's there's places out there where they do commissions. So if there's you know, you're getting a 50% commission, and if you're doing a dog for a hundred dollars and it takes you two hours.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

What is usually the charge to groom a dog?

SPEAKER_01 7:23

Um, I think in this, it's so it varies. In this location, um, I think you can probably expect to pay for a small dog somewhere around$75 to$80. I think it goes up to a larger doodle type dog of you know, upwards of like$200. But you're think you gotta think about, you know, at$75, it's an hour and 20 minutes. It takes me about an hour and 20 minutes, hour and a half to groom that dog. So if you break that into hourly, and then you have to pay your bather, then you have to pay your taxes, and then you have to pay your electric bill, and then you have to that goes into it. So you have to you know, you have to know your worth.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

You make more money on grooming a show dog, right?

Money Talk: Pay, Pricing, Costs

SPEAKER_01 7:59

No, not really. No, because so I groom my own show dogs, and I obviously I don't get paid for that, and you know, I still am charging a certain amount for grooming a a show dog, but they're coming to me much more regular. You know, to keep an aerodale and coat, if they're coming to me every other week, or to keep, you know, even a smaller dog, it's still the same, it's not necessarily more money, it's just it's it's a little easier because they're coming so regularly and they're so used to it.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

How often do people come for uh to groom their dog? Oh, every four to six weeks. So you mentioned the beginners will start with a minimum wage, but how much can they grow? What is the potential?

SPEAKER_01 8:36

I mean, there's I think there's you could grow your businesses as much as you want. You could go out and get this really high upscale, especially in this area, this upscale salon, and you could line five tables in there and hire groomers and just manage your salon. You could potentially make a lot of money, or you could stay small. What happens if somebody comes and they don't like the haircut you gave? I'll fix it. However, I can make somebody happy. I would rather make them happy. To a certain point, you know, you have some people that are like all over the top and and you're never gonna make them happy.

SPEAKER_00 9:08

Do you have a story like that?

Frequency, Growth, And Scaling

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Oh, I had yeah, I do. I have this one little poodle lady I she had gone around from groomer to groomer to groomer, and I had groomed her dog. I've worked at two different salons in this town, and I groomed the same dog in both of those salons over the course of like three or four years. And she came to me here and she was like telling me how to groom the dog, and then she would take the scissors and move my scissors away as I'm trying to groom the dog's, you know. I oh, it was it was it was she was a lot, and I I had to let her go.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

Do people come to you with photographs of a dog? All the time.

SPEAKER_01 9:44

And I I I want that, you know, give me an idea. And and I I can explain to them how realistic that is or not nicely, you know. I mean, if you're bringing me a picture of a puppy and your dog is 10, we have two totally different hairs, you know, it we we have to kind of compromise on something.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

Do you have to get some sort of insurance because you're dealing with scissors and somebody can get hurt? I carry a liability insurance.

SPEAKER_01 10:07

I don't know if you need to do that if you're working for compensation for if somebody's you know sharing their profit with you. I don't know if they carry the insurance or if you carry your own.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Is it good to specialize in a specific grid? I think so.

Fixes, Redos, And Letting Clients Go

SPEAKER_01 10:19

I think so. I think you should get good. Like I'm known as the terrier lady. People come to me with their terriers from Canada and from the bottom of New Jersey and from you know, people. That's a long way away. It is, it is. People travel from New York City with their terriers up here, and people travel to go. Because people are crazy. But if you know, you know, say say somebody knows how to do a standard poodle perfectly, they will travel for that. You know, it's like they're kids. It really is.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

What's the surprising thing about your business that people don't know? That it's probably one of the dirtiest dog jobs.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

I mean, it really is. You know, people they they think like you you sit there and you play with puppies and you have this great life, and then they don't realize like the dog next to you just puked in his crate and the other one had explosive diarrhea, and you've been peed on today. It can be really gross. I could go on further, but I'm not going to. I mean, you you're I'm just a glorified pooper picker upper sometimes, you know. It's like and then you step in it and you're like, oh, it's just good luck, you know. You just gotta laugh it off. But you know, people think it's it's like this great, you know, you just get to play with dogs, and it's just not and have you ever got bitten by a dog?

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Oh, yes.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

I have uh I just finally I got bit on my finger and it was all black and blue. It finally just peeled off. But is the owner responsible for that? Or no, it's part of the job. I mean, yeah, it's just kind of it's a hazard. You're gonna get bit. Is there a physical demand? So I don't sit down all day, pretty much. You're you're walking around, you know, walking around your table. I mean, I've had carpal tunnel surgery from holding scissors. Really? I have half a bicep tear right now because I picked up something, but it's because I had bicep tendinitis from probably from hand stripping and brushing out a long-haired dog. So physically demanding.

Insurance And Specializing

SPEAKER_00 12:09

Yeah, sounds very demanding. So let's talk about reward. What is the most rewarding thing about your job? Watching them walk out like through all that in a bag of chips.

SPEAKER_01 12:18

And watching, I've had I've had owners come back and especially like a first-time groom on a puppy, and their owners come back to get their dog and they cry.

SPEAKER_00 12:26

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Um, you know, when when somebody says, you know, even just like gives you a shout out on Facebook and say, I have this amazing groomer. I mean, it's just it's the little thank yous. It's because it's a thankless job for the most part. But when people take a take a minute and really say, you know, we appreciate you and thank you for taking care. When a dog passes and they send you a, you know, they send you a a a little email or a note just saying thanks for taking care of Buddy for the last, you know, 15 years or whatever. It's you know, it's moments like that that really make it.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

So if you go down the street and you see one of the dogs you worked on, you recognize immediately.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Yeah. I usually recognize a dog before I recognize a person.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

I have one more question. You mentioned before you put them on the table. So just describe to me. You have a sink to wash the dog.

The Messy Reality Of Grooming

SPEAKER_01 13:10

Yeah, I have a big sink. It's like a it's a sink that it's electric, so it goes up and down so that I can have a big dog walk in and then I can raise it up, or I just you know, it's raised and you lift a little dog, and then I have the same kind of table. I have a big four foot-long table that goes all the way down to the ground and comes all the way back up, all the way back up. That makes it a lot easier. It makes it a lot easier. It makes it makes you able to do a big dog by yourself because otherwise you need two people to help lift up a big dog.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

So, how many dogs can you get you can do a day?

SPEAKER_01 13:40

I mean, I've done as many as 10 recently. Um I try and keep it to like six though.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

Six, six clips. Fantastic. And that's kind of a job. AI is not threatening your your job at all.

SPEAKER_01 13:52

I would love to see a robot or a robot groom my 18-year-old cockpoint. I mean, I would love to see that. I it's you know, it's pretty recession proof. It's pretty people will stop getting their hair done as much, but they will still get, you know, maybe they'll stretch it like an extra week, but they're not gonna not come.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

Did it happen to you that somebody groomed a dog at home and it was awful and they came to you and said, Please help? Oh yeah. Oh, all the time.

Physical Demands And Injuries

SPEAKER_01 14:18

Oh, you should see what so I have this one lady, she has two old English sheepdogs and two Yorkes, and she brings them to me every single time. She's like, I just cleaned it up a little bit. And she like gave him like a flat top on top, and she's like, Can you fix it? And I'm like, I can't. I mean, I gotta glue hair back. I'm like, I don't know how to fix that, but I'll try, you know. Oh, every time she does it every single time to me. And I tell her, and she's a we have a good working relationship, and so I can tell her all the time, like, I'm gonna come take your scissors away. Cause I can't there was nothing wrong until you did that. It's easy, but it's not. It's not, dogs move, you know, dogs are un so unpredictable. So you know, and it happens. I mean, mistakes happen. I used to have this little Yorkie again, and it would lick all the time. And so as you're trying to, you know, clean by the face and and trim by the face, you'd have to like just pray to the scissor gods that you didn't chop his tongue off. And groomer before me did it because it had he had two little nicks in his tongue, and and I did it once, you know. It's horrible. You feel horrible. You don't want to hurt a dog. That's not why we're here, you know.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

How many years have you been doing it?

Why It’s Worth It: Rewards

SPEAKER_01 15:28

20. This is my 20th year. And you still love it? I still love it. I do. I still love it. There's some days where I'm a little more tired. You know, there's some days where I'm like, I have a little less patience, and you just kind of gotta take a step back. But I love every single dog that comes in here. They're good.

SPEAKER_00 15:43

Is there a dog that you will not accept?

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Yeah, the big argumentative ones, like, so because I I have four herniated discs as well in me. So I'm not lifting up big Saint Bernard's, and I'm not doing great dance, and I'm not doing I just can't. I can't like let I know there's plenty of 25-year-old groomers that would love to do that.

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Do people ever come with German Shepherds? Uh-huh. All the time. I love them.

Tools, Tables, And Throughput

SPEAKER_01 16:06

Those are they're just big babies, they're great. Wow. I have one right down the street, and he comes to me just about every like every five weeks or so. And uh big tall guy, and he walks in with a German shepherd, and he gets on the table and he whines and cries the whole time. He's the biggest baby ever. Biggest baby. He's great though.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

Wow, I think that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

He doesn't think that they get groomed. So every dog gets groomed. Every dog needs their nails cut and their ears cleaned, you know, whether they net they are short-haired or long haired, they still need to get their nails clipped. How often do you recommend for them to get a bath? I think you can give a dog a bath every time it feels you feel think it's getting smelly. With a good shampoo and conditioner, you're not gonna dry out coat, you're not gonna, you're not gonna hurt them. Well, Sarah, I can't thank you enough. I could talk about dog grooming forever. It's bad.

What Dogs She’ll Take (And Won’t)

SPEAKER_00 16:53

That's how much you love it. Yeah, yeah. That is great when you love your job. Because you don't really work a day in your life. That's fantastic. Okay, that's a wrap for today. If you have a comment or question or would like us to cover a certain job, please let us know. Visit our website at how much can I make that info. We would love to hear from you. And on your way out, don't forget to subscribe and share this episode with anyone who is curious about their next job. See you next time.