After a bit of a hiatus, I’m thrilled to announce a long-awaited Tuesday Tapestry interview!
In this edition, I caught up with Abigayle, the founder and Chief Wag Officer at Dog of Honor Event Specialists. As a wedding dog chaperone, Abigayle looks after couples’ fur babies and works with event coordinators, photographers, and other professionals to ensure the big day goes seamlessly.
In this interview, Abigayle:
- Shares the inspiration behind her unique business
- Discusses the importance of niching down
- Talks through the marketing strategies that have led to her success
- And chats about her future plans
There are several unique and helpful insights here, and I think there’s a lot to take away from this conversation. Let’s get started!
Brina: Let’s chat a bit about your background. What inspired you to start Dog of Honor Event Specialists?
Abigayle: I think the natural place to start is that I don’t remember a time when I haven’t had a dog — golden retrievers, bulldogs, cockapoos, you name it. I’ve also volunteered at shelters and done business fund development for the SPCA.
But my day job for the last 20-something years has been in software construction technology sales. So I really didn’t get to tap into my love for animals.
When COVID hit, I was feeling a little stuck in my job. I didn’t want to leave because of the economy, but I needed something to feed my soul. I decided I was going to launch a company to help people throw birthday parties for their dogs.
Then I came across the idea of wedding dog chaperones at a company in Florida, and I saw that they were even flying to California to do weddings. So I thought, “Certainly there must be someone in Northern California who is providing this service. We’ve got all these amazing outdoor wedding venues. We’re all obsessed with our dogs here, especially in the city. Like, who’s doing this locally?!” I figured I’d reach out to them and say, “Hey, I’ll do a wedding for you once in a while.”
I was Googling, Googling, Googling. Couldn’t find anyone. And so I was like, “Okay, well, that’s my opening. That’s my opportunity.” And so in July 2021, I jumped right in. I started my website, my Instagram, and began networking with other wedding professionals.
Brina: I love how you were able to find such a niche need for a lifelong interest.
Abigayle: Yeah, and a couple of really big trends gave me the wind at my back. One is that we were coming out of COVID. So a lot of weddings had been postponed. 2022 was supposed to be the biggest year for weddings since 1984. So I had that helping. There’s also the growing number of millennials who are delaying getting married overall. Plus all these people who got dogs during COVID.
So there’s all these little micro trends. I keep coming across stories about how millennials are buying homes not because they want to have children (and have a backyard for these children). The only reason they’re buying a home is because they want to give a backyard for their dog. Millennials are making major life and financial decisions around giving their dog the quality of life that they want.
Dogs are such a great way to socialize and meet people because [they’re] an easy bridge to connect. Everyone loves dogs. Republican, Democrat, all ages, all walks of life — what do we all have in common? We all love our dogs.
Brina: Oh, definitely! I can really relate to that. I wanted to pivot a bit now. What does a typical Wedding Day Pet Care session look like for you?
Abigayle: We provide a full concierge service for our couples and their dogs. What that often looks like is chauffeuring the dog of honor from its home or wherever the bride and groom are getting ready. We take the dog to the wedding venue just in time to participate in the first look and all of the pre-wedding ceremony pictures.
Our role at that time is to support the wedding photographer. I’ll usually stand behind the photographer with a squeaky toy or a treat and make sure the dog is looking at the camera. I’m running back and forth to make sure the dog stays in place. So that’s helping to speed up the timeline and making sure that the photographer is able to get amazing photos of the dog. They often have a long shot list, and adding a dog to a large group can slow down the day.
Then there’s also understanding the dog’s role within the ceremony itself. Sometimes that means we’re walking the dog of honor down the aisle ourselves. Other times that’s just understanding who is walking the dog down the aisle.
We have to consider a few things. Does the dog stay up front the entire time? Or do we need a game plan if the dog starts barking and crying because mom and dad are up there and not paying attention? In the latter case, we have a plan B to escort the dog out of the area.
After the ceremony, we’ll rinse and repeat with the photography. Everyone’s favorite part of the day is escorting the dog through the cocktail reception.The guests get such a big kick out of saying hello to the dog of honor. The dog is treated like a rock star! I’ll take pictures of guests with the dog or take a little selfie with the dog. That’s a really fun time to mingle and get to know everybody.
Typically, that’s when we say goodbye to the bride and groom for the night and then escort and chauffeur the dog home. Usually the venue doesn’t allow the dog to stay for the reception. A big reason why a lot of the couples hire us is that they don’t want to ask any of their friends or family members to leave their wedding to drive their dog home.
So, we’re taking the dog back home or wherever home is for the night. This might be an Airbnb, a hotel, grandma and grandpa’s house, or any other designated location. We’ll bring it back home, feed it dinner, give it one more walk, a little bit of snuggle time. Since the dog is so tired from such an exciting, overwhelming day, it usually takes itself to bed. (And has great puppy dreams for the rest of the night!)
Brina: Love that! My dad got married a few years ago and our dog was there. We didn’t have somebody like you there, so we did have to ask some friends to take care of him. It would have been so handy to have a dog chaperone to look after him and let him be part of the wedding more.
Abigayle: Right!
The other thing that I discovered early on is that there’s naturally a lot of downtime in between events.
I started taking a lot of pictures and videos of the dog to provide for the couple — a bit more of the behind-the-scenes photos. You can never have too many wedding photos, right?! It’s fun to get your dog’s point of view of your wedding.
I take any opportunity to create social media content for them, saving them the cost of hiring a content creator. I’ll also upload photos to the Google album so their friends can enjoy them, as well.
I’m never trying to compete with [the wedding photographer]. In reality, the photographer can’t be everywhere all at once, so I joke that I’m the dog’s paparazzi.
Brina: That’s cute! Okay, I’m also curious: in your experience, what have been the biggest benefits of niching down in your business?
Abigayle: I think the biggest benefit has been the referrals that I’ve received from other wedding professionals. Couples and other wedding professionals, particularly venues, photographers, and planners, take comfort in our service. They appreciate that Dog of Honor understands the flow and unpredictability of weddings.
I think of weddings as live productions. It helps to have a plan in place for how a dog is going to be part of the couple’s special day. We’re able to think on our feet and be gracious to all of the guests and vendors when things don’t quite go to plan.
We’ve mastered the customer service aspect and understand that things won’t always go according to plan. And so how do we address that? A Rover pet sitter won’t be able to anticipate the unique needs of a wedding.
Brina: Yeah, for sure. Weddings can be so stressful. It’s a major advantage to be able to take away some of [the couple’s] stress.
Abigayle: I tell couples that the wedding is gonna go by so quickly. They’re just not going to have the time to manage anything that has to do with their dog. So I just try to anticipate all of their needs. I have backup leashes, treats that fit their dog’s dietary needs, enough water, especially when it’s really hot. There are all these different contingency plans.
The other benefit of having such a niche service is that we’re able to fine-tune our website for SEO. There’s of course the Instagram algorithm, as well, which is doing all the heavy lifting for me.
If I were just a pet sitter, I wouldn’t come up because there are hundreds out there. People who find me through search are looking for a very specific service. They may not know that my niche service exists, but they’re exploring ideas like, “What do I do with my dog at my wedding?”
When someone finds our business online, it becomes obvious that we’ve chaperoned countless dogs at weddings. I really haven’t touched my website since I created it.
I feel like Instagram allows me to reach a lot more people. I constantly keep it updated with new content. So why do double the work with the website?
Brina: Awesome! Sounds like Instagram really has been huge for bringing awareness to your business. In addition to that, what other marketing efforts have worked the best for you to get your business’ name out there?
Abigayle: One of the reasons why I transitioned from dog birthday parties to weddings is that my professional background has always been in business-to-business sales.
I realized that with dog birthday parties, I would be responsible for outreach directly to each potential client. So it would be a B2C model, which requires much more effort to build awareness. And the chances of repeat business would be low. After all, how many people are going to throw a big birthday party for their dog every year? Probably not many.
On the flip side, if I’m networking with wedding professionals, they can bring me repeat work. Ultimately, it’s the wedding professionals who I’m marketing to.
Brina: That’s clever.
Abigayle: Yeah. For me, Dog of Honor is still very much business-to-business.
So that’s how I initially got the word out there. I just attended a bunch of wedding fairs and was strategic about it. For instance, I would wait until a week before the fair and ask, “Oh, do you still have a table available?” By this time, they were desperate — they didn’t want empty tables at their fair. I would negotiate a reduced rate and since my business is such a niche service, they liked the novelty of it. They may have multiple photographers and venues, but there was only one wedding dog chaperone. That’s another way that the niche has really served me.
While I paid for these wedding fairs, my primary goal wasn’t meeting couples, as most attendees are newly engaged and not immediately in need of my services. When are they getting married? A year or two from now. I’m a brand new business. I can’t wait two years!
At the very first fair that I went to, I had what I called my “wag swag bag.” It had my logo on a pink little bag that had my business card and some treats.
I gave these little goodie bags to all of the vendors, and it was a good excuse to network with each one of them. I definitely will confirm that [the wedding fairs] weren’t great for meeting couples.
I stopped paying for fairs and then, I started getting invited to venues that have vendor showcases. It’s still a wedding fair, but they’re not charging the vendors to attend. I can still network with all the vendors, and for the most part, the only vendors that are present are on the preferred vendor list.
So it’s like, “Okay, you’re one of us. You’re trusted by the venue. We’re going to also refer business to you.” I found out that if I bring my dog, so many vendors will share an Instagram story — a picture of my booth with my dog in front of it. It’s been so great for business!
Brina: I bet! It’s awesome that you’ve gotten to build so many important connections.
Abigayle: Yeah, so going back to marketing. Now, my focus is on just building awareness, mostly through Instagram by connecting with other vendors.
I don’t really pay for any advertising except for paying to boost an occasional Instagram post. But I don’t pay for wedding fairs, I haven’t paid for The Knot or any magazines.
I’m pretty much at capacity. So there’s no point in spending money to create more demand than I can fulfill.
Brina: That’s true. And it seems like you’re already doing so well organically.
What are the three biggest lessons you’ve learned from owning/running this business?
Abigayle: I think the first one is knowing that niching down is better. Being a generalist means you’re competing with so many others and potential clients have a hard time finding you. There’s so much noise out there.
Having a niche gives people the confidence that I have the expertise they need.
The second lesson is that it’s okay to ask for help. I’ve met so many wonderful wedding professionals that are thrilled to help me. Like I said, they meet me at a vendor showcase and they take a picture of my dog, my booth. They’re so thrilled that they can refer me and that they can help their clients who want their dog at their wedding.
I also think it’s okay to be very specific in what you’re asking for. Let’s say it’s a photographer. I might say, “Hey, I see you do a little work at this venue. I would love to work at that venue. Do you know how I can get on the preferred vendor list? Who could I reach out to?” Even just asking them that question can lead to them saying, “Oh, I’ll talk to them.”
People need to know how they can help you. So give them some ideas. Sometimes it’s as simple as, “Hey, could you share this post? Share a story?” There are a lot of low-effort ways for other vendors to help build awareness.
The third lesson is that I don’t have to go overboard. This was probably a bit of imposter syndrome when I first started, which I think is natural. I wasn’t an expert yet; I was learning as I went. So I was trying to offer more guidance, but I was going way above and beyond.
I was spending a ton of time creating vision boards — almost being a wedding planner. After a few months, I realized that people didn’t need that. They really just wanted someone to take care of their dog the day of the wedding and drive them home.
I didn’t need to kill myself spending a bunch of time sourcing attire for them and brainstorming other ideas. It’s best to just keep it simple. That saved me a lot of time.
Brina: Right. Like you said, the imposter syndrome can make us do all these extraneous things in the beginning when we’re still trying to build that confidence.
For our final question, I wanted to know: how do you balance running this business along with your day job? Do you ever plan to make it your full-time gig?
Abigayle: It’s definitely challenging. But one of the reasons why I picked this industry, aside from the fact that I knew there was a business-to-business element to it, is because 80% of weddings are likely going to take place during the weekend. So by design, I knew I had the capacity to balance the two.
With all of the work that leads up to the wedding day, I’m very disciplined about how I use my evenings and my weekend hours for consultation calls, client communication, social media, content creation, et cetera.
I do a couple of key things. One way I manage my time is by leveraging technology. So, for example, all of my consultation calls are scheduled via my software platform, HoneyBook. Whether you’re finding me from social media or my website, it takes you to my Linktree, which has a link to schedule a consultation call with me.
I’m also working on expanding my team to service more weekday weddings. I have taken some PTO days here and there, but I’m trying to find team members that have more flexibility Monday through Friday.
I’ll still do weekend weddings, but I want to rely more on my team to do the bulk of them, especially during the weekday.
As I mentioned earlier, I’m the social media content creator with the focus on [the couple’s] dog.
I spend a lot of time editing photos and finding music for Instagram reels, which takes a long time. I’ll do all of that on the weekend or the evening.
I’ll then queue up the post and can either post it or I can schedule it. If I want to publish it at 11 a. m. on a Monday, I can schedule it to be released at that time. So there’s the difference between when I create content and when it actually gets published.
I don’t see Dog of Honor becoming my full-time gig. But like I said before, I’d like to grow the team so that I can expand our reach in terms of geography and availability.
I’d like to have the capacity to work on the business rather than in the business — focusing on networking and the things that are more marketing-related because that’s more of my area of interest as it turns out. I love spending time with the dogs, but that’s not necessarily the secret sauce.
The key in any business is delegating those parts that are not what you want to be focusing on, because it all comes down to time. I can’t do everything myself, and I want to have some free time to myself.
So I need to find people who just have good judgment and good customer service skills. It’s not just about the dog. It’s so much more than the dog. It’s about how you work with all of the vendors and the guests and the couple.
Bio: Abigayle, Chief Wag Officer at Dog of Honor Event Specialists, always knew she wanted to surround herself with dogs. From starting a dog walking service at the age of 11, volunteering for a number of animal rescues, and always having a Golden Retriever to cuddle with, she is happiest when in the company of canines and the people who share her love for them. After two decades in software sales, she found a way to apply her business-to-business networking and client relation skills to launch Northern California’s first and only wedding dog chaperone service. Now she spends her weekends preparing Dogs of Honor for their big moment in the spotlight as the 4-legged ring bearer or flower girl. She also gives wedded couples peace of mind, ensuring that their fur child is having the best day ever.