I work at a pet store (our main focus is food. We have all your crap brands like Iams and Science Diet, but we have some good stuff, too. One of our sister stores in Madison even sells Honest Kitchen!). I've actually gotten reprimanded a few times about how I educate the customers on what their pet should be eating. But really, I don't care how much money the company makes off of selling crap in a bag. I care about the dogs and cats who are forced to eat it! But that's another story.

So something happened today. This lady comes in with her dog (some sort of mutt). Dog's pulling her all over the place. I see this all the time. She heads for the gentle leader aisle. Or, I should say, she tries to head for the gentle leader aisle while her dog is being a total spaz. She finds a size she thinks will fit, and after some struggling, manages to get it onto the dog's face. Meanwhile, I'm stocking leashes and collars and I'm slowly meandering over to her. I suggest that she might have better luck with a prong collar.

That didn't go over so well. She glares at me like I'm some monster and says all snarkily, "I would never do that to her. It's inhumane." By the way, during this little conversation the dog is barking its fool head off and smacking its face into the ground trying to get the stupid gentle leader off. I try to explain that putting something like that on the dog will help, but it won't solve the actual problem. The dog will still pull. I even managed to take the leash and show her how to properly walk her dog. The dog calmed down right away when I took the lead and acted like a total angel. I love it when that happens. Then boss lady comes over and asks if the lady needs any help. I slink away before I get yelled at again. I swear, at this rate I'm gonna get fired =P

So I'm curious about some negative reactions you folks have gotten from friends, family, or random strangers when they see or you tell them how you train/feed/walk/whatever your dog. The more ridiculous, the better.

Dogs I understand. Cats I understand. All non-human animals I understand. People? I will never understand.

I would have fired you already It's not my employees decision whether I am right or wrong.

But here is the way I see it:

Convincing people of correct training is the same as being a sales person. You need to sell your idea.

When a sales person approaches a customer, he sizes the customer up and makes an educated guess about the type of person they are. From this they can make assumptions about what the person WANTS to hear. Once you have an idea of what the person wants to hear, its your job to tell them what they want to hear, but in such a way that it favors your product/training philosophy/health concepts etc etc.

If your audience is a group of little old ladies with miniature dogs that eat better than you do -- odds are they wont want to hear your crazy rantings about prong collars and pack leadership Don't even waste your time.

If you are a good sales person that people feel they can trust, and you make the right educated guesses about what type of dog owners the people you talk to are, then you will quickly realize when you are going to waste time, and when you will have success. After a while you will stop talking to the disapproving so and so's entirely and then only have success with people who want to learn.

Is it a chain store? Or privately owned? If its privately owned why not try to convince your boss to carry high quality foods that you dont have a moral problem selling to people? Try carrying some pro raw books or Wysongs book about the pet food industry. Just a thought.

I agree with Mike, don't waste your time. One day you will find that some people are ignorant about things and can learn if they are willing and able to open up their mind and shut their mouth. If you are lucky, they will be able to do one but not the other.

But then a lot of other people are just flat out stupid and that is genetic, really can't do a lot with those people.


"About the only thing the general public could comprehend using properly is a Cyanide Pill" - Arthur Jones

I agree that alot of people are stupid, but some people are feeding Science Diet or other horrible foods that are actually damn expensive and totally think they are doing the best thing for their dog because their vet told them to.

Maybe your boss doesnt care about the animals, tell him that since the big pet food recalls people are really concerned and looking for other options, and it would be a great opportunity to fill a niche that is really growing in popularity. If you cant get him to care about the animals best interest try to get him to care about his wallet.

Just a thought.

Its funny. My boss owns two buisiness' a petstore and a reptile breeding facility(one of the best in the country). I work at the reptile breeding facility, my girlfriend manages the petstore, so I spend sometime down there every now and again. If people think I work there I have probably a 50/50 chance of them listening to what I have to say about pet foods. If I have my coat on and they dont think I work there I get a much more open mind from people because they dont think I am trying to jam a product down there throat. If I have one of my dogs with outside the petstore, or at a different petstore I actually have people come up to me and say how great they look and ask what I feed.

With all the problems out there with dog food the people that are willing to listen are really increasing, and I think people that are educated enough to feed their own dogs properly have somewhat of a responsibility to try and help other people and their pets.

JMHO And this coming from someone who hates people. I do it for the animals not the owners.

Ashley - I know exactly where you are coming from - I used to work at Pet World Warehouse Outlet in Waukesha (I think they have one in Madison also?)

Mike is correct - it is a sales pitch. You really have to put a lot of effort into it and remind yourself that it doesn't matter if they don't take your advice, you know you are trying to help them.

I come across lots of people this way all the time - when I worked at Pet World I had someone in every single day who wanted to use or currently used a Halti or Gentle Leader and their dogs drug them around.

People think prong collars are inhumane. So I did not call them pinch or prong collars, I called them Live Savers. "Can I show you the life saver collars we have?" That interests them into following you.. and usually they will become confused .. why did you call that a life saver collar? And so begins the pitch.

Put one on your arm and yank on it to show them it does not hurt, and explain that dogs have fur and thicker skin to further "cushion" the feeling of the collar.

As for food, print out some articles from the internet, Leerburg has a great raw diet e-book you can print out and take to work with you. Carry a list of books about proper nutrition for animals. Be prepared to back up your opinion with facts about grains/corn/fillers and meat sources.

I would spend an hour or more on some customers and it really really pays off. Remember to smile, never become angry or suullen and resist the urge to slink away when management comes around - it makes you seem guilty to the customer.

One thing to do also is to say you used to feed a certain food or you know someone you did and then switched and the incredible difference it made for your/your friends pets.

After only 2 weeks there I had customers coming in specifically to see me, they would ask for my schedule and only come in on the days that I was working. Build a good relationship with the customers and your boss will have less against you - sell the store's products that are good products, don't concern yourself with the fact that you are not selling the more expensive crap foods and useless "fashion" collars.

Good luck

Jennifer brings up some good points. I deal with a pet store which sells only good foods like EVO and Honest Kitchen. They also sells the stuff I need to supplement a raw diet too. ( I am going to miss them when I move back to WI... Anyways, a Navy Recruiter from next door came into the shop about 1 year ago and started asking about needing to pick up science diet for his cat. The owner, her helper and I started to explain how bad Science Diet is for the cat and rendering plants. The guy didn't bolt, so we gave him samples of good foods. He thanked us and went back to work. Not sure if it worked, but it was worth a try and he was willing to listen. It is worth telling because some people don't know and are willing to listen.

Calling people “stupid” for feeding SD is a bit harsh, uninformed would be more like it. I fed that damn food to my dogs for years, I did so because I believed I was feeding the best food to my dog and I was willing to go to the extra expense to do so. Why wouldn’t I, my vet highly recommended it. It wasn’t just one vet, over the years it was probable no less then 6 different vets that all made the same recommendation of feeding it. I had no reason to question it; I trusted my vets to know these things and had no reason to doubt their knowledge.

I honestly don’t know what I would have done if someone in a store had approached me and started telling me how bad the dog food was that I was buying. I probable would have figured that my vet had a lot more knowledge on that subject then some store clerk and would have blown it off. Don’t know how that makes me “stupid”.

I was researching different health issues when I came across this site; imagine my shock when I started reading about what I had been feeding my dogs. I didn’t automatically believe it, but it was enough to prompt me to do some more research. Unfortunately, sometimes it takes something to happen before we realize there is a problem.

If anything, I am angry that vets are even allowed to make any recommendation on feeding animals when they themselves have no real education in that area.

A friend of mine calls store clerks "register monkeys". It is not inappropriate for a dog owner to think you're a kook if you come at them and start berating them. I'm sure this isn't what you DID, but...put yourself in her shoes. Her whole life revolves around not hurting poor Fluffy, who is a shelter dog, and as we all know, every dog that's in a shelter was abused, and that's why poor fluffy is so crazy, and well...if that's what happened to him and he needs to be a little crazy, who is she to try to make him stop?

Jenn is dead on right. You need to sell the ideas to them, you need to sell it in a way that appeals to your prospective client. Their specific needs, desires, hopes, and dreams have to be built into your pitch, or you will fail.

I agree with Mike, too. Your boss doesn't pay you to convince her customers that they should buy all their dog food from the sister store, or from Ralphs. Any business exists primarily to make money. If you're working against that goal, you aren't just neutral, you are an active detriment to the business.

With that said, if you're in a position where you are expected to sell a product that you are morally opposed to, it's your responsibility to find a new position elsewhere. And until you do, it's your responsibility to grit your teeth and sell Science Diet.

Actually, like I said, we do sell good food. I will direct the customers towards that if they ask me what I think the best food is. In fact, because the better food is usually more expensive, they're giving the company more money! And my boss isn't some greedy corporate jerk. She's probably almost as frustrated as I am.

I really like getting to help new dog owners off on the right track. It's the ones that have dogs who think they know everything.

But that's not even the question I was asking. To reiterate: "So I'm curious about some negative reactions you folks have gotten from friends, family, or random strangers when they see or you tell them how you train/feed/walk/whatever your dog. The more ridiculous, the better." Let's stop talking about how I'm sabotaging the company =P