The Ethics of Matting
Have you noticed a few posts lately on social media where groomers are announcing how they ‘dodged a bullet’, or ‘had a lucky escape’ because they turned away a client with a matted dog?
Honestly, we find these posts disturbing.
Yes, grooming a matted dog will place extra wear on your tools, take more of your time, require your highest level of concentration and skill to complete safely, and possibly lead to problems arising after the groom including clipper rash, haematomas, and physical or mental stress on the dog. The groom will cost the owner a lot, and there may be a dispute about the price if correct documentation is not available to the client to read, agree to and sign prior to the groom.
But is any of this the dog’s fault? Didn’t we fight so hard over Covid to be recognized as an essential service? (Remember this?) Did we not all agree emphatically that our role in society was not negotiable, that the welfare of our beloved pets was not to be sacrificed?
Our job as groomers is to be the mouthpiece for the dog. Our job as groomers is to recognize and understand the pain and discomfort the dog is experiencing and convey that to the owner, and then assist the animal to the best of our ability. Sometimes, over and over again.
We know a lot of groomers reading this will not want to work on old, matted and aggressive dogs, but we are hoping that the majority of our community do.
More people are dog owners now than ever before. We need to keep banging the education drum, the CLIENT education drum.
How?
Spend an extra 30 seconds on the booking phone call determining the coat condition – or get a photo sent to you. This helps manage expectations on both sides, in advance
Get your matting forms and waivers organized, either digitally or old fashioned paper print outs (some ideas here)
Print brochures outlining what matting is and what causes it, and how to prevent it, how to brush and comb correctly (there’s some free ones here)
Create an aftercare brochure or email explaining possible outcomes from a complete shave off, what to look out for, why it might happen
Be actively educational on your social media - we've never in history had access to such a captive audience, by way of literally having a device that plays videos to people in their hand.
As frustrating as it is, (and Nat has been grooming for 30 years, saying the same thing over and over - brush your dog, bring your dog in more often, etc), we just need to keep saying it out loud, and we need to be united in that voice as an industry.
Our voice is the voice of the dog.
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