Odor objections from grooming salon customers are the number one complaint and reason to not come back for future services. That comment shows up time and again on too many surveys and should not be ignored if one is hoping to sustain and grow one’s grooming business. Yet hit and miss attempts at solving these issues seems to be the most popular course of action by all too many grooming operations. It should not be said that many don’t work hard at reversing this perception. However, public opinion does not generally support a positive view on this matter. Better solutions need to be found.

We all recognize odors of many varieties can somehow affect at least someone of the retail public in some negative way. However, to accept the idea that if your employees can tolerate obviously strong odors with minimal solutions, then the customer must come to the same acceptance of a grooming salon’s strong scents may not be the best way to help your business grow.

Perhaps ten years ago when one or two people might complain about a malodorous grooming salon, it was not considered such a big thing. However, with the advent of social media, everything has certainly changed and made the vocal minority a loud, brash, unrelenting roar that taints even the best reputation, while also being an overlarge irritant in the side of all pet-related businesses and products without leaving an effective way to overturn negative comments nor counter how unjustified the opinion might be. This is especially true with service businesses where a manufacturer or product is not there to divert or absorb responsibility for such a sharp, critical opinion that can so negatively affect especially small businesses and their success.

It would be disingenuous of me to magically produce and suggest a one or two-step solution to odor control that would instantly resolve the odor control conundrum in a grooming salon. However, an approach that does not promise complete, total resolution and also provides a large, positive foot forward is really not possible without our industry’s commitment to change. A more modern and attainable approach in reducing the public’s negative excuse for not supporting and recognizing a positive view of the grooming services and the animal care industry as a whole would be wrong.

So first, let’s review from our past articles and what we’ve learned that helps us achieve a much more positive public relations result. Presentations on dehumidifiers and particulate matter (PM) have demonstrated that the equipment covered will in their own way contribute to a reduction of odor-causing agents and their effects.

Dehumidifiers showed us that a high-moisture environment increases not only inside moisture levels and particulate matter (PM) formation as well as odor-causing bacterial and fungal (mold, mildew, etc.) growth, but also along with drying machines creating increased numbers of positively-charged ions which are known transporters of odors in the grooming workplace.

We also learned that besides elimination of the tiniest pollutants transported by particulate matter (PM), a carbon filter in the air purifier is highly effective at capturing certain odors associated with overall particulate matter filtration, including some of the most noxious ones, such as animal urine and smoke, among others.

A practical example of this phenomenon was a field test reported to the author that described urine-soaked towels left overnight in a grooming salon during the winter season. The pile of towels was adjacent to the air purifier unit operating overnight that caused a reported complete lack of odor the following morning in the grooming salon. We know that activated carbon alone cannot capture all odors, but for many noxious odors found in a grooming salon environment, this type of filtration can be quite successful.

We also found that HEPA air purifier filters are highly effective in capturing the tiniest of particles such as PM2.5 and smaller without equal to any other filter type. At least 99.97% of 0.3 micron, with sizes both larger and smaller are captured, as well as biological and fungal (mold, mildew, etc.) material, which are a major source of odors.

We must now progress beyond capture of odor-causing material and concentrate on kill and elimination of odor for the entire work environment that has managed to permeate fabrics, surface crevices, and other absorbent material present in a grooming salon.

Till Next Time,
The Professor