New member from Sweden

[Mia]

Hi all!

My name is Mia and I live in Sweden. I have been grooming since 1990. In my free time I breed and show apricot poodles and wirehaired foxterriers.
In 1999 I started to compete in groomingcompetitions around Europe and found my self a new exspensive hobby *smile *

To work as a groomer over here is a bit different from the US. We handstrip all wirehaired dogs - otherwise you are looked at as a bad groomer . We dont bring all the dogs in in the morning - we take one dog in at a time. Thats becouse the owners gets so upset when you try to tell them that the dog will be in for a long time.I try to do 2 dogs at the time if its possible - but its hard when you do a lot of handstrip and handsissoring( I have a lot of poodle clients that I handscissor the whole dog)

We dont have any mobile groomers.And the grooming bussiness is still in the stone edge compered to the US.
We still dont have a groomingorganisation but are working on it!

regards
Mia

[SpikeyTheYorkie]

Welcome to the boards, Mia! I don't think hand stripping dogs is from the stone age---your dogs are probably better in skin and coat than ours are! But I hope you get paid well for your hard work. Hand stripping all day would kill me! How well are groomers paid over there?

Tammy in Utah (USA)

[Chicken]

Welcome Mia! I think it's fantastic that you are handstripping all the wire-haired breeds. I commend you for all that hard work, and like Tammy said, I hope you are well compensated for it.

I take in 1-2 dogs at a time too. Some US groomers do that, though not the majority.

Welcome to the board!

[Mia]

Thanks for the welcoming

I charge by the hour for the handstripping - so if its a airedaleterrier it gets expensive....*smile*
Its hard to compare prices - but I charge about 38 US dollars an hour . If the dog only take 1 hour they pay a higher price -62 US dollars.
We have a 25% VAT incl in that.

Most of the people in the industry are females - and I dont know how it its in the US - but here they have a hard time pricing their time - no matter what work they are doing....I guess guys are better in pricing their time. I use to joke and say that if my car repair guy made my pricelist my grooming would be very very expensive....

Sadly many new groomers think they must compete with a low price and they also say - I love dogs and I love grooming them....so they dont consider this a work. But sooner or later reality strikes and they must look for another work to survive.

I am the highest charging groomer in my area - but I am in the countryside. In the bigger cities they charge more.

We have a lack of good groomers all around the country - and you are allways looking for someone to come and work with you. Sadly the fees and regulations for hireing people makes it impossible to hire someone - so you cant hire someone only as a bather for instance.It must be someone that can groom and have their own company and they then hire a table at your salon.

All dogs here come from regular breeders - you cant shop a dog in a petstore. And most of the breeding stock is showed at least once or twice - so thats makes the wirehaired breeds keeping their coat texture. But we also have a lot of bad coated westies with skin problems....or soft coated mini schnauzers.
And many of the breeders tells the puppybuyers that they MUST handstrip their dogs - so people think that they are bad owners if they allow us to clip the dog.

As a breeder of wirehaired foxterrier I must admit that I think that a handstripped dog looks mutch better . But if the dog dont like it or have a bad coat/skin I think its mutch more humane to clip it.But some people think that you MUST handstrip - no matter what.....

regards
Mia

[scullysmom]

Welcome! I have a friend in Stockholm, not a groomer though. She is in theater.

[c.c.]

Hi Mia, the internet makes the world so small!!! I love that! It's always fun to hear how things are in another country. Here we've had an explosion of "designer dogs" (deliberate breeding of mixed breeds). Are you seeing that kind of breeding (for money-not quality) where you are?

[misscatahoula]

Hello to you and Welcome!

[Dexy]

HI

I love meeting groomers especially those "in" poodles, what variety do you own?

[Mia]

Hi Mia, the internet makes the world so small!!! I love that! It's always fun to hear how things are in another country. Here we've had an explosion of "designer dogs" (deliberate breeding of mixed breeds). Are you seeing that kind of breeding (for money-not quality) where you are?

Yes - earlier the mixed breeds was usually mistakes. But now people do it on purpuse.
But its usually no plan behind it....becouse they mix everything....*smile* so the dogs ends up being a mix of 3-5 breeds. People just want to have pups and make some money.
There is some people trying to sell cookapoos as a breed - claiming it is a breed in the US. But otherwise its more popular with small breed mixes .Right now they mix chiahuahuas with everything.
And then we have the large breed mixes - allways with a rottweiler or german shepherd mixed in to it. And then they "spice it up" with an amstaff or pitbull.

We still dont have your problems with puppymills - everything is on a small scale basis.

regards
Mia

[Mia]

I love meeting groomers especially those "in" poodles, what variety do you own?

Hi!
I breed apricots. I focus on the FCI minis ( 35 -45 centimeters) but I also have standards.

[Animal Oasis]

Mia Welcome to the forum & Happy Easter
from Angie in the UK

[Gracy Rose]

Hi Mia, welcome to the boards. I would love to see photos of your shop. I love how we all set them up differently.

[Angie]

Cool, Sweden. Wecome! So nice to have you

[Poodlefluff]

Hi Mia I love poodles too! Welcome to the board

[ejmj30]

Hello!

I visited Sweden when I was in college, played basketball over there for a couple weeks. Wow, what a beautiful country (what very little I saw of it unfortunately)!! I had so much fun and would love to come visit again! We were in Malmo, down near Denmark. The buildings and the streets even were so artistic and historic. Nothing like you find over here.

Welcome aboard, can't wait to learn more about grooming overseas. See you around.

Erin