By Dogswell Staff
Now that summer is here, many of your clients will be spending more time outdoors with their dogs, heading to parks, beaches, campgrounds and hiking trails. While being active and out in nature is a great way to have fun and bond with pets, it can also result in various skin irritations and injuries. Issues like insect bites, exposure to poisonous plants, rashes, skin allergies, and minor cuts and scrapes occur more frequently this time of year.
As a professional groomer, you are often the first to detect these issues while bathing (image right) or trimming clients’ dogs. In addition to alerting owners to these problems, you could also recommend solutions that can help relieve their dog’s soreness and itchiness, promote faster healing and prevent a wound or inflammation from getting worse.
The Dogswell® Remedy+Recovery® Pet First Aid line includes range of products that can be used to treat minor injuries and skin irritations in dogs, making it an ideal complement for a grooming shop to sell. Many of your clients might not even be aware that there are over-the-counter first aid products developed specifically for pets. By carrying a selection of pet first aid products and educating people about their use, you can perform a valuable service for your clients and their dogs, while creating a profitable new revenue stream for your grooming salon—a win-win situation.
You can sell more of these products—and help more dogs—if you make sure your clients know several important things about pet first aid. One is that it is essential to act quickly once inflammation or injury occurs. This is because canines will scratch and lick the affected area, causing it to become even itchier and more inflamed, which in turn leads to more scratching. This itch-scratch cycle, unfortunately, can result in acute moist dermatitis, commonly called “hot spots.”
Areas of the skin affected by a hot spot typically lose hair and develop inflamed lesions, becoming extremely sore and sensitive. However, if an anti-itch product, such as Dogswell Remedy+Recovery Medicated Hot Spot Spray, is applied quickly, it can help relieve the pain and inflammation, breaking the itch-scratch cycle and keeping hot spots from developing. You could advise your clients to keep a medicated spray on hand so that if an injury or irritation does occur, they can help prevent the problem from getting worse.
Choosing the Right First Aid Product
Your clients also need to know which first aid products should be used to treat specific injuries or skin conditions. In the case of an itchy rash, for example, a good remedy would be Dogswell’s hydrocortisone lotion, which helps soothe and reduce inflammation and swelling. A minor cut or wound might be treated with Remedy+Recovery Wound & Infection Medication, an antimicrobial that helps prevent infection. All of the line’s product labels have informative descriptions, making it easy to select the right one to treat an injury or skin issue.
Other Dogswell Remedy+Recovery solutions include:
- Medicated Antiseptic Spray: formulated to kill germs and help soothe itch and pain from minor scrapes and bug bites
- Liquid Bandage: a spray that forms a protective waterproof film to help keep injuries clean and dry and promote healing
- Medicated Shampoo: a penetrating therapeutic shampoo that helps relieve itching, dryness and other types of dermatitis
Developed Exclusively for Pets
Another important point to stress to clients is that dogs should be treated only with first aid products formulated specifically for pets. Human first aid products should never be used on a dog. This is because canines’ skin and coat properties are different from humans’. For example, dogs’ skin has a different pH balance than humans. The U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has taken these differences into account in establishing specific ingredients and amounts in products and drugs it approves as being safe for pets. All Dogswell Remedy+Recovery first aid products are made to comply with these standards in an FDA-certified manufacturing facility in the USA..
In the future, Dogswell will be introducing other proactive skin and coat products, including a functional dry dog food and soft and chewy treats. We look forward to partnering with groomers to help keep their clients’ dogs’ skin and coats healthy and glowing—and to provide effective first aid solutions when the need arises.