Meet Paul Abbott | Entrepreneur

We had the good fortune of connecting with Paul Abbott and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Paul, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
I was born and raised in Ireland. I worked as a waiter during college in various restaurants around Dublin, but my first real job was a car salesman. I enjoyed the job, largely as it presented opportunities to drive the newest cars, but also the aspect of the job that involved problem solving with people as we went through the process of finding the right car at the right price. This led me to start my first business, Ireland’s first car broker business called Auto Consulting. Through Auto Consulting, I sourced a small fleet of suitable cars, created another business plan and secured a bank loan, then launched my second business, a taxi rental business. If any of my taxis were idle I would drive them myself until they were rented out again. You have to be an licensed taxi driver to operate a taxi rental business in Ireland, or you did back in 2007 at least.

It was around this time that I met Laura, now my wife and business partner. We met in Crowes pub in Dublin, incidentally a short distance from one of our current dog grooming salons. When we met, I asked Laura what she wanted to do with her life, and without hesitation she said her dream would be to open a luxury dog business. It was another 6 or 7 years before that would come to fruition, and a journey that took us via London, Monaco, Barcelona, Washington DC, Florida, back to Dublin, and now back to Florida again. Along the way I started various businesses and worked in online gaming, daily deals for consumer electronics, live comedy management, superyacht charters, Italian tiles, and now dogs.

In 2013 I was working with an international Italian tile retailer that was expanding into the US, so Laura and I moved to a suburb outside Washington DC. Laura started walking dogs in our neighborhood, and I helped her with the admin and marketing. It quickly became clear that this was working, so we both went into it full time, we had 9 dog walkers working for us, and subsequently signed a lease on a 12,000 sqft property to open our first Pet Hotel and Spa called Life of Riley. In 2017 we opened our second Life of Riley location in the heart of DC. We had around 40 amazing people on the team, one of whom is still working with us now. We were offering dog hotel suites with chandeliers, underfloor heating, wide screen TVs and other luxuries normally reserved for human hotels. We also offered dog daycare, dog grooming and dog related retail products. In 2019 we sold both Life of Riley locations in a private equity deal. By this time we had two amazing kids, and we decided to move home to Ireland around the time Covid was getting going.

We used the downtime during Covid to plan our next business, and we decided to focus solely on dog grooming. We named this business Grooming.dog, which is also the URL. We opened our first Grooming.dog salon in Dublin Ireland in 2021. Our Dublin location is a wonderful business and it’s still thriving with a great team, but we encountered various issues with the Irish market and felt our best opportunity was back here in the US. So we moved back to America and opened our first US based Grooming.dog salon in Boca Raton, Florida in October 2023.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Laura and I came to the US in 2013. We had no network or contacts here, and we were essentially starting from scratch. Fast forward to 2019, our biggest achievement was starting a family of our own but also we were US SBA Small Business Persons of the Year in Washington DC, and one of three national finalists for Small Business of the Year from the US Chamber of Commerce. 2019 was also the year we sold our previous business in a multi-million dollar deal.

Of course it wasn’t easy, but it was and continues to be rewarding. We have encountered death threats and law suits on the negative side of things, but overall the positive side wins the day. If you operate with resilience, tenacity, and a conscious effort to do the right thing, it will always work out in the end.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My wife Laura who is also my business partner, my kids who moved away from their school and friends in Ireland and have been amazing, our team in Dublin who are all doing what they love and doing it incredibly well, our team in Florida who have trusted us with their career ambitions, and of course our thousands of clients and their furry friends who trust us each day to provide the best care and environment.

In the early days I used to drive the doggie chauffeur and work the front desk, and a client once asked if they could speak to my manager – so I got my wife – and the client told Laura she should put me in a backroom somewhere behind a computer but never dealing with customers! So I’m grateful for that too, because I’m the guy in the background but it’s the team of dedicated, professional, world-class pet care professionals around me that actually make things happen.

Website: https://www.grooming.dog

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/furs.best.friend

Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/grooming-dog-boca-raton