Doggie Day Out in the Pearl

By Robert Goldfield
Business Journal Staff Writer

Suzanne Losh's shop in the Pearl District offers city dogs a hip place to catch up on canine gossip while their masters toil.

When Stella arrives at Northwest Portland's Urban Fauna, her eyes light up. She rushes into the shop and excitedly greets her friends and fellow canines, who, like the 5-month-old golden retriever, regularly receive daycare at the store.

"It's just like preschool; she has all kinds of good friends," said Stella's owner, Natalie Roberts. "Urban Fauna's been a godsend to me. I used to run home from work every few hours because I know about goldens' socialization needs." Now these needs are met by the staff at Urban Fauna.

Roberts, a hairdresser, said the extra hours she can now spend at work more than compensate for the $20 a day she pays Urban Fauna's proprietor, Suzanne Losh.

Stella and her friends are growing into a goodsized clientele for Losh, who opened her doggie daycare business in mid-December in the Pearl District. On a busy day she has about 17 dogs on the premises, at least for part of the day She has room to accommodate 25 at a time.

Suzanne Losh takes good care of all of her drop-in buddies, including Mookie.

Losh isn't the first person to think of providing daycare for dogs, nor is she the only one in Portland to offer the service. But she and a few likeminded entrepreneurs around town are on the leading edge of a trend.

Losh said the first such service she knew of started in San Francisco about a year ago. They seemed to pop up in other major cities at around the same time. The general idea is to entertain and exercise clients' dogs while their owners are at work, rather than having the dogs stay alone at home, chewing up the furniture in their angst.

Most of Losh's clients are commuters who bring their dogs into town specifically to drop them off at Urban Fauna. Losh is a veterinary technician whose past experience includes managing a pet store. When she decided to open her own business, her first choice was a pet supply store, and pet supplies account for much of Urban Fauna's revenue.

The shop can't compete with supply stores like PetSmart or Petco in terms of price or selection, but those large chains don't have locations in Northwest Portland. Losh further differentiates herself from the chains by emphasizing upscale products: pet beds with designer fabrics, extra durable chew toys and food dishes on wrought iron platforms, for example.

But it's the daycare service that generates most of Urban Fauna's income.

Employee Phyllis Ardolino spends most of her time giving the dogs attention, be it petting, holding or roughhousing. Losh moves back and forth between the pens and the retail section, depending on the need. And, of course, the staff walks the dogs, with the nearby North Park Blocks coming in especially handy.

Not any old mutt can slip into the daycare ranks at Urban Fauna. Besides requiring that the animals be neutered and current on their shots, Losh wants to ensure the dogs get along reasonably well with the staff and with each other. She requires owners to fill out an extensive history about the dog, including questions that boil down to personality: the dog's habits, attitudes, likes and dislikes.

Then she has the owner stop by with the dog for an interview to see how the dog interacts with others at the shop.

She doesn't require perfect manners. The three pens allow her to separate some dogs from others, and she may change the groupings over the course of a day.

There's definitely a weekly cycle to the doggie daycare business, Losh said. Monday is the slowest day of the week. Most dogs will have spent the weekend with their owners, getting more than their usual dose of exercise in the process, and will seem docile and tent to laze around at home on Mondays.

Wednesday is the busiest day. After spending the day alone at home on Monday and Tuesday the dogs need an outlet for their energy! Stella drops by three days a week, and a few clients opt for the five days a week routine.

A rambunctious day at Urban Fauna makes for a quiet evening together at home, Roberts said of Stella's experience. "When I come home from work at night ordinarily she'd be so hyper but now she's just as tired as I am and we can just kind of cuddle together."

Urban Fauna: Pet supplies, doggie care and jewelry

By Robert Goldfield
Business Journal Staff Writer

Suzanne Losh sells imported silver jewelry Her fiancé, Devin Laurence Field, creates metal sculpture.

So when Losh opened a shop that offered pet supplies and daycare service for dogs, both the jewelry and the sculpture went on sale there. That may sound like an odd mix, but a common theme runs through the inventory.

Much of the jewelry Losh sells consists of pins in the shape of animals. And much of Field's work features animal forms, often blended with architectural forms. Both lines are designed to appeal to animal lovers and could well catch the eye of customers stopping at Urban Fauna to pick up some cat food or drop their dog off for a day of play

"We wanted to be a full-service business, a bit of an animal-lovers' paradise," Losh said.

On a practical basis, selling the jewelry at Urban Fauna was Losh's only choice. She had been selling the pins for five years. When she opted to start a pet business, the new venture took all of her energy. She lacked the time to sell the jewelry business, or liquidate the inventory or run both businesses at once.

So 45 days after opening Urban Fauna, she closed her jewelry store and transferred her stock to the pet supply store.

Losh's inventory includes pieces from Mexico and India. It isn't limited to animal pins, but she possesses enough of those to fill a display case. The rest she stored fur the time being.

Losh said the notion of caring for lonely canines popped up when she and Field were mulling over the idea of how to best draw customers into the pet supply store. A live animal or two might do the trick, they thought. Meanwhile, Losh was trying to figure out a way to make use of the large garage area that came along with her lease of ground- floor space in an aging brick structure at Northwest Sixth Avenue and Flanders Street.

One thing led to another, and today the former garage is outfitted with three large pens where dogs roam and play.

Many of Field's smaller works, meanwhile, fill a gallery that was created on a mezzanine level when they remodeled the space. Field has also produced many larger pieces on public commission, including a steel sculpture of two horses displayed at the entrance to Clackamas Community College.

"We both love animals and that focus has sort of permeated everything we've done," said Field, a native of New Zealand and the son of a zoologist.

While Urban Fauna offers animal services and products, animal art and jewelry, Losh continues to dream up ways to squeeze sales out of her shop. She recently hired Marcia Hartman to provide grooming services on the premises.