Puptown Lounge, a family-owned and operated business based in Upper Arlington, Ohio, was founded in 2008 by siblings Sarah Himelstein and Cliff Boyden. At the time, Sarah was a sign language interpreter for the Columbus City Schools, and her younger brother Cliff was a sheriff’s deputy. For their entire lives, their mom groomed dogs in their basement while they went to school, and they were surrounded by customers bringing their dogs in and out of their Upper Arlington home. As any children of entrepreneurs know, there are times when they’ll get pulled into the business on weekends and during breaks, and the Boydens were dog bathers when they were not in school.
Their mom Cheryl had heard about a new concept called doggie daycare. So she encouraged her entrepreneurial oldest kids to look into starting a daycare business. With help from their Grandpa giving them a $25,000 loan, they opened Puptown Lounge doggie daycare on November 1, 2008. Although their Grandpa is gone now, during the early days of Puptown, he stopped in nearly daily to give support, ideas, and mostly encouragement to Cliff and Sarah. Within a couple of years, the business was so successful that they paid Grandpa back every dollar of his loan. At the time, they didn’t offer grooming services, but as Sarah was taught all of the finishing grooms by her mom, they started grooming services in 2009. Their mom Cheryl still works in her children’s business as a groomer today.
Now we have Two Locations and a stand alone Grooming House and hoping to expand in the future!
