Just as a certain dog may be a perfect match for its master, a specific commercial location could be likewise for a certain business. That’s pretty much why No Leash Needed will soon move into its new location at 15599 Manchester Road.
“It’s well located but it’s been challenging to find a tenant,” Barnes said. “A couple reasons why: Once you get above 4,000 to 6000 square feet, your prospect list goes down quite a bit. Second, the property is not anchored by a traffic generator such as a grocery store, a Costco or Walmart. I’ve been a retail broker for 16 years and when we cold called trying to find retailers to locate at the property, they were very interested in the location and being in Ellisville, but they really want to be in an anchored center. So, we’ve had none that really fit the bill.”
The future site of No Leash Needed in Ellisville (Source: Loopnet.com)
Now, however, NVA is going to invest between $1.6 and $1.7 million in the Ellisville building.
“One thing about NVA that a lot of people don’t know is they’re probably one of the largest veterinary clinics that practices in the country,” Barnes said. “They’re a really established company with the resources to run a really solid business.”
Answering questions from council member Vince McGrath (District 1), Shad Cloud, of NVA, said the site will furnish up to 66 boarding kennels. There will be anywhere from 60 to 120 dogs on the site for day care. An existing wooden fence will be replaced by a new one and trees in the area will remain as a buffer and extra sound barrier for neighbors to the north in compliance with recommendations of the landscaping plan. Those sound barriers will be for times a handful of dogs are outside.
“The dogs will not be able to go in and out by themselves,” Cloud said. “That would be controlled by the staff. There’s one or two staff members with the dogs at all times.”
Small groups of dogs are normally rotated in and out and divided by breed size. The facility will have several indoor yards, which helps to manage outdoor yard use.
The last staff person leaves around 10:30 or 11 p.m. and the earliest returns around 6 a.m., Cloud said. However, the dogs are typically inside so any sound would be muted in the case that one or several are howling. Open hours are 7 a.m.-7 p.m. so the last time you’ll see a dog outside would be between 7:30 and 8 p.m.; anything that happens after that would be in one of the indoor yards.
Cloud also noted that both animals and humans are evaluated and well trained.
“We focus a lot of energy of on the evaluation of dogs to make sure we’re bringing in ones that work well with the population we have,” he said. “We have dogs coming in that can be controlled and can be in that environment. But we also do a lot of training with our staff, and we focus our energy on dog control. So, you don’t hear the amount of barking as you do at a franchise type location or a dog resort because staff members are always there and they’re well trained to control dogs. We want to be friendly and courteous neighbors to everyone.”
Bill 3740 passed unanimously to become Ordinance 3509 after an amendment from council member Dan Duffy (District 3) to amend the petition such that dog waste runoff be handled by best practices as defined by City Administrator Bill Schwer. Solid waste will be collected at all times and disposed of at the end of every day.
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