Catering to Canines Dogtopia CEO retains "a burning desire to improve"

Name: Neil Gill

Title: CEO and President

Company: Dogtopia

Units: 275

Years in franchising: 35

Years in current position: 9

Neil Gill is a franchising entrepreneur who has spent more than three decades in leadership roles with KFC, Pizza Hut, Brinker International, and Gloria Jean’s Coffee, where he was CEO for more than a decade.

But in 2015, the Australian native was looking for something new. He was in search of a franchise space that wasn’t overdeveloped and offered growth potential. He says he zeroed in on the pet sector, a growing multi-billion-dollar space.

Today, he is CEO and president of Dogtopia, a Phoenix-based premium dog daycare, boarding, and spa brand with more than 270 locations in North America. As Gill explains, it’s a brand that is redefining pet care.

“Since we began reinventing the Dogtopia brand in August 2015, we have experienced exponential comp and store growth with positive feedback from our franchisees and pet parents alike,” Gill says.

Dogtopia resides in a good place. The global pet market is worth more than $320 billion and is projected to reach $500 billion by 2030. That offers ample room for growth for the brand, and 2024 has been a prime example. 

“We will open 30-plus stores this year,” he says.

Gill isn’t content to rely on a growing market and an expanding portfolio of franchise locations; he’s looking to capitalize on a changing market as well.

“Health and wellness are one of the biggest changes I have seen in the industry in the last three years,” he says. “In addition, people are traveling with their dogs, so we have seen a further shift from boarding into daycare, which we predicted eight years ago.”

You might say Dogtopia is experiencing a dog’s life. Dogs receive enhanced levels of wellness care that benefits both them and their humans while franchisees reap the rewards of a profitable franchise model.

LEADERSHIP

What is your role as CEO? My role as CEO is to define the long-term strategy with our board of directors and management team. Together, we establish the business plan and detailed initiatives to deliver on both the long-term and short-term needs of the business and our franchisees to ensure we remain the leaders in the category and in our respective markets. 

How has Covid-19 affected the way you have led your brand? As consumers have become more comfortable and much more reliant on convenience offerings, like home delivery, online streaming, Uber, etc., we’ve had to pivot our key consumer touchpoints to be more convenient. As a result, we’ve worked to remove all barriers to entry to make doing business with us as simple as possible so that we can meet the demands of our current and prospective dog parents. 

Some of our convenience-type offerings include curbside pickup and drop-off, a mobile app to aid in scheduling and webcam viewing, 3D tours of our locations, an interactive Dogtopia virtual world, and spa products available on Dogtopiashop.com or Amazon so that parents can bring the experience home. 

We’ll continue to refine the way we do business. In fact, we’re in the middle of reviewing the requirements of a key and long-standing process of dog entry and evaluation, a process that has been unchanged across the industry for more than 22 years. As the largest operator in pet wellness, it is our responsibility to drive change and streamline some of the antiquated processes while retaining the highest quality of care for dogs to exercise, socialize, and learn. The health and overall wellness of our dogs is always our key priority. 

Describe your leadership style. A rock in my shoe. While I appreciate what we have achieved to date, I always have a burning desire to improve, to find that next opportunity, to be better. It’s a constant chase (pun intended) to set the absolute highest standards for the industry and play to our full potential, which is one of our values. I believe every great business builder lives comfortably with a rock in their shoe. They’re still capable of running forward but never 100% comfortable with where they are!

What has inspired your leadership style? My innate desire and motivation to see people learn, grow, evolve, and succeed in business. It is one of the things that I love about franchising. The franchise model, when managed well, allows the creation of entrepreneurs in an environment with proven guardrails. 

What is your biggest leadership challenge? I have high expectations, and at times, that can seem unreasonable to some people. My goal is to create an extraordinary brand, and that takes sacrifice and determination. When building a team, it’s important to make sure you’re all aligned and the people on the bus are prepared for the long journey. During interviews, people often say, “Tell me about work-life balance,” and I tell them, “I cannot answer that for you as it is so personal, and it depends on how much you love what you do.” I can’t define for other people where life intersects job and job intersects life. To me, they are one and the same, and we all have a responsibility to manage both. If you’re asking this question, you haven’t found something you truly love doing.

How do you transmit your culture from your office to frontline employees? It all starts by setting the example. You must be on the frontline with your teams, and that includes franchisees. If you’re not constantly reminding people of what you do and why, you’ll lose the culture. This includes regular store visits, in-person workshops, conferences, in-person training, digital webinars, training sessions, and, sometimes, simply having a meal together. I think we are all nicer people when breaking bread together.

How can a CEO help their CMO develop and grow? Understand their role and challenges, define the strategic intent and messaging of the brand and its offerings, set united goals with clearly defined outcomes, provide the resources to achieve the goals (team, agencies, consultants, and capital), and get out of the way so that you don’t slow them down.

Where is the best place to prepare for leadership: an MBA school or OTJ? There is no better way to prepare for leadership than by immersing yourself in business and managing teams across all walks of life. Always keep an open mind, be an avid reader, and constantly explore successful and unsuccessful businesses as you learn from both. Regardless of age, we are always learning and gaining knowledge. Education is key as it prepares and wires your mind to learn. It is the fastest way to improve cognitive capability. Find people you can trust and respect and understand that you’re only as good as the people you surround yourself with. 

Are tough decisions best taken by one person? How do you make tough decisions? The leadership team should make decisions together. There is no such thing as a tough decision when it’s the right decision. The tough part is getting to the right decision. 

Do you want to be liked or respected? Respected.

Advice to CEO wannabes: Choose a sector or industry that is in growth mode, ensure that you can be passionate about it, be well capitalized, find the best people you can afford at the time, create a plan and budget, get buy-in from all stakeholders, execute the plan, and manage to your budget.

MANAGEMENT

Describe your management style: I like to understand how things work, so I like to be involved. I don’t like surprises, so keep me informed, and once we have developed mutual trust, I get out of the way with one caveat: deliver. I also believe that every challenge has a solution. You just need to surround yourself with people smart enough to solve the puzzle.

What does your management team look like? A group of pragmatic, intelligent individuals who are committed to the cause.

How does your management team help you lead? Trust. They keep me grounded, tell me what I need to know, and help me manage the greater team, the business plan, and our budget. Remember: You’re only as good as the people you surround yourself with.

Favorite management gurus: Stephen Covey, Jim Collins, and Gallup Inc.

Do you read management books? (please name): The best business book I have ever read is Great CEOs Are Lazy: How Exceptional CEOs Do More in Less Time by Jim Schleckser. And of course, Jim Collins’ Turning the Flywheel is a favorite. We use this book as prereading for our planning sessions, and we applied its principles to establish the Dogtopia Flywheel. 

What makes you say, “Yes, now that’s why I do what I do!”? Two things: When I get to spend time with our franchisees and when I spend time in stores talking to our parents. When I spend time with our franchisees, especially in training, I’m always reminded of the importance of our role at the support office. They rely on us to deliver on the strategy, to maintain our leadership position, and to be their support and motivation. We also provide the systems, tools, and processes to successfully run their businesses. When I spend time with our parents, it is extremely rewarding to hear how Dogtopia daycare has changed their dogs’ lives, and it’s always a different story. 

OPERATIONS

What trends are you seeing with consumer spending habits in your stores? Parents are becoming far more concerned for the health of their dogs than in the past, so we focus on the six attributes for healthy lives and the development of our range of wellness products. It is interesting to think that Dogtopia sees a dog so often that we do have a genuine impact on their overall health and wellness through exercise, socialization, and general education of dogs in the playrooms. There is no doubt dogs are now influencing human decisions. This is a concept that we have named “Dogification of the Human,” and the leaders of the pet industry understand this change.

How is the economy driving consumer behavior in your system? The increase in experiential spending (concerts and travel) has seen parents travel with their dogs, which has contributed to a shift in spending toward daycare and away from boarding. The trend is great for Dogtopia. Fortunately, our focus on regular dog daycare continues to drive positive daycare growth and improve the health of the dog with every visit. We also believe the design of our new wellness product range will connect well with parents.

What are you expecting from your market in the next 12 months? I’m expecting dog parents to further embrace the need for dog daycare regularly as they have the importance of exercise, socialization, and education for human children. Dogtopia is perfectly positioned to provide parents with a holistic wellness offering, from daycare benefits to the new range of spa products that are available on Amazon and Dogtopiashop.com. 

Are your franchisees bullish or bearish about growth and adding additional units? While the higher-interest rate environment has slowed development, we are confident that the Fed rate cuts will give our franchisees more confidence to invest further. We have also taken the past two years to refine the store model. The most recent changes have improved the efficiency of the store footprint by 21% and reduced CapEx by more than $100,000. The team is always looking at how to improve ramp and reduce CapEx with the constant goal of accelerating ROI. If you can achieve this, and get lucky enough to ride some macro tailwinds, we all get bullish about growth. 

Are commodity/supply costs any cause for concern in your system? Yes. We have developed our own supply chain, which helps manage global purchasing for most aspects of our locations. We want to ensure the best quality product at the best possible price for our franchisees. We took control of supply more than two years ago so that we could better manage these headwinds and leverage our scale through better buying power.

In what ways are political/global issues impacting the market and your brand? From a macro perspective, most businesses today are facing a range of headwinds that have simply slowed business initiatives. I believe our management team has done a great job in countering these headwinds with innovative solutions to reduce costs and generate leads to our stores.

TECHNOLOGY

How much influence does your IT department have on your brand? The IT team is pivotal to parent connection and engagement while maintaining synergy and brand support. We are in the process of launching an entirely new tech platform to better drive this parent connection. 

How have your company’s tech tools changed over the past five years? Entirely! 

How does technology influence your decisions? It’s important to understand that today’s consumers use technology as their first touchpoint with your brand. That interaction must be flawless. It needs to be as smooth, simple, and sophisticated as possible. It also needs to be genuine and transparent. If it’s not, they will abandon you. 

Are you using AI? How? Yes, we use AI to aid in content development, predictive analytics, data analytics, and chat support within our technology platform to name a few.

How do you measure your ROI on technology investments? We’ve invested heavily in our technology stack and expect an ROI over the next five years. We see it simplifying operations, lowering the cost of parent acquisition, aiding in better retention, and improving workforce management. This return on investment will benefit both the enterprise and our franchisees by improving single-unit economics. 

How did/do you create a culture where use of technology advancements is welcome and used? We’re still working on it. We work on it every day. It’s a culture that we are constantly promoting and reminding all stakeholders that change is necessary.

PERSONAL 

What time do you like to be at your desk? There is no such thing as a desk anymore. If you have a device in your hand, you’re connected, you’re thinking, you’re growing, and you’re working. That’s why you have to love what you do.

Exercise in the morning? Wine with lunch? Exercise in the evening. I frequently skip lunch and eat a late dinner with my wife. 

Do you socialize with your team after work/outside the office? When I do, it’s normally to catch up with franchisees or during a planning session. I believe you can achieve both work and life coming together. 

Last two books read: Great CEOs Are Lazy by Jim Schleckser is the best business book I’ve ever read. Turning the Flywheel by Jim Collins is another favorite. I constantly revisit his range of books.

What technology do you take on the road? Laptop, cell phone, and Fitbit.

How do you relax/balance life and work? Spending time with my wife. We exercise and walk together. We enjoy traveling, kayaking, riding bikes, and getting out in the garden.

Favorite vacation destination(s): Italy and Sydney, Australia.

Favorite occasions to send employees notes: When they’ve exceeded expectations.

Favorite company product/service: Dogtopia for love, Mercedes Benz for quality, Amazon for convenience, and Apple for simplicity.

BOTTOM LINE

What are your long-term goals for the company? To be a genuine wellness company for both the dog and the parent that really changes lives while developing successful entrepreneurs through a profitable franchise model. 

How has the economy changed your goals for your company? It has forced us to become more innovative, think more about the convenience proposition, invest more in technology, and think harder about our people, the structure of our team, and our skill sets.

Where can capital be found these days? We’re fortunate to have built a robust balance sheet that allows us to self-fund, and we have very good relationships with banks for franchisee funding. 

How do you measure success? Ask yourself these three questions every day:

1. Are you delivering on what you said you were going to do?
2. Do you still enjoy the journey?
3. Are the people around you growing?

What has been your greatest success? We’ve built Dogtopia as the world’s leading and largest dog daycare brand. 

Any regrets? No, I don’t believe in regrets, only learnings. 

What can we expect from your company in the next 12 to 18 months? Many, many things. We’re forging forward with beneficial technology and convenience at the center of everything we do and continuing to build a genuine wellness brand for both the dog and the parent through leading-edge services and products.