About the business
Dusty's Dog House has been Bayonne's dog daycare, boarding, and grooming facility for twelve years. The facility runs two playrooms, cage-free boarding suites, and a grooming room that handles one dog at a time. Hours are seven days a week, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. All breeds are accepted. Rescue dogs have been fostered and placed at no charge for a decade, and a bill can go missing when a family is going through a hard time.
The business is profitable, carries almost no debt, and is operating well below the facility’s capacity. What it needs is a leader, not a body.
The opportunity
This is not a standard General Manager posting. The owner is building toward a business that runs without him, and is offering a share of the profit, and then a share of the business, to the person who helps build it. The successful candidate will receive a base salary, an annual performance bonus tied to profitability, and a written profit-participation agreement effective from the start date. After twelve to twenty-four months, on conditions agreed in advance in writing, participation converts into an ownership interest that vests over four years against performance milestones, together with a right of first offer to acquire the business itself down the road. The first stage is deliberate on both sides: it gives each of us a full operating year to find out whether this is the right partnership before ownership changes hands.
The starting base sits below the large-facility market rate, and that is stated openly here rather than discovered later. The range is wide because it is genuinely negotiable: it moves with experience and with how much of the package you choose to take as profit share instead of cash. The profit share and bonus are designed to close the gap for someone who performs. Anyone looking purely for the highest salary available should not apply; both sides should say so now.
What the role owns
- Daily operation of the facility: safety, admissions, standards, and the customer experience.
- The team: hiring, scheduling, demand, training, and retention.
- Revenue: attendance, boarding occupancy, pricing discipline, packages and memberships, grooming, and add-on attachment.
- Reputation: the review program, responses within 48 hours, and local search presence.
- The numbers: a weekly operating dashboard and a monthly review with the owner.
- Growth projects: new service lines, including training and enrichment, and the grooming attachment at boarding checkout.
What the right candidate brings
- Three or more years managing a pet care facility, veterinary practice, grooming salon, or comparable service business with a team and a P&L.
- Real experience in reading and acting on financial statements. Comfort with being asked about last week's labor percentage.
- Demonstrable skill with dogs, including reactive and hard-to-place dogs, and sound judgment about group dynamics and safety.
- A track record of hiring, scheduling, and holding a team to a standard.
- Fluency with booking systems, payments, scheduling, and reporting software.
- Physical capability for the work: on your feet, lifting, cleaning, and outdoors in all weather.
- Availability across a seven-day operation, including weekends and holiday periods.
Helpful but not required
- Grooming or training certification.
- Pet first aid and CPR certification, or willingness to obtain it.
- Experience opening or scaling a facility.
- Local knowledge of Bayonne, Jersey City, and Hudson County.
Compensation
Base
$36,000 – $45,000, negotiable — depending on experience and on how much of the package is taken as profit share. Reviewed annually
Performance bonus
A share of profit above an agreed threshold, paid annually
Profit share and equity
A written profit participation agreement from the start date, converting after twelve to twenty-four months — on conditions agreed in writing in advance — into an ownership interest that vests over four years with a twelve-month cliff, tied to performance milestones, with credit for time already served
Succession
A right of first offer to acquire the business in the future
Other
Paid time off, a flexible schedule once the operation is stable, and your dog comes to work
Attorneys will document both the profit participation agreement and the conversion terms before the start date, and the structure and its tax treatment will be explained in writing before any offer is accepted. The conditions that trigger the conversion are written down in advance and are objective. Nobody is being asked to take a handshake on this.
How to apply
Send a resume and a short note to Frank.Valentine@gmail.com. In the note, describe a problem you found in a business you worked in that nobody had asked you to fix, and what you did about it. That answer carries more weight here than the résumé.
