About

The Kennel Guide lists the people who look after other people’s animals: dog groomers, boarding kennels, catteries, day care, dog walkers, pet sitters and trainers. It started with the larger English cities and will spread town by town.

Most of the businesses here are small. A groomer working from a converted garage, a walker with six regulars, a cattery run from the back of a farm. They rarely reach the first page of Google, where the results tend to belong to booking apps that take a share of every job. Each listing on this site shows what the business itself has made public, and you contact them directly. We take nothing from the booking.

Where the listings come from

We built the first version from public business listings, then grouped them by town and by service. Nobody paid to be included, and most of the businesses don’t know they’re here yet. Details go out of date: a phone number changes, a kennel closes for the winter. If you spot an error, tell us and we’ll fix it.

Walkers and sitters usually work from home, so for those we show the postcode district only (N4, M20) and never a street address.

Licences: ask to see one

In England, anyone who boards dogs or cats for money, in kennels, a cattery, day care or their own home, needs a licence from the local council under the Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (England) Regulations 2018. The council inspects the premises and gives a star rating from one to five. A good boarder will show you the licence without being asked. We don’t display licence status yet, because each council publishes its register differently and some don’t publish one at all.

Grooming, walking and training don’t need a licence. For those, ask about insurance, how many dogs they handle at once, and whether they hold a pet first aid certificate.

Who runs it

The Kennel Guide is published by OmniLearnConsultingCommerce LLC. Corrections, removals and everything else go to hello@thekennelguide.co.uk.