The wheels on the pup bus are going round and round the globe for Escape to the Country.
The Foothills County kennel, located south of Highway 7 between Black Diamond and Okotoks, has seen its profile grow to a global stage with social media views of its Pup Bus reaching over 26 million for one of its videos alone.
“It just started off with one video,” says owner Emma Godley. “There’s an awareness that it’s brought. There was a lot of people that think (we’re) in the (United) States and so we’ve even had people say, ‘Oh my god, this is right in our backyard.’
“It’s just something different that we offer our clients.”
Godley says the idea behind the bus been has front of mind for quite a while, starting with the kennel doing adventure walks comprised of packing dogs into staff vehicles.
“We thought, ‘We have to do this better,’” she says. “There’s another pup bus up in Alaska and I liked that idea, but they had shuttle buses and I actually wanted a school bus.
“I went out and bought an old school bus, re-purposed it, and the wrap cost me more than the bus and all of the mechanical stuff too.”
The bus hit the road in May 2023 following a couple of months getting it up to speed for furry friends.
“It was mostly a convenience thing for us and we thought, 'Oh, that’s kind of cute,’” she says.
The bus content started small, primarily for Facebook clients, before one of Godley’s tech-savvy staff members Katie Michailuck suggested trying it out on Instagram.
“She took over and so I said here you have access to the account and she started posting,” Godley says. “If she couldn’t do it all of the time, then I would do a little video and send it to her and she would put it together. It was the putting together that I had no clue about.
“She ended up doing that, one video took off.”
With internet fame came inquiries from the likes of AccuWeather and Calgary radio station XL 103.
“It’s just a service that we offer,” she says of the acclaim. “The thing I like about it is that we’re actually spreading happiness. There was a lady who said she worked in palliative care and said she would show these videos to her patients, and it made their day.”
The pup bus picks up and delivers in Diamond Valley on Wednesday and Okotoks on Thursday and there’s a good chance that a second day will be added to meet the growing demand.
There’s a maximum of 16 to 18 dogs on the bus and after a scenic drive through the rolling hills of Foothills County, the canines get their chance to burn off energy for an hour at the off-leash Little Creek Private Dog Park.
“The dogs definitely, if they’ve been here for a while, it’s nice for them to have that different sensory experience so they can go out and sniff around and have what we call the sniffari, go play in the water, the bushes and the hills,” Godley says.
The Pup Bus is just one of several offerings at Escape to the Country, a dog and cat boarding retreat which also offers doggie daycare, adventure walks and pet food delivery services.
The expansive facility has heated floors for cooler months, air-conditioning for the summer, boasts a large outdoor play area for dogs on grass and all-weather indoor play area with K9-Grass.
The upstairs, where the cats live in luxury in spacious suites with climbing trees and windows with tons of natural light, started with nine kennels before its recent expansion.
The owners live on site at the SPCA-inspected and MD-licenced facility, which is approved for 55 dogs and 35 cats and has fully supervised social interactions.
“We’ve got great clients, they want the best for their animal, the best care for their animal,” Godley says. “That’s a big thing for us, we just treat them as our own because a lot of places, they’ll only let their dogs out twice a day, ours go out four to six times per day and it’s all supervised.
“We try and do as much as we can with them and have them be mentally stimulated. For the dogs, if they’re tired and they’ve been stimulated, then it’s nap time. It doesn’t have to be a barky kennel, it’s usually nice and quiet.”
The built from scratch business, located on a five-acre plot with picturesque views of the Foothills to the east and the mountains to the west, launched in 2011 as strictly a dog kennel on a much smaller scale.
Godley grew up on a farm in DeWinton with horses, dogs and cats and worked as an aesthetician before pet care became her calling.
“I was still going and doing my aesthetics during the day, but then I would come home and look after the animals,” she says. “As we were looking for this, I always had it in the back of my mind.
“We started, it just started rolling, getting busier and busier.”
From a car garage with three kennels, then six, nine and grew to a total of 16 in the first five years.
The expansion broke ground last fall with the animals in the new digs as of this April.
“We just outgrew,” she says. “I got the little van during COVID for the pet food deliveries and that got really busy and then the pup bus, that got busier and was attracting people.
“When you’re booking all of the time, months in advance, then you need to expand.”
With expanded services comes growth of the staff with eight full-time employees, all of whom are Pet First-Aid certified, working in pairs during morning or evening shifts.
“I think next year I might even have to hire a few more,” she adds.
The pets will also see expanded grounds and new offerings in the coming months.
Future plans include an outdoor cat patio, or catio, on the second floor.
On the ground level, the dogs will soon have an opportunity to burn off energy outdoors with an expanded play area being constructed.
“I go and do a lot of training in the (United) States, and in the U.K, I’m always taking conference,” she says. “We’re also part of the International Boarding (and Pet Services) Association, they offer tons of staff training, all of the staff takes that so we’re very current on all of the trends and basics.”
Godley says it’s been rewarding to see the business grow, adding she takes every step possible to find ways to make things better.
“It’s very rewarding,” she adds. “Especially if you get a dog that’s very nervous coming in, or even pet parents that are nervous leaving their animals, and then you can watch them both grow, watch the confidence grow.
“You’re always moving, switching and adapting to whatever the animals’ needs are.”
For more information on the pet boarding retreat, visit escapetothecountry.ca and for the latest adventures from the pup bus, go to @escapetothecountrykennels on Instagram.
