Burned Out by Traditional Grooming Conferences?
The PNW Grooming Conference 2027 is not your average grooming event.
Here’s what your registration covers:
🏡 Fully All-Inclusive
Lodging, meals, materials — everything. You show up. We handle the rest.
🍽️ Real Food. Not Sandwich Trays.
We’re talking actual meals — and we can accommodate any dietary need. No one goes hungry, no one feels like an afterthought.
📚 No Choosing Which Classes to Attend — You Get Them All
Here’s what’s on the schedule:
🐾 Mary Oquendo’s 5-Hour Pet Tech Pet Care & First Aid
One of the most valuable certifications a groomer can have. Already certified in the last year or an instructor? No problem — you’ll join one of three small group coaching sessions instead with Denise Heroux, Melissa Jepson, or Erin Huland.
🎨 Hands-On Creative Grooming Workshop
Get your hands in it. Real skills, real techniques, all materials included.
🐕 Behavior & Handling
The education that makes every appointment safer and smoother.
📊 Business Programs
Real tools to grow, protect, and sustain what you’ve built.
✏️ All materials included — everything you need to get the absolute most out of every session is provided.
And when the learning is done for the day?
🔥 S’mores by the fire pit — because community matters and some of the best conversations happen around a fire.
👻 Supernatural Theme Party — because we work hard AND we play hard.
This is the conference that finally does it right. Education, community, nourishment, fun — all in one beautiful Pacific Northwest setting.
June 6–8, 2027 · Seabeck, WA
Decode Your Dog with Melissa Jepson
Have you ever wished your clients could see a doggy therapist?
In a sea of classes focused on how to handle a dog, there are precious few that truly dive into the why behind canine behavior, especially in the grooming salon.
In this comprehensive 4-hour class, Melissa will take a deep dive into the science and psychology behind why dogs respond to different stimuli the way they do. We’ll explore what dogs may be communicating through their behaviors, how to recognize their emotional states, and most importantly? How to respond in healthy, effective ways. The goal isn’t simply to get a dog through a grooming appointment. It’s to understand the dog in front of us, build trust, reduce stress, and become more thoughtful, confident handlers.
Come learn to look beyond the behavior, understand the why, and see your four-legged clients in a whole new way!
Included class materials: a book with bullet points that can double as flash cards with the important points so we remember the highlights
Make A Fur Flower with Erin Huland
Attendees will learn how to create fur flowers for client dogs in the salon or for model dogs.
Erin will demonstrate how to create a simple, yet intricate fur flower and how to airbrush color, shading, details, and 3D like effects.
Each attendee will get hands on practice in this workshop to gain the necessary skills to complete a fur flower on a client or on a model dog. Attendees will need to bring: Brush, Comb, and Shears. We will provide hairspray and glitter.
Class materials include: Wool pad and air brush marker kit (yours to take home.)
Pet Tech Pet CPR And First Aid 5 Hour Program
with Mary Oquendo
Every groomer works hands-on with animals every single day — and knowing what to do in an emergency can save a life.
This 5-hour certification workshop teaches you the skills and confidence to respond when it matters most. Led by Mary Oquendo, you’ll learn pet first aid, CPR, and essential care techniques designed specifically for the pet professional.
Whether it’s a reaction on the table, an unexpected injury, or a moment of crisis — you’ll know exactly what to do.
What you’ll learn:
🐾 Pet CPR techniques
🐾 Recognizing signs of distress and medical emergencies
🐾 First aid for common injuries and conditions
🐾 How to stay calm and take action under pressure
You will receive a workbook and bleeding kit.Upon completion, participants receive their Pet Tech™ certification.
Stuffed dogs will be provided to practice on.
Already certified within the last year or a Pet Tech™ instructor? You’ll join a small group coaching session with one of our other educators instead — so no one misses out.
Business And Personal Development
with Denise Heroux
Elevate Your Customer Service
1 hour.
Service is what people remember, and it is the reason a client comes back or quietly finds somewhere else to go. Most of it comes down to anticipation, which means noticing what someone needs before they think to ask for it and setting expectations early enough that there is nothing to argue about later. This hour covers building service that stays consistent whether you are a one person operation or a team of twenty, using systems and technology to hold that standard when the day gets busy, and catching small frustrations while they are still small. The goal is a business people trust rather than one they simply use.
Mastering Price Increases: When, How, and Why to Raise Your Grooming Fees
1 hour.
Raising prices is a business decision that most owners delay far longer than they should, usually because of how the conversation feels rather than what the numbers say. This hour covers how to know when an increase is due, how to look at your own costs and your market honestly, and how much of one to take. From there we get into the part people actually dread, which is telling clients. We cover how to communicate the change so it lands as a straightforward business decision rather than an apology, how to answer the questions that come back, and what to expect in terms of retention once it goes out.
Leading Starts With You: Developing the Skills Nobody Taught You
2 hours.
Leading people is usually treated as something you either have or you do not, but almost all of it comes down to a handful of skills that can be built like any other. The hardest ones have nothing to do with managing anybody. They have to do with being able to say no and then live with having said it, which is a thing plenty of capable people have never learned to do.
These two hours are about developing that in yourself first. We start with saying no, and then we work on what holds it in place when someone pushes back. It applies to a client at your table, an employee asking for a schedule change, a coworker who keeps taking advantage, and honestly to most of the people in your life outside of work.
Hour One: Saying No
Saying no is hard for anyone who likes being liked, and the habit of saying yes to everything has a cost that only becomes obvious after a year of it. This hour covers where that habit comes from, the difference between a boundary and a wall, and how to give someone a real answer without attaching a paragraph of justification to it.
Hour Two: Becoming Assertive
Saying no once is the easy part. This hour is about what holds it in place: staying steady while someone keeps pushing, letting go of the need for them to agree with you before you can stop explaining yourself, telling the difference between genuinely changing your mind and simply wanting the moment to end, and putting the whole thing down afterward instead of carrying it around.
You do not need to lead anyone to get something out of these two hours. If you do lead people, this is the part that makes the rest of it possible.
Included class materials: A bound workbook.
❤️ Giving Back: Supporting the Pet Stylist Relief Fund
We’re proud to support the grooming community beyond the classroom.
10% of all ticket sales will be donated directly to the Pet Stylist Relief Fund, helping groomers in crisis receive emergency financial support when they need it most.
Your education helps lift the entire industry.
🌲 Learn. Heal. Create. Grow.
No overlapping classes.
No overwhelm.
Just meaningful education, real connection, and space to breathe
.June 6-8th| Pacific Northwest