PetSmart — Local services in New London

I love PetSmart, they have a wonderful selection of items for my pet needs. I've been to the one in New London a few times and everyone is super friendly and helpful.

The reason I am only giving this review 2 stars is because of the grooming.

I recently took my cat here to get groomed, which was about $80 because I wanted all the bells and whistles. He was a stray so I wanted to make sure he got the best available grooming there was. I asked for his nails to be trimmed, his ears to be cleaned out since they were pretty dirty. I wanted him to get a bath to help reduce shedding, I wanted him to get brushed and maybe his fur to get shaved or trimmed since I noticed he had some matted fur going on.

I was told, "No problem" and that I could pick him up in a few hours.

After I picked him up and brought him home I made sure to look over the wonderful grooming job I was expecting for $80. To be honest it was not the greatest. He is still shedding a TON. I lightly pet him and TONS of fur came flying off. Where they had trimmed his matted fur, it looked like someone just grabbed a pair of scissors and cut it off. There are pretty apparent "bald" spots there now. If they were going to do that maybe they could have at least tried to blend it in. I would expect more for an $80 grooming job for my cat.

His ears were still very dirty. It didn't look like they cleaned them out at all. So I had to go in with a warm wash cloth and wipe them out myself, even though I specifically asked for his ears to be cleaned when I dropped my cat off and they told me it wouldn't be a problem.

I read on the grooming site for PetSmart that if you are getting the furminator/deshedding bath they brush your cat for 20 minutes with their fancy shed-control tool. It is very apparent that he didn't get brushed for 20 minutes. I've have had better experiences with pet grooming at other PetSmarts, but the New London location has disappointed me twice now. We had the same thing happen with our dog a few weeks ago, but we were hoping it was just a fluke.

Overall to say the least I was EXTREMELY disappointed and from now on will just groom my pets myself or take them else where.

I will still go shopping at this PetSmart just never going to make another grooming...

I prefer PetSmart over Petco in general. Their prices are more reasonable and they seem to have a better selection of the things I personally buy, like Purina hydracare, which Petco in my area does not carry. I've used their auto-ship service as well just a couple times and have had almost no issues (except for a bit of a long wait on a case of prescription cat food that hasn't been delivered to me yet). I also like that they have their adoption center for cats. I wish that Petco and PetSmart would carry fancy rats as I've been wanting one for a pet for some time, and to my knowledge they used to do so, but not anymore.

One complaint I have is the state of the poor fighting fish. I noticed on a couple of my recent visits to the store that they have these poor fish in very small containers (it's a myth that that it good for them - it's not), and some looked very visibly unhealthy. Last visit there was even TWO dead ones I had to make the staff aware of, which is really sad and shouldn't be occuring. If you can't make sure ALL the animals (including fish) in the store are healthy and given proper food/shelter/medical care, you shouldn't be in the business.

Besides that I'm generally happy with Petco and it does continue to be my pet supply store of choice. Unfortunately right now the cat food shelves are abysmally empty, but I know that is due more to a national shortage/supply chain issue than any fault of PetSmart directly, and I believe they are doing everything they can atm to keep the shelves stocked the best they can. More affordable than Petco, better variety of items I personally buy, a clean well kept environment, and friendly helpful staff are why I give it 4 stars, with one removed for the situation with the fish, an issue which I hope will...

UPDATE: The team of associates and managers were super helpful in rectifying the situation and gave us a free bag of dog food as well as refunding the whole training program. I still hope nobody has to go through what we went through, but the sales team is definitely the best out there. Tonight we went to our 3rd group training at petsmart in New London and had the worst experience I could ever imagine. Coy, the trainer not only refused to work with Lexie (my puppy) because she was difficult, but turned his back towards both me and my puppy the entire class. This all started because she wasn’t interested in the fake bone he was using, and I can only assume it made him insecure to not be able to get my dogs attention in front of the class. The only time he addressed Lexie and I was to tell the entire class that Lexie will leave last because “she will not get it” when we were practicing to “wait” before going through doors. This was extremely embarrassing for both me and Lexie. He was on the floor giving all the other dogs treats and love and attention, but told me to hold my dog, singling us out. Coy had no problem working with the other dogs/owners, but paid no attention to Lexie and I. I did not pay $136 to be ignored and embarrassed. His body language and tone of voice was extremely unprofessional as he talked down to both my dog and I. She is the happiest most playful and energetic and loving dog you could imagine, yet she cried the whole car ride home and cried herself to sleep on my...