PetSmart — Local services in New York

Whatever issues people have with this Petsmart, they seem to stem primarily from the grooming department. I had an appointment scheduled and brought my dog in. I WAS LATE TO THE APPOINTMENT. Taking full accountability and responsibility for the part that I played in this situation. I was about 15-20 minutes late. When I arrived at the Petsmart and went down to the grooming department no one was out at the desk. I stood there for a few minutes not knowing what to do. I went back upstairs and another employee assisted me; he instructed me to ring a doorbell to get their attention. I went back down and rang the doorbell 3 different times before anyone came out. At least two different employees can attest to me standing around waiting for someone to come to the desk. Finally a woman came out and I mentioned that I was there for a grooming appointment for my dog. She said to hold on and she would see if they could still fit him in. She disappeared to the back again and then returned with the groomer, Joubal. He said that he couldn't fit in my dog anymore. He said he had a meeting in a few minutes and that grooming my dog would "really throw off his day". He kept talking about how fitting him into the schedule would throw off his day. I asked if there were any other times that day that my dog could be worked in, possibly later on, but he was insistent that he couldn't, and that he had a meeting in 5 minutes, and that working him in would "throw off his day". I did mention that I was late and acknowledged that fact. I said something along the lines of "I know we were like 15 minutes late, but is there anyway you can still see him?" To which the groomer responded "Actually, it's closer to 30 minutes that you're late." At that point is when I got mad. By your watch I'm 30 minutes late, but some of that time was me standing around an empty grooming section wondering where everybody was. I understand that groomers are working with animals and cannot just drop what they're doing right that second to go take a call or answer a door, but why wasn't there anyone out at the desk to field customers in the first place?? I didn't appreciate being told that I was 30 minutes late when a portion of that lateness was their fault. By no means am I dismissing their time as any less valuable than my own, but the communication was extremely poor and lacked any semblance of customer service. To the groomer's credit, he did say that he could fit my dog in the next morning at 7am, but I was unable to accommodate that as I would be traveling the next day early in the morning so I could not make that suggested time. This isn't an instance of "the customer is always right", because we aren't. However, this is a prime example of how consumers want to know if they can get a service provided, yes or no full stop. In my field of work the customers that we serve don't care what we have going on behind the scenes or how their requests will impact our day. They care about whether or not we can provide them with the service that they need. I'm not saying that this is right or fair but that is unfortunately how consumerism works. My biggest issue is how Joubal seemed to care more about lamenting his day and how he would be inconvenienced, rather than providing good customer service. And also how he said that I was 30 min late. Um, maybe you guys should have someone manning the front desk so customers aren't standing around in an empty section as tumbleweeds drift by?? Honestly, it was a blessing in disguise that they didn't groom my dog because reading some of the other reviews, I saw horror stories and pictures of people's pets that were injured during grooming. I would raise hell if anything was done to my dog out of frustration or annoyance because the groomer's "whole day was throw off". If you have a pet that you love, don't bring them here. If you must, ask for Shaina Saunders. She does an incredible job and is extremely kind and professional. She's a star. The 1...

I’ve brought my Samoyed to this location for grooming for a while. While it was certainly not the best, due to the convenience of its location, I found the overall grooming experience and the result somewhat acceptable, if not below than average at times. However, the experience I had today was the last straw.

PetSmart has always been considered by the dog owner community as the “corporate” overlord, one more incentivized by profits and less by the well-beings of the dogs, and it really shows when our groomer Amber insisted to add an additional furminator service as it would require extra brushing time and she couldn’t complete her job without performing the furminator service, which was totally understandable, except that another groomer who groomed our pet Samoyed last time did a spectacular job WITHOUT the furminator — with no mat whatsoever — and managed to complete the job in two hours, shorter than other groomers. In contrast, about a year ago when we brought our pet Samoyed to the same spot, we were asked by — you guess it, Amber — to add a furminator service, as it was supposed to be — and I believe it is — beneficial for my pet Samoyed’s double-coated fur, but the result was terrible — mats were everywhere, and we had to clear those mats on our own, not to mention she refused to take away the additional charges even if we insisted we would not need those services. In short, why would I trust and gladly let someone shove an additional charge for an additional service that ended up being a terrible choice and a terrible experience for us and our pet?

My experience today attests to my claim about how Petsmarts is a business driven by financial incentives and not by the well-beings of the dogs. It was especially evident when not just our groomers but also the staff members insisted that our Samoyed pet need to be bathed every four to six weeks, while our vet suggested that it is crucial that Samoyeds should only be bathed TWICE PER YEAR or EVERY QUARTER- maximum, as constantly exposing Samoyeds, specially our pet Samoyed, to bathing is going to bad for her skin in the long-term.

It makes sense that a business driven by financial incentives is going to prioritize maximizing the number of services it can provide as a means to maximize its profits, and I understand for a corporate of this scale to function in an organized and scalable way, there needs to be a protocol of some sort, but every pet, every dog — even if they are the same breed — is different and therefore require different needs. I don’t think there is anyone who better understand our pet better than we or our vet do, and I am sure that the staff members and groomers who were perhaps treated or paid unfairly by their corporate overlord would not necessarily have the mindset of abundance to care for the pets they were grooming but instead be more concerned about the cost-effectiveness of their labor versus the paychecks they ended up receiving, and I believe this explains my overall grooming experiences in Petsmart — groomers and staff members who were bounded by the mindset of scarcity imposed by their greedy, arrogant corporate overlords who operated behind a superficial facade and carefully constructed image that makes one believe that they know their pets better than you do and that one should consume whatever “services” they shove into your face in the name of the well-being and the betterment of your pets in exchange of your green glistening cash, and I am sure I will be cheering my lungs out among the thunderous applauses of many others the day a flare was ignited on the piles of cash obtained from your greed becomes the fire that burns...

Don’t get me wrong I don’t really like to leave bad reviews at all but what happened today was unbelievable, here is a summary

My turtle tank broke yesterday night around 2:00am so we had to order a new one, the best deal for a 40 gallon tank was here so I bought it.

turtles (2) were put in a provisional home (expected to be just for the night) a Lowe’s bucket

Place the order at like 3:00am with same day delivery between 12:00pm - 3:00pm (pic 1)

Order arrived around 1:24 but wrong item, we got dog food from another customer (pic 2) tried to call the delivery man but never picked up.

Called costumer service to let them know what happened, went on hold for a couple minutes (around 6) and told us sorry that they took longer than expected because seems they’re busy and that’s why they couldn’t pick up the phone and they will proceed to send a new dasher (they deliver with DoorDash) and we can keep the food, we don’t have a dogs so we donated it, for now good, mistakes happens I understand and somehow good that now shelter dogs can have a bit more of food.

3:20 hits and I had to go work and didn’t want to leave my turtles in a bucket because it’s abusive, called directly the local store and explained to me that dashers came but they couldn’t take the order because they were in a bicycle so that’s why I got delayed and I should call DoorDash to let them know that it’s a 40 gallon tank and they need a car to transport it, no problem I just don’t want my turtles to be in a bucket.

There was no number where I could call DoorDash so I called the only number provided by them that was the central office of Petsmart, they left me on hold again this time around 20 min and apologized for the wait, same reason and told me my tank will be delivered today at the end of the day, asked if that meant 8:00pm and they responded “yes around 8:00pm” honestly I was already annoyed because it ment my turtles were reaching the 24h mark in the bucket and there was not even a way to go to petco to buy a tank bc I had to go work in less than 15min so I said ok, offered me a 10% discount for the inconvenience.

11:00pm while looking at my messages on my way home realize that my order was cancelled and I should reach out to the store. (Pic 3) thought maybe was a mistake and bc I didn’t picked up to put the order as delivered they “cancelled it”, arrived home and saw that it no tank was waiting for my turtles and they didn’t even refund me or applied the “discount” (pic 4).

Phone call record (pic 5) Turtles (pic 6)

Now turtles are still in a bucket waiting for a tank, the only ones that tried to help were the two really nice ladies at the customer service center and the only reason this has at least 1 star, I’m truly impressed in the worst way about all this, I’ll be going there today early morning to solve this because my turtles DO NOT deserve to be one extra second in that bucket and now I have to spend another $70 in a new tank if I buy it there if not $150 and another $20 in a taxi to go back home, terrible terrible experience and for sure petsmart will not be a place I’ll be visiting any time soon, if something I’ll be updating my situation, hopefully someone actually professional can help me...