If you’d told me a week before the 4 Small Paws open day that everything would go smoothly, I wouldn’t have believed you — and honestly, I’d have had good reason to doubt it.
With internal walls still not fully constructed seven days out, and my team and I touching up paint and hauling out equipment the night before, the lead-up was, in a word, absolute chaos. But when Saturday morning rolled around and the doors swung open at 10:00 AM, something wonderful happened.
People showed up.
Not just a few curious neighbours — a couple of hundred of them, streaming in steadily from the moment we opened. I’d spent the weeks prior doing everything I could to spread the word: posting on Facebook and Instagram, running a small advertising budget across local newspaper and online articles, and — perhaps most importantly — wearing my branded 4 Small Paws t-shirts at every dog park I could find, handing out business cards and flyers to anyone who’d listen.
The anxiety in the lead-up was real. Anyone who’s ever put something they care about out into the world knows the feeling — that constant swing between this is going to be great and what if nobody comes? Without a clear feedback loop beyond people liking posts, I genuinely had no way of knowing.
Then the cars started arriving.
The coffee cart worked overtime, burning through the subsidised coffee budget faster than any of us expected. The sausages started running low. Inside and outside the facility, people mingled, explored, and gave me the kind of immediate, genuine feedback that no amount of market research can replicate. One moment stood out above the rest: a nervous corgi — whose owner swore it doesn’t talk to anyone — wandered over and sat down calmly right next to me. If that’s not a sign you’re doing something right, I don’t know what is.
By the end of the day, I think we were all a little shell shocked. The Facebook page filled up with positive comments overnight, and something shifted for me. The theoretical became real. The idea that had driven months of hard work wasn’t just viable — it was wanted.
That day wasn’t just a successful event. It was confirmation that every decision I’d made, every risk I’d taken, and every wall I’d eventually gotten around to building were all worth it.
