Inspired by personal experiences traveling with dogs and caring for an aging parent, Pet Friendly Concierge founder Kamala Lovie wants to make it easier for people to keep their pets close—even when life gets complicated.
A hotel may welcome dogs, but what happens when a guest wants to attend a conference, visit a museum, or enjoy an evening out without their pet?
An assisted living community may allow residents to keep their beloved companions, but who walks the dog when a resident needs assistance—or cares for the pet during an unexpected hospital visit?
These are the questions behind Pet Friendly Concierge (PFC), a specialty pet-sitting service designed to provide personalized, one-on-one care where pets are already staying or living.
Pet Friendly Concierge | At a Glance
Service: Specialty pet sitting and temporary care
Specialization: Personalized, one-on-one pet care at hotels, resorts, and assisted living communities
Service Region: Greater San Francisco Bay Area
Website: https://petscango.com/pet-friendly-concierge/
When Traveling With Pets Gets Complicated
Traveling with her dogs, Reggie and Lovie, revealed a frustrating gap between hotels that welcome pets and the practical realities of traveling with them.
“I know when I’ve been traveling with one of my dogs, Reggie or Lovie, one of the challenges is what happens to your dog if you want to do something that’s not pet friendly, like go to a show or a museum or even just go to the hotel spa,” Kamala explains.
Leaving a dog unattended may violate hotel policies, while arranging daycare can require transportation to another location.
Pet Friendly Concierge approaches the problem differently. Rather than requiring owners to transport their pets to daycare or boarding facilities, PFC is designed to bring individualized care to the pet’s temporary surroundings.
The goal is to help travelers enjoy activities that aren’t pet-friendly without unnecessarily disrupting their pets’ routines.
A Caregiver’s Perspective on Pet-Friendly Senior Living
Kamala’s second inspiration came from 15 years of caring for her mother, including navigating senior living arrangements following her mother’s stroke.
Finding communities that would welcome the family’s dogs was only part of the challenge.
Reggie and Lovie lived with her, allowing her to bring them back and forth. But she began wondering about residents whose pets lived with them full-time, particularly when those residents couldn’t independently meet every aspect of their animals’ care.
During visits to nearly 100 senior living communities throughout the Greater Bay Area, Kamala observed that allowing pets and providing an environment where they could thrive were not necessarily the same thing.
Some residents needed help with walking, cleanup, exercise, or enrichment. Conversations with community executives and staff reinforced her observations.
“So I thought, ‘Well, there’s an unserved population,’” she recalls.
The challenge becomes especially urgent when a resident experiences a medical emergency.
Kamala remembers the stress of repeated emergency room visits while caring for her mother and the family’s dogs. Those experiences helped shape her vision for a pet-care resource that families and communities could turn to when an owner was temporarily unavailable.
More Than a Dog Walker
What distinguishes Pet Friendly Concierge from conventional walking or boarding arrangements?
According to Kamala, the defining features are individualized attention, on-site service, and flexibility around the owner’s circumstances.
PFC is designed for temporary care that may include companionship, walking, exercise, and enrichment at a hotel, resort, or assisted living community.
The service is not intended to replace traditional boarding or off-site routine pet-care providers. Instead, it addresses situations where transporting the pet elsewhere may be impractical or where the owner needs temporary assistance.
Kamala also sees opportunities for hotels and senior living communities to establish relationships with specialty pet-care providers, making assistance easier for guests, residents, and families to arrange.
Making Pet-Friendly Living More Practical
For Kamala, the larger issue isn’t simply whether a property allows pets. It’s whether people can continue enjoying their lives while meeting their pets’ needs.
Her vision also extends to animal rescue. During interviews with rescue organization representatives, she heard that dogs were often returned when their owners moved into senior care communities.
That raises another question: Could access to reliable pet-care assistance help more older adults keep their companions rather than surrendering them?
Kamala hopes services like Pet Friendly Concierge can become part of the solution, helping people continue living with their pets even when age, disability, travel, or unexpected medical needs make caring for them more complicated.
Her guiding ambition is to help create a world where people with pets can enjoy the same opportunities as people without them.
That vision recognizes something fundamental: pets are part of family life, and planning for their care can make a meaningful difference during travel, aging, illness, and unexpected emergencies.