Sarah Waters & Boondocks Boarding: College Student Entrepreneur Highlight

Sarah Waters is a graduate of Lorain County Community College where she completed a partnership with Hiram University in environmental studies. 

After completing her degree, Sarah decided to follow her passion for animals and launched Boondock Boarding with her husband Ray. Located in New London, Boondock Boarding is a Northeast Ohio regional pet care service offering board, bathing, rescue, and limited training services to pet owners.  

About Boondock Boarding

Boondock Boarding started after Sarah purchased a property with a kennel and a large amount of land in the New London area. This is when Sarah knew she needed to fulfill her passion for helping animals and elaborate on her environmental studies degree. 

The property was vacant for five years with no heat, water, or electricity. Sarah and her husband Ray had a lot of work to do on the property to make it safe for boarding animals. This work involved painting, remodeling, redesigning, and restructuring of the kennel areas. 

Eventually, after all the hard work Sarah and Ray had put into the property they were finally able to open up Boondock Boarding and Rescue service, fulfilling Sarah’s long-time passion for helping animals along with her desire to provide pet owners with a reliable and safe place to keep their animals. 

Since their early beginnings Sarah and Ray have been able to grow the business further through their extraordinary service and  remarkable care of the animals. Along with the trust that customers have developed with Sarah, they knew their animals were staying in a place where they would be taken care of and loved.

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Boondock Boarding's Sustainability Practices

Creating Boondock Boarding wasn’t all about Sarah’s passion for helping animals. Boondock Boarding also prioritizes aspects of sustainability and innovation. 

Sarah articulates some of Boondock’s specific efforts saying  “We want to focus on dog waste and disposable bags. We also want to use a lot less water, and we are actually working on building solar panels on the property.” These unique initiatives are just some of the reasons why Boondock Boarding has become a successful business. 

This also shows how Sarah is a perfect example of combining your passions and skills into a successful business no matter how different or outside of the box these interests may seem.

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Sarah's Advice to Future Entrepreneurs

Sarah’s advice to entrepreneurs is to not be scared to ask for help. Being a small business owner you are taking on a lot of tasks that can become overwhelming very quickly and sometimes seeking help can be difficult. 

"Remember that solopreneurs don't have to go at it solo, it's okay to ask for help."

Along with asking for help Sarah wants to stress the importance of planning and organization, as Sarah describes her utilization of planners “ use several planners both online and offline for each aspect of your life from school, to your personal life, to your business”. 

Sarah believes the utilization of planners will help any entrepreneur maximize the amount of work that they can get done in all aspects of their life.

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If you are interested in learning more about Sarah’s story, watch her episode in season two of EEC’s Dream It Do It Series. Find out more about Boondock Boarding and see some adorable pictures of Sarah’s animals.