Pet-store franchise saved by customers

Carol Andersen has found that sometimes a customer can be more than just a customer.

Andersen, 52, who had put in 20 years with a sports physical therapy company in East Northport, thought she had at least another two decades of work in her, and decided to do something she always wanted to do: own a pet-food store.

She paid $20,000 to buy a franchise and then spent another $100,000 fixing up a store in East Northport. After wading through the lengthy municipal permitting process, she opened Just Dogs! Gourmet in April 2011. Everything was set. But then the bottom fell out.

About a month after Andersen opened the store, she said she received a letter from the franchise company, Just Dogs Barkery Inc., of Washington, Pa. "They said they were no longer going to be in business," Andersen said earlier this week. Her $20,000 investment was gone, as was the advertising, marketing and professional support she believed she would receive from the company. Officials at Just Dogs could not be reached for comment.

"I was close to going out of business," Andersen said. "I felt I had a month or two left."

But toward the end of last year, into her store walked a couple from Babylon Village, Linda and Trevor Williams, both dog lovers and both in the advertising and marketing field. They all got to talking.

"They took over from there," Andersen said. The Williamses built her a website, gave her marketing tips and business strategies. Her business survived.

"She told us the story about the franchise," Linda Williams said. "We were driving home and I said to my husband, 'I can't help myself. I have to get involved.' She had nothing."

While Andersen has been saved, she says she has learned a valuable lesson about franchise operations: "I would tell people to really research everything."