We all know Blanchard’s is #1 but they are not open on Sundays. Who is the 2nd best BBQ in Lafayette and open on Sundays?

This is gonna be a quick post, I just need to know where the best prices are for fireworks and or honest owners.

TL;DR is at the top, the full story is below. It's long - but if you're about to hand your dog to a big-name daycare or boarding place, I promise it is worth your time to read.

I used to work on the floor at one of the big corporate dog daycares here in town. I won't say which one, but honestly it doesn't matter, because this applies to the whole corporate model - The Dog Stop, Camp Bow Wow, Dogtopia, all of them. I'm not a competitor, I have nothing to sell you, I just really love dogs, and I want people to know how these places are actually run, because they won't tell you these things.

TL;DR

• It's usually ONE worker in each yard for 15–20+ dogs. You can check this yourself RIGHT NOW - pull up their live webcams during the day and count the dogs, then count the humans.
• The people watching your dog are attendants or "coaches," NOT vets or vet techs. At most they have basic first-aid training, and it's a tossup whether the facility even keeps first-aid supplies on hand.
• Small injuries happen constantly, and a lot of the time the owner never gets told.
• In my experience, reactive or dangerous/aggressive dogs do not get turned away, which puts YOUR dog at risk.
• If your dog is old, sick, scared, or very shy, these places will still take your money and just park them alone in a kennel all day with almost nobody watching.
• The workers themselves are good people who love animals. The problem is the corporate system, not them.

The long version

1. The dog-to-employee ratio is unsafe

One person cannot safely watch 15, 20, sometimes more dogs at once. It's not humanly possible. Nobody can keep eyes on that many dogs and still catch the little signals that a fight is about to break out. So they don't catch them. They only step in AFTER something already happened and a dog or a person is bleeding. Again, don't take my word for it, go look at the webcams and count.

2. The staff aren't medical people, and they're exhausted

The folks watching your dog are attendants, "canine coaches," handlers, whatever the brand calls them. At most they've had a basic pet first-aid class and a handout about what bloat is. That is NOT the same as a vet or a vet tech who can actually tell when something is medically wrong. On top of that they're usually young, close to minimum wage, and on their feet all day with no real breaks. When a person is that worn down, they miss things. That's just how it goes.

3. Injuries get missed, and honestly, hidden

Here's something most people don't know: in my experience, the owner usually only hears about a bite if their dog bites ANOTHER dog badly enough to leave a serious wound. If their dog bites an EMPLOYEE, or nips another dog without leaving a big mark, management often never even finds out, let alone tells you.

I got bit by a dog through thick jeans and it broke the skin. That dog wasn't being aggressive towards me specifically, I was just standing next to him when a fight broke out (and yeah, they can happen that fast!) and I got caught in the crossfire. That dog had zero bite inhibition - not his fault, but still something that needs to be addressed. (Guess if the owners were informed!)

And the smaller stuff - a nicked lip, a scraped paw pad- gets missed all the time, especially if it's stopped bleeding by pickup time. So you take home a dog with a wound you don't know about, and now you're looking at possible infections and hot spots.

4. They don't turn away dangerous dogs

A dog basically has to be actively mauling another dog to get kicked out. Where I worked we had a dog that would regularly bite people and other animals completely unprovoked, (not play biting, promise me I know the difference. We were all scared of him.) and he was allowed back over and over, because his owner kept paying.

5. They often aren't equipped for basic medical care

One time, management decided to accept a dog for boarding last minute (over the phone, mind you, while we were actively closing, without seeing the dog or owner) that had JUST had surgery and still had a drain tube in its neck (and a shock collar on - classy), and we had literally nothing on hand to care for it. One of my coworkers had to go buy coban, gauze, and antiseptic supplies from the dollar store out of their own pocket.

A safe, responsible place says "we can't take this dog, it's not safe and we're not equipped." A big chain says "sure," pockets the boarding fee, and leaves the minimum wage employees to stress about it and treat wounds that they aren't trained to treat. Also- NOT in my job description to be treating recovering surgical wounds!

6. Your dog can get bullied and nobody can really stop it

With that many dogs and one worker, if your dog is the type that gets picked on, there's almost nothing anyone can do except pull them out and stick them in a timeout kennel for a break. We had one sweet boy the other dogs would NOT stop mounting, to the point his whole back would be soaked with drool. The only peace he got was when I'd pull him out to breathe and put him in the timeout kennels - the ones meant for dogs that were misbehaving. That wasn't fair to him, but there was nothing else we could do.

7. Fleas, vaccines, and kennel cough

The vaccine and flea/parasite checks can be really lax at high-volume places. I'm not exaggerating when I tell you I brought fleas home ON MY OWN CLOTHES from the place I worked. If it's on the staff, it's on your dog. When you pack dozens of dogs together and screening is loose, fleas and stuff like kennel cough go through the place fast.

8. "Good tired" is often just stress

When your dog is wiped out for days after daycare, that's often NOT happy-exhaustion. It's a dog that got flooded with stress hormones for hours with no quiet place to calm down. What's funny is some of these places actually brag about it. Customer reviews saying their dog "slept for nearly 2 days after." That dog is usually unwinding after a stressful visit.

9. The sick and elderly dogs get the worst of it

If your dog is old, sick, or just can't handle the chaos, these places will usually still take them, they just stick them in a kennel by themselves. And that's honestly WORSE than leaving them home alone, because now they're bored and stressed in a strange loud place, AND nobody's really watching them, because there aren't enough staff to go around.

There was this sweet old Great Dane who was staying with us once. If you know Danes, you know even a healthy one can have loose stool, and this poor guy was old AND sick. He was too weak and elderly to be out at regular playtime, so he was kept in a kennel alone most of the day. He had diarrhea all over his bed and his whole kennel, and he was left alone long enough that he walked through it, laid back down in it (or fell in it. He was weak enough I think it's likely he could've slipped in his own feces). Nobody noticed. I only found it myself as I was leaving the yard. He had tracked it over the entire floor of his kennel - the linoleum was actually covered in it - and it had already dried onto his fur and the floor, so it had been sitting a long time. I mopped and scrubbed that kennel myself. It took FOUR full mop bucket refills because the water kept coming out brown.

At a real vet-run place, someone would have caught that fast, cleaned him up right away, and called his owner. Instead he laid in it, alone, and if I had gone down another aisle to leave the yard then he might have laid in it for another several hours before anything was done about it.

10. They take dogs that are far too terrified to be there

Some dogs are just not built for this kind of place, and a good facility will tell you that honestly instead of accepting your dog (and your money). I'll never forget one little dog who was so petrified of everything and everyone that he's stuck with me to this day. His owner left him with a comfort blanket, which I gave him, but he was so scared he'd snap if you got anywhere near him. I spent every spare moment of my entire shift checking on him, trying to tempt him with treats, talking to him soft, and eventually I stopped trying to interact with him because he was so scared, and he never calmed down - he just shivered in the corner. He wouldn't move, wouldn't eat, wouldn't drink, wouldn't sleep the whole time I was there. He stayed shut in that kennel the entire time. I have never seen a more stressed or frightened animal in my life. That dog should NEVER have been allowed to stay.

It's cruel to the dog, and it's dangerous for the staff, because a terrified dog WILL bite. It does not matter how sweet your dog is at home. Fear makes ANY dog bite. (Even a golden retriever will bite if it's scared, overstimulated, or stressed. Everybody goes "oh it's a golden, he'd never bite!" Yes he will. He's still a dog.)

A place that actually cares would either screen for this and catch it, or call you and say, "hey, your dog is extremely distressed, we recommend picking him up." This is the type of dog who will come home and sleep for two days, by the way - and you won't know if they had a good time or a horrible time, because they can't really tell you, and management won't tell you the truth either, because if you don't bring your dog back, they lose that money.

11. The webcams don't show you the whole picture

"But they have cameras!" The cameras show the playrooms. They don't show the kennels, the back, the grooming area, or the long stretches when the room is empty. And a lot of these places have NOBODY in the building overnight, from close to open. So if your dog boards there and gets sick, injured, or panics at 2am, there's probably no one coming - and god forbid there's a fire. It was not an uncommon occurrence for us to have a very large number of dogs boarding overnight by themselves. The most I remember was 52, over a holiday weekend. How much sleep do you think your dog is getting when there's that many dogs in a metal building alone for 12 hours?

A quick word about the employees

I want to be crystal clear, because this really matters - and yet it doesn't change my recommendation to not bring your dog to places like this. The people in the yards, scooping poop and watching your dogs, are almost always wonderful and they genuinely love animals (not just saying that because I was one). Nobody does that job for the money, trust me, because the pay is usually like 75 cents above minimum wage. It's dirty, physically brutal, low-paying, and you WILL get hurt, repeatedly. You're on your feet the entire shift (the place I worked literally did not have a single chair in the back of house at all - not even for when we were itemizing the things the owners brought with their dogs. We had to sit on the nasty floor), you're getting bitten and bruised by overstimulated or untrained dogs, and turnover is so high there's a new face every few weeks.

None of that is the workers' fault. It's the corporate setup, which is built to cram in as many dogs as possible while spending as little as possible on the humans and the safety. The staff are doing their absolute best inside a broken system, and they are the best part of these places.

Alternatives

You absolutely don't have to skip daycare or boarding entirely. Just look for a different kind of setup.

• A place connected to a vet clinic. This is my top pick, especially for a senior, sick, or anxious dog. Because they're attached to a clinic, there's usually actual medical staff on-site and a vet right there during the day, plus real monitoring - not just an empty building overnight. If your dog gets hurt or sick, someone who actually knows what they're looking at is right there, and they'll actually call you. (People around here seem to really like The Lodge, which is through English Animal Clinic.)
• Small-group play that rotates. The better places run small groups and rotate smaller batches of dogs in and out with rest breaks, instead of dumping dozens of dogs into one room all day. Small groups + downtime = way less stress and way fewer fights. (The Lodge does small-group play, for example.)
• A good solo sitter on Rover. Look for someone who takes only ONE family's dogs at a time, so your pup isn't thrown into a giant pack. Read the reviews carefully and meet them first. Know what their plan is if your dog needs medical attention while in their care. Do they have a dog-safe first aid kit? Do they have a vet in mind in case of emergency? Do they know about bloat? Do they know doggy Heimlich? Doggy CPR? Do they know not to feed your dog grapes, garlic, real bones, or rawhide?
• Ask your own vet. Vets know which local boarders actually call them when something goes wrong.

Questions to ask any place (and watch how they answer)

• How many dogs per person in a group?
• Do you separate dogs by SIZE and by play style, not just size?
• Is anyone in the building overnight, or at least monitoring remotely?
• Is there medical staff on-site? What do you do in an emergency?
• How strict are you on vaccines and flea prevention?
• Can I tour the ACTUAL back - the kennels and yards and all, not just the lobby?

That last one is important. If a place gets weird or hides behind "insurance" or "liability" when you ask to see the back, walk away. A place with nothing to hide will happily give you a tour.

Bottom line

I know a lot of these big chain places are cheap, but like with most things, that usually means someone is getting exploited or corners are getting cut to give you that price. There are plenty of local and family-owned, non-chain boarders, groomers, vet clinics, and daycares you can bring your dog to instead. Your dog can't tell you when a place scares them or makes them miserable, and you can't always trust management to tell you either - so take some insider advice and PLEASE do your due diligence to make sure your pets are safe and happy.

I'm deliberately leaving the specific location out of this - I don't want any trouble. But everything here is either something I saw with my own eyes or something you can verify yourself on their public webcams and websites. Take care of your pups, y'all. They deserve it.

Hello!

Who do yall go to for alternative style hair ??? Color, cuts etc.

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Hey yall! I am new(ish) to the area and am looking for a hair dresser. I have long, fine hair and really want to go to someone who just cuts fine hair real good. I never color my hair so their coloring abilities dont matter to me. Bonus if they do good bangs!! Thanks in advance for any help and recommendations :)) there are so many salons here its honestly overwhelming lol

Hey,

I recently moved to Lafayette from North LA for college and have been struggling to find a barber I like.

I’m a guy with short but very thick curly hair (not coily though), do yall have any suggestions on where I should go? I’m even open to a salon if that would be best. I’ve tried Just4Hims and one other place (can’t remember the name sorry) but didn’t really like either.

Thanks for the help