A dog trainer who shut her salon to open a canine creche has been hit with another blow to her business.
Six months after Bolton Council refused planning permission to use the property in Bromley Cross as a dog training unit, a government-appointed inspector has dismissed an appeal against that decision.
Leah Kellett, who closed Estilo last September with plans to use the premises to train up to five dogs at a time, described the dismissal as unfair.
The appellant argued that she should have been given a trial period to see whether there were any issues with noise coming from her shop.
She said: “I don’t think anybody understands the nature of my business. For them to dismiss it on noise grounds when I had suggested sound proofing and the fact I had already done it for almost a year with no complaints, I do feel it was unfair without even giving it a chance.”
Miss Kellett pointed to a dog grooming salon two doors down in Darwen Road which she believes would be no quieter than her business.
Now, she is hoping to find bigger premises to expand her business, Paws for Thought, which she currently runs from a pet store twice a week.
She said: “The reason I closed the salon is because it was failing with the trade becoming very saturated and I found I was working for the overheads. I lost trust with staff, having lost my last staff member who opened another salon, and I could see the trade was becoming too saturated.
“The dog business was rapidly growing so I felt this was the way to go. The decision to change the salon into the training unit was because I only had one allocated day at the store to hold my classes at the time and had a two-month waiting list for people to enrol on classes – which is still the case.
“So, I actually held classes in my salon one night a week to help accommodate people which then grew to two nights at the salon. I did this for ten months with no issues, hence the reason for change of use.”
