The Modern Grooming Debate: Holistic Grooming VS Conventional Grooming
- Stephanie Zikmann
- Oct 9
- 16 min read
If you've been following the evolution of dog grooming over the past few years, you'll know there's a growing conversation about how we groom - not just technical skills, but the entire approach.
As the founder of the HGA, I've heard every objection, every pushback, and every "but that's not how we've always done it" argument imaginable.
So let's have an honest debate. Here are the most common arguments I hear from conventional groomers, and my responses based on behavioural science, welfare research, and real-world results from our graduates.
Table of Contents
Round 1: "Dogs just need to learn to tolerate grooming - it's part of life"
The Conventional Argument:
Dogs need to be groomed for health and hygiene. It's not optional. If we spend ages trying to make every dog comfortable, we'd never get through our appointment books. Dogs need to learn that grooming happens whether they like it or not. That's just reality, and repetitive exposure to grooming will naturally desensitise them to it anyway.
The HGA Response:
You're absolutely right that grooming is essential but how we achieve that matters enormously. One look in the wild and you will see that grooming is about more than just skin and coat health (and styling). It's also about bonding and emotional well-being.
Did you know? How a dog feels during grooming sessions and other day-to-day activities has a direct and prolonged influence on their overall quality of life.
Tolerance and compliance do not necessarily mean consent.
We need to be confident that we are not creating unnecessary trauma in the process of carrying out our responsibility. It's important to note that when we force dogs to "tolerate" procedures they find frightening and/or uncomfortable, we're not teaching resilience - we're teaching learned helplessness (Seligman and Maier, 1967). Furthermore, research on canine cognition shows that repeated exposure to inescapable stress doesn't build tolerance, it builds fear associations that compound over time (Corridan, C.L., et al, 2024).
One of the most frustrating misconceptions around a more behaviour-led approach to grooming is that sessions must take hours to complete.
Not true.
Fun Fact: HGA groomers start by reducing grooming time and opting for more frequent sessions until positive associations are formed and trust is built.
Not only do dogs have lower attention spans than the average adult does (think 2-3 year old human child equivalent), for various more reasons, often more time means more problems.
Less is more.
An HGA Philosophical approach means working more efficiently by:
Reading and listening to stress signals early
Adjusting our approach before a dog's behaviour escalates, and
Building positive associations that make future sessions easier, not harder
HGA graduates report that whilst progress might seem to take longer initially, longer term, sessions will be more cooperative and low-stress once positive associations are established. Dogs become progressively easier to groom, rather than more difficult and groomers are less likely to dread each working day.
Round 2: "I don't have time for all that behaviour stuff - I'm a groomer, not a dog trainer".
The Conventional Argument
I trained to be a groomer. I learned scissoring, clipping, breed standards, and coat care. Now you're telling me I need to understand advanced behaviour science too? That's a completely different profession. I just want to focus on building my technical skills, because that's what makes a good groomer - that's what dog owners want and expect.
The HGA Response
Here's the thing: you're already doing training and behaviour work.
Every time you approach a nervous dog, choose which leg to start with, decide whether to use a muzzle, or work around a dog who is air snapping, you are making behavioural decisions.
But are you making them based on outdated dominance theory and a "just get it done" mentality, or based on an updated understanding of how dogs learn and process stress?
Because here's the kicker: the behaviour and training theory I have come across in various professional grooming courses (so far) does not reflect modern science.
The point is, you don't need to become a dog trainer - I'm not saying you have to invest thousands more pounds in learning and qualifying as more than what you are, but relevant CPD in those topics is essential, whether you like it or not.
You need to understand why a dog is responding in a certain way, what their body language is telling you, and how to adjust your handling to make the experience better for them, otherwise, you will be contributing to the detriment of their health.
Knowing how to read and communicate with the animals you are working with is not separate from grooming responsibility at all - it's essential grooming knowledge that you should know before you even consider touching a dog in a professional grooming setting.
Fact: Once you can effectively pick up on subtle behaviour cues, grooming becomes safer.
Why? Well:
You spend less time wrestling dogs
You get bitten (or nearly bitten) less, AND
You finish your day less exhausted and more optimistic
Round 3: "This 'holistic' stuff is just trendy, 'woo-woo' nonsense - grooming is grooming"
The Conventional Argument
There's always a new trend in the dog world - raw feeding, "force-free" training, and now "holistic grooming". It all sounds lovely, but at the end of the day, grooming is a practical, high-stress, demanding job. You wash the dog, you clip the dog, you send them home looking smart. All this philosophical stuff is just marketing fluff and woo-woo.
The HGA Response
I understand the scepticism, and honestly, I share some of it.
The term 'holistic' has been diluted by overuse and mixed understanding, which is precisely why I am trying to shift focus to emphasise the behavioural foundation of the HGA approach.
In my first book, The Magic of Holistic Grooming, I cited Oxford's Dictionary's definition of 'holistic', specifically the medical definition, hoping it might make my views and intentions clear. For the purposes of this blog post, I've looked it up again on Google and this is what came up:
"Holistic care is a comprehensive approach that treats the whole person, encompassing their physical, mental, social, and spritual well-being, rather than focusing solely on a single disease or symptom. It recognises that these aspects of a person are interconnected and affect each other, and aims to provide care that addresses their broader life context, promoting overall health and addressing imbalances through diverse, personalised approaches" - AI Overiew, Google
And this is exactly how HGA Philosophy approaches dogs in a dog grooming environment.
Let me be clear: as far as I'm concerned, holistic grooming isn't the use of crystals and aromatherapy (though these things may help to reduce stress for some dogs). My job is to acknowledge that grooming isn't just a physical task, but an emotional, physiological, and psychological service of care that must consider and respect the individual needs and circumstances of each dog.
This matters because when a dog's needs aren't met, you can expect:
Their cortisol levels to rise
Their skin will become more sensitive
They will behave in a state of high stress
They will be less able to establish positive associations.
The 'holistic' approach, as far as HGA Philosophy is concerned, simply means considering the whole dog - their physical comfort, their emotional state, their previous experiences, and their individual needs.
Now tell me again that this is just "woo-woo", and I'm just a "snowflake"!
Round 4: "If I let dogs dictate appointments, I'd never finish a groom - dogs are never going to want to be groomed!"
The Conventional Argument
If I stopped every time a dog showed stress signals or tried to move away, I'd be there all day. Some dogs need firm handling. If we give in every time a dog protests, we're teaching them that fussing gets them what they want. Sometimes you just need to get on with it.
The HGA Response
There's a crucial difference between "letting dogs dictate the appointment" and listening to what dogs are telling us to help guide us in making better choices.
When a dog shows signs of stress, they're communicating. Ignoring those signals doesn't make them go away. Instead, the dog learns that subtle communication doesn't work, so they escalate to more obvious (and often, more dangerous) behaviours like snapping and biting.
Myth: Holistic Grooming means never completing a groom from beginning to end again.
You're missing the point entirely. This is about recognising when we can adjust our approach to reduce stress short-term, so that we can achieve better outcomes longer term.
While you might have to succumb to sending a dog home incomplete one or two times during the initial process, you can expect far better outcomes once positive associations have been successfully established.
The key to more cooperative grooming sessions is, adaption.
For example:
Can we start with a less sensitive area?
Can we take a 30-second break?
Can we use a different tool or technique?
Can we reduce session time and schedule more frequent sessions?
Here's the critical point - when we ignore stress signals and "just get on with it", we're only forcing a dog to suppress their emotions. Suppressed emotions lead to suppressed anxiety and stress, which we know has a direct influence on the quality of life an animal has.
Research also suggests that repeated exposure to stressful scenarios not only reduces lifespan, but also increases the frequency of disease and its severity (Dreschel, 2010).
A study that sought to explore the role social environment has on stress in rodents showed that one acute stressor not only resulted in long-term behavioural and physiological harm, but also sensitisation to other less intense stressors as well (Koolhaus et al., 1997).
Hard Truth: Each grooming session can either contribute to the enhancement of a dog's life or be of significant detriment to it.
Round 5: "I can't charge enough to make this approach financially viable!"
The Conventional Argument
This all sounds lovely, but grooming is already undervalued. Most pet owners won't pay premium prices even with immaculate styling results, and if I start taking longer on appointments or not complete grooms, I'll go out of business in no time. The conventional approach puts food on my table.
The HGA Response
This is perhaps the most important debate because it touches on the sustainability of our entire profession.
Fact: Premium pricing comes down to how you market and show your value.
We see it all the time in shops everywhere. You could place an unbranded polo shirt next to a well-known branded one - both could be made at the same factory using the same material, and most people would choose the branded version despite it being hundreds of pounds more to buy.
While I won't deny that dog carers have been known to gravitate to the cheaper option, I'd say that how you position and market yourself plays a significant role in your financial success (or lack of).
When you publicly showcase why you are the best option for their dog, and you build trust in what you do, people will pay what you're worth. When I was actively grooming dogs, some of my clients were travelling over an hour just to see me for thirty minutes, and they were happy to pay more than the average rate.
With a behaviour-led approach, you are offering more than just styling. You are providing a service that will support and contribute to their dog's health in every capacity.
It comes down to us to start educating the public on why this is as important, especially for the average pet dog who will be suffering some form of genetic and/or environmental defect, all thanks to selective breeding and human vanity (RSPCA, 2023).
Secondly, consider the hidden costs of conventional methods:
Injuries from bites
Time spent managing escalated behaviours
The physical and emotional toll of wrestling highly-aroused dogs all day, and
The burnout that drives groomers out of the profession and destroys their relationship with dogs.
As a business professional, you can't really afford to ignore the risks you are taking the conventional way.
Round 6: "My clients just want their dog to look good - they've never asked about the process!"
The Conventional Argument
At the end of the day, clients want a well-groomed dog. They're not asking about my handling techniques or how I communicate with their dog. They drop their dog off, they pick them up at the designated time, and as long as the dog looks good and isn't injured, they're happy. All this "behaviour focus" is solving a problem clients don't think they have.
The HGA Response
I'd challenge that assumption. Clients might not be asking about your methods, but that doesn't mean they don't care. They expect you to be safeguarding the experience their dog has, and because we have been trained to "put on a show", they believe that they can have their cake and eat it too.
Many don't know that their dog struggles, air-snaps, and crocodile rolls around the grooming table, but if they did, I know they would be devastated, worried, and desperate to make the process less awful for their dog. I know because I've seen it countless times.
But also, most dog carers suspect/know when their dog has had a negative grooming experience, and they are quick to blame the groomer when things go awry. We hear about it all the time!
Having a more behaviour-led approach sets you up for less customer conflict long term because you aren't pretending that Bruno is "great to be groomed" when the reality is you've had to use every restraint in your possession just to get the job done.
Transparency builds a culture that demands more, not just from you, but from dog carers. It lowers expectations and allows us all the breathing space needed to work with dogs at a pace that is realistic, safe, and ethical.
Make no mistake, as awareness of animal welfare continues to grow, clients will start asking for a more dog-centred approach, and the groomers who are already implementing behaviour-focused approaches will be ahead of the curve.
Those still clinging to outdated methods will be left defending an approach that is no longer considered acceptable in a modern grooming world.
Round 7: "Competition dogs enjoy the show ring, and we get to educate the public on how technical and advanced our jobs are!"
The Conventional Argument
We all care about welfare. Competition dogs are treated with so much love, care, and respect, and they thoroughly enjoy being in the show ring. What you do isn't any different to what we do - we're all working towards the same goal of happy, well-groomed dogs. Besides, there's no better way to showcase how advanced and technical our job is than through competitions and events.
The HGA Response
I absolutely believe that the majority of groomers genuinely love dogs and want the best for them, but there are three points I would like to make in answer to this statement:
While some show dogs may very well be bred for temperament, extensively socialised from puppyhood, conditioned to grooming procedures from an early age, and handled by experienced, positive-only professionals who've invested significant time in updating their training, many simply aren't! I have witnessed heartbreaking footage of countless highly stressed dogs being mishandled and paraded around at grooming shows and events such as Crufts, over the years, by handlers who are considered well-respected "experts" in their field. It's truly worrying to say the least. Knowing this, can we justify the culture if we know that, for many dogs, the process is as uncomfortable?
While you can say that the benefits of showcasing styling will help to demonstrate how advanced and technically difficult styling is, does this represent the value of our roles in a meaningful way? Though styling is a talent worthy of our respect, when it comes to how worldwide media advertise our industry (as 'entertainment'), can you honestly say that we are doing a good enough job at showing the world our value? I don't think we are...
Lastly, the average pet dog is simply not equipped to withstand even basic grooming activities let alone more intricate styling demands. When we glamourise styling and make the world believe that this is how to measure success and competency in our field, we set a standard that sets most pet dogs up for failure and a lifetime of stress off the bat. Unrealistic expectations of what grooming is, and what to expect at the end of each grooming session, contributes to the high-stress environment that makes up the majority of grooming salons. Grooming success should be measured not by how perfect a dog looks, but how good a dog feels during and after a grooming session.
I'm not for a second suggesting that all competition groomers are causing harm, but what I am trying to highlight is a missed opportunity to gain the right kind of respect from both the public and other pet care professions.
While excellency continues to be measured with a fine-toothed comb (literally), a more modern and dog-centred approach to defining success would be in a groomer's ability to effectively work with, and adapt to, various dogs based on their very individual needs.
If nothing else, our industry needs a compromise for how things are done that puts the dog's needs first and human's desire, second.
Round 8: "Your approach is unsafe - restraints prevent bites and injuries"
The Conventional Argument
How you operate is unsafe. If we didn't use restraints, we'd be open to more bites and various other risks like dog injuries. Restraints are essential safety equipment that protect both groomers and dogs. Without them, grooming would be dangerous for everyone involved, and insurance companies would have a field day!
The HGA Response
This is a critical conversation because safety is paramount. But let's examine what actually creates safety, and what creates the illusion of safety.
First, let me be clear: I'm not against all restraints. I'm against restraints that contribute to anxiety, fear, discomfort and/or pain. I am also against the misuse and/or overuse of restraints.
That's not to say that certain dogs might benefit from a specific handling device to help support them in their stance (a padded belly strap, maybe?) or to prevent a neurologically-unstable dog from biting (a suitably fitted muzzle, perhaps?).
The key to restraints is individualised assessment rather than blanket application, and also knowing:
How to introduce tools gradually and positively
How to select the most suitable tool based on the individual needs and preferences of the dog
How to use the tool safely to prevent unnecessary suffering
When to remove a device to prevent a negative association from forming
From a physiological and psychological point of view, here's what behavioural science tells us:
Feeling restrained actually increases the likelihood of stress-induced behaviours (Butterworth, Wood and Rowe, 2022).
When a dog feels trapped or unable to escape, their fight/flight response is triggered (Cisneros et al., 2025).
Dogs typically bite when under duress and/or when in pain - if restraints contribute to fear and/or pain, the risk of bites increases.
And while we have an obligation to keep ourselves safe, we must also remind ourselves that we are also duty-bound to honour legislation as well.
Legislation Recap: Specifically, Freedoms 2,3,4, and 5 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006.
If we think back to legislation and the five freedoms, the conventional approach to grooming is in breach of four out of the five. There can't be loopholes in how we comply with welfare guidelines, especially when there are alternative ways to do things better.
With that in mind, a 'less-restraints', and in many cases, 'zero-restraints' approach combined with better communication skills creates a safer and more welfare-led environment.
When we can read a dog's stress signals early - the subtle lip lick, the whale eye, the yawn out of context, the tension in their body - we can adjust our approach before they feel the need to bite. We're preventing the escalation rather than simply trying to contain it.
As for injuries to dogs? The grooming environment should be adapted to suit the dog's physical safety needs as well. You wouldn't place a dog unattended on a high-set grooming table if there's a risk of injury (regardless of whether restraints are used or not), but what you could do is lower your grooming table and integrate dog steps to allow a dog to comfortably step on and off the table throughout a session.
Remember: restraints don't deter dogs from attempting to jump off tables or escape. In fact, restraints are more likely to trigger a flee response.
Consider this scenario: a dog attached to a neck loop who attempts to flee is at risk of strangulation or severely injuring their trachea, neck, and spinal cord. But a dog on a low-set table with no restraints can step off the table safely when they need a break without risking injury. At worst, in the latter example, there might be a low risk of strain to a muscle should the dog trip, but which risk would you prefer to take - strained muscle VS. broken neck?
The point is every approach has risks, but our approach - from a scientific, evidence-based point of view - has less risk of catastrophic injury and stress because it relies on trust-building, cooperation, and consent. Moreover, our students and graduates report fewer bites and/or near-miss bites.
When dogs feel they have agency, when they can communicate and be heard, when they're not pushed into a corner (literally or figuratively), they're far less likely to resort to fear-induced behaviours.
Safety isn't about how tightly we can secure a dog to the table or how immobile we can make them during the grooming process. Control is not safety - control could be considered torture for an uncooperative dog.
The Bottom Line: This Isn't About Perfection, It's About Progress
I want to be clear here: implementing HGA Philosophy doesn't mean you've been doing everything wrong. Many conventional groomers are incredibly skilled, deeply care about dogs, and work hard to minimise stress within the constraints of their training and understanding.
This debate isn't about judging past practices! It's about embracing better ones as our knowledge evolves.
We can continue with methods rooted in dominance theory and "just get it done" mentality, or we can evolve towards practices grounded in current behavioural science, welfare research, and ethical care.
The evidence is clear. This approach isn't just better for dogs (less stress, more resilience), it's better for groomers (fewer injuries, less burnout), and it's also better for business (premium pricing, meaningful respect, loyal clients, professional differentiation).
So whilst I respect the concerns and objections raised by conventional groomers, I'd argue that the real question isn't whether we can afford to implement HGA Philosophy, but whether we can afford not to.
Your Turn: Join The Debate!
What's your biggest objection to HGA grooming concepts? What do you believe 'holistic grooming' to be, and does it differ from what I've explained in this post? What's stopping you from embracing a more dog-led approach to your practice?
I genuinely want to hear from groomers on all sides of this debate.
Drop a comment below, send me a message, or join my community discussions online! Let's keep this conversation going because the future of our profession depends on our willingness to challenge assumptions, examine evidence, and put dogs' welfare at the heart of everything we do.
Ready to explore HGA Philosophy for yourself?
Our Behaviour Grooming Access Course provides the knowledge, skills, and support to implement these approaches in your own salon - without sacrificing profitability or efficiency. Learn more here:
References
Butterworth, H., Wood, L. and Rowe, S. (2022). Patients’ and staff members’ experiences of restrictive practices in acute mental health in-patient settings: systematic review and thematic synthesis. BJPsych Open, [online] 8(6), pp.1–11. doi:https://doi.org/10.1192/bjo.2022.574.
Cisneros, A., Carroll, A.D., Moody, C.M. and Stellato, A.C. (2025). Handle with care: Dogs show negative responses to restrictive handling restraints and tools during routine examinations. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, [online] 286, p.106601. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applanim.2025.106601.
Dreschel, N.A. (2010). The effects of fear and anxiety on health and lifespan in pet dogs. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, [online] 125(3-4), pp.157–162. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applanim.2010.04.003.
Koolhaas, J.M., de Boer, S.F., Buwalda, B. and Meerlo, P. (2017). Social stress models in rodents: Towards enhanced validity. Neurobiology of Stress, 6, pp.104–112. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ynstr.2016.09.003.
RSPCA (2023). Health problems | rspca.org.uk. [online] www.rspca.org.uk. Available at: https://www.rspca.org.uk/adviceandwelfare/pets/dogs/puppy/pedigreedogs/health.
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