A born animal lover, Caldwell, who owns two dogs and a cat, noticed the lack of dog care operations on the Chicago’s South Side. Charged with taking up the slack by his fiancée, Caldwell stepped up to the challenge.
“My fiancée and I were driving around and we would always take our dogs up north or downtown to get services and I said, ‘There’s nothing in our neighborhood – Bronzeville, Hyde Park – where we can go,’ ” he recalls, adding that his fiancée jokingly replied, “Maybe you should open one.” And so he did.
Caldwell resigned from his job as a college director of admissions and poured his energies into opening the pet paradise. Despite the challenge of finding adequate financing, he was able to get the business up and running.
“[There’s] something about owning your own business, especially a black-owned business,” he says. “I want to show people that black-owned businesses are able to operate effectively and with great quality and service.” -tony binns
