A Year of Appreciation: A Thanksgiving Greeting to Our Dog-Loving Community

It’s no surprise to anyone at this point that AGDT loves holidays. Thanksgiving is especially special to us because we are grateful year-round for what the community has helped us build, and all the dogs and humans we’ve met around the day. Seriously, at every company event, Amanda leads a gratitude circle. It’s part of who we are as a company, and we bring that with us into everything we do. Our clients are the best human beings we know––we see you actively working with your dog on the street, sharing advice, donating items to shelters and rescues, and we want to thank you for that. 

We also want to take space to thank our amazing staff at the top of the page instead of near the bottom. Our trainers are some of the most dedicated dog-humans you will ever meet, and treat each case with tenderness and experience. We see all of your hard work, and we are eternally grateful for what you’ve helped this family become.

As we continue to expand, we’re also innovating. Our leadership is actively seeking new ways to engage our clients so that you feel our support at every stage of your dog’s life. We are passionate about learning to anticipate what our dogs need before they need it, so that our clients have their favorite AGDT trainer ready to tackle whatever their dog might encounter in the future. But, we’ve realized––serendipitously during the season of gratitude––that we need insight from our community to truly understand what you need. 

We have a lot to be grateful for this Thanksgiving. In the last year, we reached our long-term goal of expanding our training to the Upper East Side. We added five fantastic new staff members in the office, in the field, and as handlers. We are hard at work on hours worth of virtual content, some of which we plan to disperse free of charge to shelters around the city. We designed a class specifically for senior dogs, a demographic that is traditionally underserved by the dog training community. We created a dog-sticker empire. We graduated a class of three apprentices, and accepted an entirely new cohort who are already on track to become four of the best trainers in New York. We launched an online store of trainer-curated products. 

That’s why, this Thanksgiving, we’re asking for a favor: Amanda is hard at work on developing one of our most popular class requests––a resource guarding workshop. We would be grateful this season if you would tell us what your dream AGDT resource guarding workshop. For example, would it be beneficial for the class to take place part indoors, part outdoors (like our Recall Workshop)? What is your most immediate need, in terms of resource guarding? There are no bad ideas or stupid questions––we want to know how Amanda can make this class, and classes going forward, work best for our humans. 

Since last Thanksgiving, we’ve found joy in engaging our AGDT family online. We plan to continue building our free virtual content. We now have double the amount of staff members who can use iMovie, bringing the total number to exactly two. Amanda is adapting our Instagram into a hub of bite-sized training fun, and would also love to hear from our community about what types of content you’d like to see, ranging from funny to informative to pop culture fads. Anything goes! This request is simply to help Amanda get in tune with what the kids are into these days on the good ol’ social media. But more importantly, it’s to help us get in tune to what dog people are into on social media. 

Whether you’ve been a dedicated client for ten years, or whether you came to one puppy social once, you are part of the AGDT family, and we care about what you want and need––so please use the comment section below to reach out to us about this or anything, or feel free to email us at info@amandagagnondogtraining.com. We’re treating every suggestion like it’s gold, and we’re excited to hear from you.

This time of year makes us sentimental and, of course, grateful. So, from your AGDT family to your immediate family, happy Thanksgiving. 

We are very, very grateful.