Meet Valerie Barton of Barton Bird Care, LLC

Today we’d like to introduce you to Valerie Barton.

Hi Valerie, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
We started Barton Bird Care in 2019. We have several parrots as pets and I was inspired by the work of The Gabriel Foundation in Colorado, which is a non-profit parrot welfare organization. As they offered bird boarding services, this gave me the idea of creating an in-home bird boarding hobby business.

Although I have a PhD in molecular biology, I love learning about business and have enjoyed being a small business owner and have learned so much in the process.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
When we started our business in 2019, I had no idea whether there would be a market for in-home bird boarding. We also offered parrot subscription boxes initially, and didn’t know which element of the business would take off. When COVID-19 hit in 2020, our customers greatly limited travel which no doubt impacted our growth in the early years. Despite these challenges we have seen substantial growth each year.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We offer in-home bird boarding services for parrots. Most of our visits are short (weekend to two week stays), but we also offer long term boarding and even kept a parrot for 14 months while the family went to Australia on sabbatical. Our customers want to leave their parrot with someone who is familiar with parrots and their particular needs. Many customers also prefer that their bird spend time out of the cage while they are away and have access to fresh fruit and vegetables. Our parrot guests enjoy spending time with our family.

Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
We received fantastic support from Kory Scheiber, MBA of the Michigan Small Business Development Center. He made it so easy to figure out how to properly set up the business and had the business background that I was missing! On top of this, all of the services were completely free. I think this is such an amazing and empowering resource for our community.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://bartonbirdcare.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bartonbirdcare/