At 44, with no formal business experience, a husband who was seriously ill, and a serious concussion that had affected her ability to think and plan, Donna Forster sat down and drew a vision board. On it were the services she wanted to offer, the goals she hoped to achieve, and the name of a business that didn’t yet exist: WandiliDOGS.
At the Third Annual Employer Awards, Donna was named the winner of the Small Business Start-Up Award, an honour that recognises Asuria Self-Employment Assistance participants who have launched and grown a business through entrepreneurial spirit, resilience, and innovation.
WandiliDOGS, based in Victoria’s Alpine Shire, provides professional dog grooming services for all breeds and sizes, including nail clipping, wash and dry packages, deshedding treatments, tidy grooms, and full grooms. It also retails a thoughtfully curated range of grooming tools, shampoos, conditioners, accessories, and pet essentials – and, in a community-spirited touch, has partnered with another local small business to offer custom pet pillows featuring printed images of customers’ own dogs.
The road to launch was anything but straightforward. Returning to formal education in her forties brought its own pressures, which were added to when a fall from a ladder resulted in a concussion that brought ongoing headaches, making study and planning genuinely difficult. Through all of it, Donna kept moving.
She enrolled at TAFE, added a dog grooming component to her Animal Care qualification, and worked closely with her Asuria Self-Employment Assistance mentor Brad, who helped her navigate accounting software, POS systems, business banking, tax deductibles, budgeting, and networking. The SEA program also contributed financially to essential start-up costs including signage, insurance, initial products, and salon setup.
When WandiliDOGS launched, the response from the community was immediate. Donna promoted through flyers and social media, built a reputation for high-quality, compassionate care, and quickly attracted a loyal client base. A significant turning point came when two long-established local groomers retired and, impressed by Donna’s professionalism and skill, began referring their clients directly to her. Word of mouth did the rest.
By the end of her first quarter, after covering all start-up costs, Donna had achieved a net profit of nearly $10,000. Year two income is forecast at $90,000.
The judges said Donna’s story captured the award’s purpose entirely, praising her ingenuity and noting that “faced with her husband’s illness, she enrolled at TAFE having never undertaken formal study in her adult life, mapped out a vision for her future business and applied for the Asuria Self-Employment Assistance Program, all of which allowed her to launch her business and achieve significant early success.” They added that she “demonstrated resilience, focus and a willingness to give anything a go in order to succeed.”
Asuria CEO Nicole Grainger-Marsh said Donna’s win was an inspiration. “Donna faced the kind of compounding adversity that would stop most people in their tracks, and she responded by making a vision board and getting to work. WandiliDOGS is the product of sheer determination, genuine skill, and the courage to back yourself when everything around you is uncertain. We are so proud of what she has built.”
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