Found Chicago Boarding and Training Center

I’m so happy I found, Found! I was experiencing difficulty figuring out what to do with my 2-​year old Border Collie/​Cattle Dog during the day while I am at work. He’s super energetic and needs more than just a mid-​day walk to keep him mentally and physically occupied throughout the day. He also has a tendency to demonstrate aggressiveness towards other dogs, especially other male dogs, so traditional doggie daycare wasn’t going to be the answer.
Found was exactly what we needed. They organize their daycare pups into smaller groups based on temperament, unlike traditional day care facilities where all the dogs are grouped together. In only a month, my pup has gone from playing with one dog at a time to playing with 5 or 6 dogs at a time… including other male dogs! The trainers and staff at Found are so friendly and you can tell they really care for their clients. They get excited to report his progress to me and they even send videos every few days so I can see how well he is doing.
My pup was also taking medication prescribed by his vet for anxiety, however, since we’ve been going to Found I haven’t been giving him the meds because he is so much more relaxed (or exhausted) when we get home. In fact, he’s usually in bed 15-​minutes after we get home at night! The improvement has been noticed in other areas, as well — we’ve been able to go to the dog park, pass other dogs on the street without issues and progress with some of our more advanced training tricks.
I can’t say enough great things about Found! I’m so happy I found them!

We have enlisted a lot of training help for our 3.5 y/​o rescue dog, but were not ever really able to address his emotional state /​anxiety until recently.
A tumultuous wait in a veterinary lobby inspired a fellow patron to share that his dog (who was politely sitting at his feet) had also been somewhat antisocial — and that he had been able to work through it at Found.
So we called … and did a consult …
…And I cannot say enough good things! In the short time we’ve gone to Found for daycare and training, there has been remarkable change in our dog’s anxiety level. He is more excited to go outside — less reactive on walks — less mouthy at home, and seems generally much happier.
The staff carefully select daycare playgroups to be hospitable to all participants’ specific social needs/​goals. He gets a lot of exercise. They reinforce good manners in all of their interactions with him. He is excited to be dropped off in the mornings, and he comes home tired and happy.
His trainer, Brittney, is just the bee’s knees. Her own dog is present in some of the training and really reinforces the behavior modifications. She has worked very hard at creating a comprehensive plan with us. She’s really able to interpret behavior accurately and is proud of her students when they do well.
I imagine this place will save a lot of dogs and people a lot of grief. Our pup is a tough nugget, but Found treats him with respect and warmth, and has absolutely made a tremendous difference in his day-​to-​day experience of life. We plan to continue lessons and daycare here– even after the pup is as happy and social as he can be– because the experience is so positive, in general.
Also, it should be mentioned that the facility is amazing…: Boarding, Training, Agility, Adoption Center, Grooming & Veterinarian on site. They really care about what they are doing — the best trainers we have encountered.

I’m so pleased to have found FOUND! My rescued dog TigerLily and I moved here in April 2015 and city life was new to her plus being a fearful dog aggressive dog there were no good options in daycare for her to go to. She had left her doggy friends and large backyards in Jersey and was in great need of exercise and a safe environment in which to make new friends. The parks are wonderful here but her reactions to strange dogs made a simple outing stressful for both of us unless she got a good distance from other dogs. I needed new friends too and my dog is my world as I am a new dog trainer. FOUND helped both me and TigerLily by us taking the PITBULL 1 class with Jeff and giving her a place to go and have specialized daycare with day training. We both have come a long way because of the caring and dedicated folks that work here. I’ve had to board TigerLily as well and upon my last retrieval of her after a week boarding there TigerLily came home like the dog I’ve hoped for with her behavior being calm and balanced. It is the first time I’ve seen her so relaxed and happy with walking down the street while seeing other dogs with no reaction! I work very closely and consistently with TigerLily and with the help of the trainers at FOUND we both are improving and happier and more balanced! She’s even making new friends both human and doggy! For TigerLily and me we are fans! Thank you so much Fabian and crew!
Sincerely,
Ducki C

My dog was rescued from animal control and dog aggressive and going for walks was horrible! We dreaded having people over. She was hit or miss or obeying commands. A friend recommended Found, we met with Brittney, after a evaluation she recommended a boot camp… two weeks later my dog was a totally different dog!!! We still go to daycare 4 days a week so she can socialize and keep up her training and we even adopted one of their dogs!!! They have provided support every step of the way!!! Our kids love coming to classes with the dogs!!! I recommend them to everyone and if you are looking for a dog check out their rescue program!

I had really high hopes for Found and was sent to them through my friend that runs a rescue and has sent multiple dogs there with positive results. (Update: she said they sound nothing like they used to at all)
I sent my dog for their bootcamp with a few extra days added to address his leash reactivity. Brittany did a good job training him in regards to basic obedience… but his leash reactivity was still very prevalent and maybe a tad worse. I had a few sessions with her at home which were somewhat helpful and also did the class afterwards (basics) which I did not feel was helpful in addressing my concerns at all. I called Brittany/​Found several times because I was frustrated with the lack of progress with my dog and that the issue I had sent him for still was not addressed. She put me in contact with Fabian (who is the director/​manager) — he came and did an at home session. I was really impressed initially that he took the time to reach out and come over… however, his handling of my dog was really heavy-​handed (as several other reviews mention below). Also, he said he would help me and work something out, etc etc to continue working with my dog, make sure the issue I sent him for was addressed, that I got my moneys worth, etc. This was several months ago and I never heard from him again after that day!
All in all, if you’re looking for general obedience then Brittany is a good trainer. If you’re looking for specific issues to be addressed, I don’t recommend spending the money.
Also, my dog was bit by another dog (and had to be taken to the vet + antibiotics) during their care while in bootcamp which really upset me.

We brought our 1.5 year old dog to the group basics class and are so pleased with the results! Our teacher Brian was engaging, knowledgable, funny, and patient. We were looking to teach some basic manners to our very social/​excited dog. We learned a lot of simple and effective commands that have helped us communicate better and our pup is behaving like a champ.
We had to miss one of the classes and Brian took the time to schedule a private 1 on 1 class with us to make sure we didn’t fall behind. You can tell he is very passionate about what he does and it shows with his doggie skills. Highly recommended!!!

They saved the day!
Like a fool, I had booked a stay for my Yorkie at the Pooch Hotel because I was convinced the nice photos posted meant something positive. Wrong!
One day, before my departure I called to reconfirmed my reservation at this fancy, so called nice dog hotel. I was informed that my reservation had been cancelled due to the flu epidemic. Understand, I had received no email, phone call or text and I found myself scrambling to find a clean reputable kennel for my dog less then 24 hrs before my flight.
Thankfully, the folks at Found Chicago worked and helped me get everything necessary to allow my dog to stay at their facilities. It didn’t matter that it was late and the weekend. They had recommendations from several dog groups and the staff was very professional.

Brian is simply amazing and I cannot be more thankful for him. After a year of having our dog and constantly telling ourselves that we will train him on our own, we just couldn’t do it. I decided to start searching Unilocal for dog training facilities in the area. We visited a few facilities but none were as accommodating or clean as Found. Brian, the trainer, listened to all of our concerns and worked on exactly what we needed with our dog. We dropped off our dog for two weeks and met with him and Brian throughout the second week to go over what they were working on. Brian not only trained our dog but he helped us understand him and taught us how to keep our high energy dog mentally and physically stimulated.

I was disappointed with the training class I took my dog to with Found. He has some bullying issues that I was hoping to work on, so I signed him up for the Buttheads and Bullies class. The class description made it sound like we would be addressing bullying behaviors when around other dogs, but the classes were just normal training classes, which my dog had already done 16 weeks of previously. The trainer also has an aggressive training style toward the dogs, which may be a necessity of the breeds in the class, but it was a turn-​off to me. Now that I’m reading more reviews on here, I’m surprised to see that many people have had the same experience as me. We stopped going halfway through because it was during the canine influenza outbreak, and spending the money on a vaccination did not seem worth it for the rest of the classes, which were about $ 40 a piece to begin with.

This review only is in reference to the grooming services at Found. We boarded our 1 year old Wheaten Terrier on a Friday and had him groomed on Saturday morning before we picked our puppy up. Upon picking him up, we were told that he was really good during the grooming session and everything went well. Once we got home we noticed blood on his fur around one of his paws and he was constantly licking at it. The next day we called Found and talked to the groomer who stated in 7yrs he has never experienced a dog reacting like this, obviously the nail was trimmed too short but they would not admit that.
Our dog, Chewie, seemed to have gotten better for a few days and then on Wednesday his paw was puffy and pink and he appeared to be in pain. I called Found back and they wanted to let me speak to the groomer which I said I already did so and I will be taking my dog to the vet and would like those services covered. The lady on the phone said the Director of Operations would call me the next morning to discuss. Well, the next morning came and I never received a phone call, after calling Found they told me my message was given to the Director and he would be calling me shortly. 6 hrs later I still did not receive a phone call and I called back and the Director answered and told me he was about to email instead of calling me. I told him I was taking my dog to Heal (Vet Clinic) and I am not paying for an infection that was caused by their services. He said he would call the vet and speak with them to create and arrangement and that he would follow up with me via email later that evening to see how the appointment went.
I never received any follow up email or phone call from the Director. On top of all of this there grooming is actually more expensive than market cost so we would NOT recommend their grooming services and hope you never have to deal with a situation like this at Found as it is difficult to talk to get a hold of management.

We could not have been more happy when we «found» this place! We were at our wits end with our new dog, we were taking him to another daycare every day that was NOT the right fit, he was horrible in his crate when we were away, not getting along with our other dog… the list goes on. So at a certain point we hit a brick wall – we had no idea what to do with him. And that’s where Found came in.
We signed him up for their two-​week boot camp. Expensive? Yes, definitely. But worth it? Yes, one thousand million percent. Our trainer, Brian, was great with him from the beginning, and he was honest with us about all the things we’d be doing wrong. It wasn’t long before we realized that yes, our pup would be getting the training he desperately needed, but we were the ones who were going to walk away at the end of it all with the most new knowledge. Brian showed us how to think like a dog and see situations from his perspective, which really showed us how to handle them better and assume the position of «pack leader.» When we picked him up at the end of the two weeks, we had hope that the future would be better – hope that we definitely didn’t have when we dropped him off. And we knew there was still going to be a lot to work on, but now we had the tools to do it.
Since boot camp, we take him to day care three times a week and he goes with his dog brother one of those days. He’s wonderful in his crate now, and his manners are excellent. He’s still impulsive, as a puppy can be, but he’s much, much better than before. And we know that when we drop him off for daycare, the trainers are on hand to offer structured playtime instead of the run-​around-​free-​for-​all where we were taking him before.
Basically, we LOVE this place. I would and will recommend it with 100% confidence to anyone, especially to those looking for a safe, effective day care that seems to be more like 50% fun and 50% training. A really rare and awesome two-​for-​one. Did I mention that all the trainers there are awesome?! Okay, okay… I’m done.

In September 2014, I adopted a beagle-​dachshund puppy. Like all dog owners, I planned to take obedience classes and reinforce good training habits at home. And like many owners, getting the training scheduled took longer than I expected. Classes were sold out, I had scheduling conflicts, etc. Come late November, I realized a few things. First, my puppy was developing some bad habits that I’d initially indulged or dismissed as cute puppy behavior. Second, she’s stubborn. Third, with the holidays and my travel schedule, it might be January before we got to our first obedience class.
Friends who’d gone the boot camp/​boarding school route all raved about it, so I started researching places in Chicago and made appointments for evaluations with the two that seemed like the best candidates. The appointment with the first boarding school went well, but when I met with Sean at Found, I knew I’d found the right school for Daisy. It also served to highlight some of the deficiencies of the other program. If you’re looking for a dog boot camp, definitely check out a couple spots if for no other reason to help you appreciate why one is better than the other.
There were a number of factors that led me to choose Found:
* The force-​free training philosophy
* Sean’s experience, including his experience training and owning dachshunds, which is a stubborn breed
* Found’s non-​profit status and work rescuing and rehabilitating otherwise unadoptable animals
* Their promise to work with boot camp graduates and their owners even after graduating from the program
* The group classes that are included with boot camp
* The daily videos shared with all boot camp owners
* The size of their indoor facilities (a particular concern since we were doing boot camp in December)
* Their willingness to address dog-​specific issues (ours included getting Daisy comfortable climbing stairs, getting her nails cut and riding in the car)
Boot camp itself was fantastic. I eagerly awaited the day’s videos so I could see what Daisy was working on, what she’d mastered and how she was interacting with Sean and Brian. The videos also served to emphasize how much we needed boot camp. It took 12 days of intense work (hundreds of repetitions) for Daisy to consistently lie down on command. I don’t know if we would have ever gotten that through obedience training classes. If I had a question about what I was seeing in the videos, I’d simply shoot off an email to Sean and get a quick response. At one point I even emailed him to ask if he thought Daisy was deaf. (How else to explain that she’s looking at you intently while ignoring everything you’re asking of her? His response — she’s not deaf, she’s the other d-​word: Dachshund.)
After 14 days, I picked up «Daisy 2.0» and the change was obvious and remarkable — starting with the moment that she willingly jumped into my car without any prompting.
Here’s the important thing to know and understand: Sean, Brian and the Found team instill the fundamentals during boot camp and give owners the tools to continue that training. But you will have to continue to work with your dog every day once he or she comes home – and you’ll continue to see improvements. For example:
* Before we went to boot camp, Daisy would cry all night long if I tried to crate her overnight. And she’s never go into her crate willingly.
* After we got home from boot camp, she whimpered a bit on the first few nights and still needed some urging to go into the crate, but it was a huge improvement.
* For the last month, I’ve been drilling Daisy on «go home» and I feed most of her meals in her crate. She’ll excitedly run in there because she knows she’ll get a treat for doing so. And for the last three nights in a row, as I’ve started to turn off the lights and get ready for bed, I’ve found my puppy waiting patiently in her crate without any prompting from me. I never thought I’d see the day!
I can’t say enough great things about Found, Sean, Brian and the entire team. These are experienced dog trainers and dog lovers who care deeply about each and every animal they work with, and are committed to helping dogs be the best they can be. Don’t just take my word for it — if I could, I’d share a video of how excited Daisy gets every time she sees Sean. Her entire body wags with excitement because she absolutely adores him.

We have invested a lot of time and money in our dog and nothing was working. Now with a baby on the way the situation became a little more urgent. Our dog is a rescue who we have had about 4 years. He is a 5 year old American Bulldog/​Boxer with some major anxiety issues. He would never relax, lunged at people, was very reactive and was overall a big stress point to my husband and I.
Found was somewhat of a last ditch effort to get him on the right path. We did an evaluation with Sean and enrolled our dog in the boot camp. The difference has been amazing after boot camp. Granted he is not perfect, but we reinforce the training every day (which can be tedious) and he is getting better. Sometimes I think Sean switched my dog out with another one, it’s that drastic of a difference. Throughout the training we received updates and Sean has always been responsive to our emails. He genuinely cares about these dogs.
Our dog does things I never thought we would be able to do like walk down the street without pulling and just relaxing in an environment with distractions. Not to mention we are convinced our dog is in love with Sean, it’s actually pretty comical to us. There is a tough love mentality to this training and when I say tough love I don’t mean abuse, but you will need to back off treating your dog like they are the center of the universe. We are now working on our dog’s focus and hopefully will move to his recall which is going to take some time. Sean has also offered to help our dog get adjusted to the baby which I am sure we will take him up on his offer.
I highly recommend Sean and Found! Without Sean I’m not sure we would have been able to keep our dog once the baby arrived which would have been devastating to my husband and I.

I reached out to Found in regards to my reactive cattle dog. She’s 8, going on 9, and this is a behavior that I’ve worked with a number of trainers with for a number of years. We have good days and bad days. She’s on meds, I’m an experienced and competent trainer in my own right, I’m just always looking to learn and Found had a reputation for being good with aggressive dogs.
Issue 1: I submitted multiple information requests via the contact form on their site, and never received a response. No phone calls, no emails.
Issue 2: Once I finally jumped through the necessary hoops to get in to see them, I met with Fabian. Fabian apparently doesn’t read the information you give him via email, nor does he listen to you as you detail your dog’s history. We’re talking about me explicitly detailing everything: when I adopted her, how old she is, when she was spayed, other dogs in her environment, when the behavior originally occurred, etc. I gave him all this information, while talking to him face to face… and he proceeded to ask me questions that I had just given him all of the answers to. I chuckled at first, thinking he was doing it to be humorous, but no, he’d simply not paid any attention.
Issue 3: Fabian was REALLY HEAVY-​HANDED. While I tend to lean towards the light and fluffy side of things and favor lots of treats and redirection, I’m actually pretty okay with some leash corrections, etc. Fabian handled her in a manner that left me feeling really uncomfortable– dragging her over jumps and obstacles, really putting her WAY OVER her stimulation threshold. If he handles my dog like this in front of me, what will he do to her behind closed doors?
I voiced that concern (politely and respectfully) when he said she needed to stay for their weeklong boot camp, and he offered to have me meet with another trainer. I met with Sean and got a better impression– he listened to my concerns, recognized that I’d tried a lot of the suggestions already. He ultimately suggested that I drop the pooch off for a free session. He said they’d video tape it and send me the footage so I could see. I agreed, which leads me to…
Issue 4: I got footage of the session. Except that it wasn’t footage of the full session, it was selective footage of what they wanted me to see. In the footage, my normally very engaged and personable dog is hovering at the end of the leash, not wanting to get near the handler or the second dog. She’s repeatedly looking away, lagging on the end of the leash, panting heavily (stress), resisting walking with him. She flinches when Sean snaps his fingers at her to get her to sit. (Snapping your fingers is not her cue to sit.) Sure, there’s footage of her near another dog, but I can do that too… minus the huge stress response.
Issue 5: Upon getting my dog back home, I discover that a lot of her normally rock-​steady behaviors– like walking politely on leash and offering auto-​downs when we stop– have disappeared. She’s pulling on the leash, making me ask for her to down when we stop at corners. In short: my dog came back with worse behavior.
Issue 6: In my email to Sean regarding the footage, I ask if the collar in the video is a pinch collar or a martingale collar. He tells me «It was a Triple Crown, a plastic martingale type collar. Very effective and not painful.» While it is made by Triple Crown, and it is plastic, and pinch collars do work like martingale collars, it’s a plastic pinch collar that certainly causes some discomfort. His lack of honesty and transparency is distressing, especially when you can see the response to pain on camera in the video sent to me. He also simply didn’t acknowledge my concerns regarding the change in her normally consistently good leash manners.
Issue 7: Communication got intermittent and inconsistent. In fact, we dropped off his radar due to a move, and ultimately I only heard back from him when he emailed, asking me to review him on Unilocal

I have been very hesitant to write this review since I don’t want to appear reactive about the situation that occurred. Almost a year ago we adopted a 6 month old mastiff/​pit mix from the anti-​cruelty society. Because we knew she would be a large dog and we knew nothing of her background we wanted to get her socialized right away.
After lots of research, it seemed like Found would be a good fit with it’s supervised play groups and in house training. Our puppy loved daycare at Found and we were very happy with the daycare staff.
However, our experience rapidly went downhill once Sean entered the picture. I initially scheduled an evaluation with Sean and was informed it would be done during daycare and the video sent to us. Upon seeing the film, we were extremely upset about the amount of force used by Sean. We asked to speak with Sean that day and he spent approximately an hour assuring us that our wishes would be honored and he would never use that level of force with her again.
Fast forward a few weeks and we receive another video of Sean with our puppy. This time he actually kicks our dog on video. We immediately went to pick her up the minute we saw it. I contacted Fabian (the manager) and let him know what had occurred. He assured me it would be be investigated and taken care of.
We never heard back, and our pre-​paid for daycare sessions were never refunded. I would never work with Sean again. Maybe his «methods» work for vicious, aggressive dogs but they were extreme overkill for our puppy (who, to this day, has never shown the slightest signs of aggression).

My dog has behavior issues– he can sometimes be aggressive with other dogs and people, and I was pretty anxious about boarding him for the first time since I adopted him two years ago. But Found was amazing.
The process to get him registered was almost completely online (sans the the info my vet needed to fax over) and super easy. The staff were all fantastic to work with, genuinely cared about my dog and most importantly didn’t bat an eye when I told them he has a history of aggression. They even asked if they could work with him on socialization while he was there (yes, please!). After his stay, staff member Kayla (who was great to us) sent me a video of him playing with another dog which, if you have a behaviorally challenged dog, you know how priceless it is to see your dog in a successful situation.
I felt like not only was my boy in good hands, but that it was an extremely beneficial experience for him. They are so good at what they do and are easy to work with. To be honest, I would’ve paid twice what I paid to have him boarded there again.

Amazing people with an amazing mission.
They rehabilitate, foster, and adopt dogs in need along with providing daycare, training, and boarding services.
The people here are absolute professionals in every way and are so incredibly kind to the dogs. They even send video updates once a day or so, so that you can see your furbaby having fun with their new friends.
Found is a non-​profit and I encourage anyone who is able to, to donate to this awesome place if you can.

Getting a puppy = fun
Puppy having separation anxiety = not so fun
Puppy starting to display aggression, and in general not listening to anything you say = really, really, not fun. Actually, really stressful, and really sad.
We took our dog, Archer, to Found to get help with his behavioral issues after realizing that his training needs were beyond our dog novice skills. We enrolled Archer in a two-​week Bootcamp with Sean. Sean is amazing. He’s incredibly knowledgeable about dog behavior, empathetic yet honest, and you can tell that he truly cares about each one of his canine clients. During the two-​week Bootcamp, Sean was able to eliminate a lot of Archer’s issues – for example, whining whenever being placed in his crate – and made significant progress with many others, including the big one, aggression.
After Bootcamp, we still seeing aggressive behavior, so Sean had us start attending one of his weekly classes. In class, Sean was able to show us the little things we were doing that were having big negative impacts on Archer’s behavior. We’ve seen even more progress since starting the class, and I feel like we now have the tools and info we need to correct Archer’s behavior without feeling like the world is crashing down every time he growls or snips.
We still have work to do, and our pup may never be perfect. But having him in our family is no longer sad or stressful. In fact, it’s pretty great.

We rescued our pup Jelly, a husky/​pit mix, 6 months ago, and while she was very sweet most of the time, she was also very poorly behaved. She would get really overexcited by other dogs and people, and was always jumping on people, barking at other dogs, pulling on her leash, etc. She constantly whined at home, wouldn’t follow commands, and would snap at us if we tried to tell her what to do. Our neighbors have little kids, and we were terrified that she would knock one of them over or bite them. We tried puppy classes at Petsmart, and private training sessions with another trainer, all to no avail. We finally enrolled her in class at Found after reading some reviews on Unilocal.Seriously: best class ever.
Sean was our trainer, and we can’t say enough good things about him. He is so passionate about his work, and so dedicated to helping us restore harmony in our home. Six weeks ago, we started class. Jelly was a total lunatic and barked the whole time and then I went home and cried and told my girlfriend that I needed this class to work, because I was afraid that we had made the biggest mistake of our lives by getting this psychotic dog. Sean explained to us all the mistakes we had been making trying to train her, and how to fix them and be better dog moms. He also is super available throughout the week via email, and encouraged us to send him videos of her problem behavior so he could guide us in what to do. We completely changed our behavior with her, and she is now 1000% better pup. We actually enjoy taking her places and having her meet people, instead of being totally embarrassed by her crappy behavior. Today, Jelly passed the AKC Canine Good Citizen class and Sean said she was most improved pup!
We have also used them for boarding when we go out of town, and it’s great. Jelly comes home better behaved than she was when she went in, and you can sign your pups up for extra training classes, too, if needed, and they’ll send you little videos of the sessions.
Take your problem pups to Found! They’re the best! Sean’s the best! Jelly is now the best! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!

I had to go out of town again (all the way to Florida this time!) which would be the longest and farthest I’ve ever been apart from my Sheebs.
Another boarding experience at Found, yet another rave review. They’re so wonderful here, and it really helped me to relax and not worry when I was so far away. Luther’s trainer, Sean, even sent me a very nice e-​mail beforehand which helped a lot. I knew the whole time he was in good hands, and was able to relax and enjoy my vacation.
When I came to pick him up, I got told how well behaved and nice Luther had been… I was a little unsure if they were talking about the same dog: P
During the week I was gone he got plenty of walks, lots of attention, and play time (even with other dogs!) He seems to have had a great time, and he came home a lot calmer. I am so happy to have such a great place for Luther to stay when I’m away!