No Solo Acts: How Ann Seberino Built a Pet-Sitting Team That Clients Trust

Ann Seberino

The pet-sitting industry has a reliability problem. Ann Seberino spotted it early and built a solution that would eventually become Grandmas4Hire (G4H).

Based in Conroe, Texas, north of Houston, G4H is a team-based pet-sitting company staffed entirely by women aged 40 and older. No college students vanishing in August. No last-minute cancellations when a young sitter’s family needs her. Just experienced, consistent care, and almost 10 years in, more than 200 active clients who keep coming back.

A Week That Changed Everything

Seberino came to pet sitting through her friend and mentor, Christel Carl, an independent sitter who asked her to shadow her on visits. After a week of handling upward of 12 appointments a day, Seberino came away with a clear diagnosis of the industry’s core problem.

“What was needed was a team concept,” Seberino said, “so that pet sitters can take vacations and not feel like they have this pet-sitting business around their neck, and at the same time, offer really quality service to clients so that we don’t lose clients every time we go on vacation.”

Her solution was to build a company rather than run a one-person operation, with backup coverage built in from day one.

Why the Name Works

Her business name came from an unexpected source: a Shark Tank episode featuring a company called Rent-A-Grandma, focused on tutoring and nannying. Seberino saw something in the concept that could translate to her business.

“I looked at that and said, ‘That’s it,’” she recalled. “I need to do something with the word ‘Grandma,’ and I need to hire people in that age range. It was like a gut thing; I just knew it.”

She and her husband, Christian, eventually secured the Grandmas4Hire name, which has resonated consistently with clients.

The Case for Hiring Older

The decision to build a team of women 40 and older wasn't arbitrary. It came directly from listening to clients who had been burned before. Many of her earliest referrals came from people who had used other services and encountered reliability problems: sitters who skipped appointments, cut visits short or simply disappeared when school started back up.

Grandmas4Hire is based in Conroe, Texas, north of Houston.

“When you have people in college that are available during the summers and vacations but not during the school year, that doesn't really play well with clients that are going to travel in the off season," Seberino said. “I have many, many clients that travel in the off season.”

She also cited the unpredictability that can come with sitters who have young children, a reality she understood from personal experience as a mother of two, and the bind it created for clients when last-minute emergencies arose with no backup available.

The team she has built is made up primarily of women who are retired or semi-retired, many of whom have deep experience with animals and strong community ties.

Growth by Referral

G4H grew from zero to 20 clients in its first year, then doubled to 40 in the second. Much of that early momentum came from Carl, who referred anyone outside her eight-mile service radius to Seberino. Word of mouth did the rest.

The number of active clients — defined by Seberino as those who have used her service at least once in the past 18 months — recently passed 200, a milestone she had been working toward for five years. The company maintains that standard deliberately: Clients who haven’t booked in 18 months are removed from the system and must reapply.

“Active means active,” she said. “It doesn't mean, ‘oh, we've had 200 clients.’”

Pivoting Through COVID

The business Seberino runs today isn’t exactly the one she started. She originally founded a separate pet-sitting company called PALS, then launched G4H as a cleaning service when the pandemic gutted travel and, with it, pet-sitting demand.

“You have to have a pivotal ability,” she said. "You have to be willing to think outside your box.”

During the lockdown, she kept the pet-sitting side alive by targeting nurses, doctors and first responders, workers who were still commuting and still needed someone to check on their animals. The cleaning company folded a few years later when staffing proved too difficult, and the physical demands became unsustainable. By fall 2021, Seberino had consolidated everything under the Grandmas4Hire brand, launched a new website, and hired her first employee.

A Pet-Sitting Business Built to Last

That first hire, Ellen Hunt, has since become Seberino’s manager-in-training and a key part of her expansion plans. The company sends a client newsletter twice monthly and recently spotlighted Ellen in a profile.

Grandmas4Hire made a name for itself by building a team of pet sitters aged 40 and older.

Seberino’s husband Christian, a former college professor with extensive online teaching experience, built and maintains the website in-house, helping keep overhead low. She credits their complementary skills as a significant advantage in running the business debt-free, a commitment she traces to following Dave Ramsey’s financial principles after early-life mistakes with credit. 

“I highly recommend that; it's a lot less stressful to build a business when you don't have debt on your back,” she said.

On the Job: Jimmy Dean the Pig

Not every client comes with a dog or a cat, and the G4H team wouldn’t have it any other way.

Take Jimmy Dean, a rescue pig who had big dreams and a bigger appetite. Jimmy was supposed to stay under 20 pounds—but had other plans. He topped out at more than 100 pounds, moved indoors, decided dogs were his people, and rounded out his household with a macaw for company. By all accounts, he is living his best life.

Before agreeing to take Jimmy Dean’s owner on as a client, Seberino requested a training session because, as she’ll tell you, pigs and dogs operate on entirely different wavelengths. “I said, ‘Will you train us?’ And she said yes.”

Seberino brought two team members with her to the client’s home to learn pig behavior firsthand, including how to assert dominance if Jimmy got a little too big for his (considerable) britches. The client remains with the company, and the sitters, as Seberino tells it, genuinely look forward to every visit. Jimmy Dean has a way of growing on you.

Loving Pets Beyond the Visits

For Seberino and her team, the work doesn’t stop at the door. G4H provides financial support and donates supplies to help rescue pets in the community, and Seberino is quick to sign her correspondence with a warmth that reflects the company’s character. She often closes blog posts with “Wiggles & wags, Ann & Your G4H Team,” a line that captures the spirit of everything she’s built.

With support from clients, team members, and a portion of G4H funds, the company supports rehoming, fostering, and rescue efforts for animals in need. If you or someone you know is working to rescue, foster, or rehome a pet, email ann@grandmas4hire.com. G4H maintains a support list for potential help with food, supplies, or financial assistance.

Their mission, simply put, is loving pets beyond the visits. The company blog shares real stories behind the mission.

What's Next

Seberino has mentors she looks to as models for the company’s future: Kristin Morrison of Six Figure Pet Sitting Academy and Amy Fiala of Austin-based Game Time Dog Services. Seberino attends webinars, listens to recorded conference sessions, and keeps Morrison’s trajectory in mind as a benchmark for growth.

Grandmas4Hire is licensed, bonded and insured, and is a member of the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters (NAPPS). Pet owners can search the NAPPS directory by ZIP code to find verified sitters.

Expansion is on the horizon. With Ellen nearly settled into her role as manager, Seberino is close to handing off day-to-day operations, freeing her to focus on growth. The timing feels right: Grandmas4Hire turns 10 this Thanksgiving, and she plans to celebrate.

“I started with my end in mind,” she said. “I want to build a company of women in their 40s. I want to offer opportunity to older women.”

That's exactly what she's done.

Grandmas4Hire serves Montgomery County, Texas (north of Houston) covering select areas of Conroe, Magnolia, Montgomery, Spring, The Woodlands, Tomball and Willis. Learn more here.

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