She’s Charmed, For Sure, by Cats

Sarah Haynes is a self-described reactionary. Her vaunted social impact agency is dubbed Spitfire. And she’s head over heels for cats.

So it’s no surprise that after Haynes had a bad experience with a cat boarding facility in the area last year – on the heels of a friend’s innocent but tragic mishap with one of her cats a year earlier – Haynes took matters into her own hands.

She opened , a moniker borne out of a joke about her penchant for boarding cats from friends and shelters at her home, in April on Miller Ave. in the long-vacant space formerly occupied by . Less than three full months later, the business is thriving, Haynes says, and it’s spiking now that families are headed out on vacation with the school year out.

“It’s gone beyond my expectations,” Haynes says. “It’s in a very niche market. You’ve got to have a cat, you’ve got to be going away and have a reason not to use a cat-sitter.”

You also have to be willing to spend some money to make sure your cat’s in good hands while you’re away. Rooms at Kitty Charm School start at $22 a night and go up to $45 a night for a “Princess Suite.”

Clients have come mostly from Mill Valley and Marin, and based on a formula created by the American Veterinary Medical Association, there are approximately 71,000 cats in Marin. But they’ve also come from Santa Cruz, Napa, Sonoma, Petaluma, Lafayette, as well as some residents of Michigan who are moving to the area but want their cats here when they arrive in a few weeks.

Upon arrival, cats are in about as feline-friendly an environment as one could imagine, from the cushy “sky-boxes” that jut out over the hallway to the zig-zagging steps on the walls in some of the rooms.

Haynes says she’s created the type of place she’d want for her own cats. She hasn’t found that environment elsewhere, and the place she took her cats to when she went to Burning Man last year charged extra ($8 for every 15 minutes) for providing love and attention to cats. She’d arranged for a friend nearby to go the facility and give her cats attention, but the friend ended up getting sick.

“When I picked them up, they were shaking and had lost weight and they were covered in a film, because kitties don’t groom themselves if they’re depressed,” Haynes says. “They were trembling all the way home and were under the covers for three days.”

That disappointment came on the heels of a friend forgetting to lock the cat door of her house while cat-sitting a year earlier. The cat got out and was killed by a coyote.

The events prompted a strong reaction from Haynes, and as she makes the rounds of the Kitty Charm School rooms on a recent afternoon, it’s clear she’s in her element. She knows the personalities and needs of each and doesn’t linger too long, balancing cats' desire for both attention and alone time.

“I don’t think love and attention should be a financial choice, especially in this economy,” she says. “And if you’re going to do a pet boarding facility, you should love animals enough that whether or not you’re getting paid, you’re going to make sure that they’re really comfy and happy.”

Haynes does charge extra for some services, from basics like administering medications and brushing to the only-at-Kitty-Charm-School ability to Skype with your cat while away or the “One Night Stand,” a sleepover with a human to “cuddle your kitty/kitties the whole night through.”

Haynes has continued her interest in boarding cats from shelters that have been unable to find owners for them, and she also accepts boarders from PAWS (Pets Are Wonderful Support), which assists with the pet needs of the disabled and elderly.

“I just thought for a long time, ‘I know this can be done better,” Haynes says. “I have to believe that there is a financial scenario where kitties have space and are given love and attention. They don’t need much – 60 seconds here and there throughout the day. And so far, it’s working.”