New dog club on BI is 1st indoor facility

In the doghouse on BI? Must be nice — it’s state of the art.

The Bainbridge Island Dog Club on Hildebrand Lane is BI’s first indoor doggy daycare, and one of its only daytime care options for dogs. The club combines a retail storefront, a grooming service, a play space and a quiet room for the dogs.

The club offers grooming, education, an outdoor dog scavenger hunt called a “Sniffy Walk,” weekday care packages and free early morning play sessions on weekends for service dogs. It also includes one-off days and weekends.

Dogs prefer routines and benefit from consistent enrichment, co-owners Andrea and Brad Bernadt said, but each dog is different.

Since the club opened in late September, over 115 dogs have passed the club’s temperament check, with sizes ranging from 5 to 106 pounds. While the pre-enrollment check ensures that dogs are comfortable in the space—with other dogs and with new people—finding the right balance on a given day is the hardest part of the job, trainer Yevheniia Breninh said.

Dog compatibility depends on age more than size: active dogs and teen and puppy dogs need more attention, Breninh said. For young dogs, daycare is great for socialization, but that goes beyond just meeting other dogs and people — it’s exposing the puppy to new sounds, textures, tastes and more that are important for your dog’s mental growth.

“We’re not a regular daycare. We’re oriented to each dog’s needs and personalities; we try to create the right environment for each dog,” she said. “It’s awesome when a dog can trust you. It just makes me so happy.”

The Sniffy Walk is an example of that care, Andrea Bernadt said. Staff take pups on a 30-minute leashed stroll through Sakai Park, where they sniff out little blue treat pouches that they’ve hidden near the trail. A portion of the proceeds of the walk go to animal-related causes around Kitsap County.

As veteran clients of dog daycare and self-described picky pet owners, the Bernadts designed the club from the studs out with a clean, calm and safe experience for canines and people in mind.

The standard comes from personal experience. Andrea Bernadt described an upsetting moment years ago when the couple’s former pet, a Yorkshire terrier named Charlie, returned from a boarding session “covered in urine and limping.” Outdoor daycares had drawbacks too; the dogs loved it, but “the dirt came free” with each session.

“It’s so important to have staff that truly love and care about dogs. You have to have that love to ensure their safety and wellbeing,” she said.

The Bernadts started with a retail location on Winslow Avenue, then began construction on the nearby daycare in December of 2022. They combined two former medical offices by removing walls and creating an open floor plan.

Inside the club, three dog play areas are separated by 4-foot barriers that resemble white picket fences. Tall windows let in lots of natural light, and the high ceilings are hung with thick gray acoustic panels in the shape of clouds. An 8-ton air filtration system cycles fresh air into the space six times an hour, and several automatic drinking water bowls refresh themselves every few minutes.

Multiple CPR and First Aid certified dog handlers, plus a professional trainer, are on hand at all times to keep an eye on the pack. Pet relief stations featuring turf grass and a classic red fire hydrant are tied into the city sewer system. The walls and floors are light blue, which is calming to dogs. The walls have a special waterproof spray paint, and the floors use a specialized waterproof slip-resistant material, similar to an indoor football field, that is great support for a dog’s nails, paw pads, and both human and dog joints, Andrea Bernadt said.

“When we were taking our own dogs to daycare in Seattle, we always asked ourselves, what’s missing? What can we do better? What new products and designs are out there?” Brad Bernadt said. “We kept asking ourselves that as we designed BIDC.”

Pushing the boundaries for a dog daycare also meant new horizons for local regulatory agencies. During routine building inspections from the city of BI and Kitsap animal control, the Bernadts and assessors had to work together to understand how building codes applied to an indoor dog daycare. The city had never hooked up a pet relief area to a sewer before, and some county requirements for animal facilities had only vague language like “adequate air circulation.”

“I’m nervous, because I’m reading this as a lawyer,” Brad Bernadt said. “We had to build the whole thing before it could be reviewed.”

Andrea Bernadt added: “But after our inspection by animal control, our surveyor started doing a little dance. It was the first time he had no recommendations and no complaints. That was one of the proudest moments of my life.”