Meet Brad Bevill: Dog Behaviorist & Owner/Founder of Bevill Dog Behavior & Bevill Dog Rescue

We had the good fortune of connecting with Brad Bevill and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Brad, what do you attribute your success to?
The most important factors behind my success are my work ethic, optimism, and the 44 years I’ve been applying both to my life. I believe I can do whatever I put my mind to. Now, I am a rational guy. I don’t “put my mind” to playing in the NBA. I’m terrible at basketball and 44 years old. But when I decide there’s something I want to do, I simply don’t stop until I do it.

Another huge part of Bevill Dog Behavior’s success is my 18 years in corporate America – where I learned about business, branding, marketing, advertising, building teams, leadership, finance, service development, client relations, etc. Without the knowledge and experience I gathered over those 18 years, I have no idea where BDB would be.

Nothing frustrates me more than hearing, “Wow! Your business really took off fast!” Or when people insinuate that someone’s success is simply “right place at the right time” or “it’s all who you know”. I worked hard for 25 years developing the skills that I’m using today that make BDB successful.

As far as the success of the brand.. The very first exercise I did after deciding dog behavior and human education would be how I spent the rest of my life was a very detailed Brand Positioning document. That document has guided every decision I’ve made, every piece of content I’ve created, and every new service/product I am creating. Consistency is EVERYTHING when it comes to branding. People lose focus, get bored, get sloppy, or simply don’t care enough. As a virgo, perfectionist, the one thing I don’t lack is focus on the end goal and attention to detail along the way.

What should our readers know about your business?

We are relationship-based, behavioral trainers. We don’t focus on obedience. We focus on behavior – helping dogs return to their natural/instinctual state of balance – a calm mind, a fulfilled body, a purposeful life, and a happy heart.

From day one our goal has been to create clarity and contentment for as many human-dog relationships as we possibly can. The dogs are easy. Their humans are the challenge. Dog owners must change the relationship they have with their dog and the environment they are creating at home in order for the dog to view the world and their relationship in a new way. Behavior is not simply about knowledge. Sit, down, stay, come, heel, and place will never fix fear, aggression, anxiety, etc. You can have a doctorate from Harvard and “know” stuff. You can also have the knowledge of how to be respectful of others, but if you’re in a situation where you feel unsafe or your life is threatened, you’ll probably throw that doctorate and your manners out the window because the environment is dictating a survival behavior – not a social behavior.

What sets us apart is – we don’t train a dog and then just send them home and hope for the best. We have built an ecosystem that is based on the human addiction recovery model to help dogs and their humans stay on the right track for the remainder of the dog’s life. We offer behavioral training, structured boarding, structured daycare, group classes, grooming, shadow programs, workshops, and online educational content. We expect our clients to take advantage of the full ecosystem in order to get the results they want for their dog and their family. We also do numerous sessions with the humans before sending the dog home.

For post-training support, we have written materials, a private Facebook group, phone/text support, and over 30 videos that every training client gets.

Another differentiator is we have 3 locations (Dallas, Rockwall, and Fort Worth). Each location is one of our behaviorist’s homes. Guess what? Dogs live in homes – not retail space or warehouses. We believe this gives us an advantage over the big box training companies. We also send all of our board & train dogs through all three locations so they get to experience a ton of different environments and stimuli which yields better results and sends home more well-rounded dogs.

We got to where we are today through a lot of hard work and a relentless desire to over-deliver for our clients. And no, it was not easy. It’s been a lot of work, but worth every single bit of it. We try to work as smart as we can, but when stuff hits the fan and we need to overcome challenges, I’ve always just doubled down and worked harder to get through it. While that’s not a long-term/sustainable solution, it has worked thus far. We continue to improve the business, the processes, the services, the team, etc and it continues to run smoother and smoother.

I want the world to know that Bevill Dog Behavior is a HUMAN business. Yes, we help bring dogs to balance. But we exist to help transform human lives through their dogs. Our dogs simply reflect back who we are. It’s very common for our clients to go through major introspection during their journey with BDB. It’s also common for them to make major life changes during the process because this process sparks personal growth.

We have a lot in the works (from TV to books to products to clothing lines to an online course to a rescue and sanctuary) and we are excited to see how many lives we can change using dogs as our vessel.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
– Deep Ellum (Adairs, Three Links, Doublewide) – Ojeda’s on Maple – Five Sixty Restaurant (RIP) – Ft Worth Stockyards – Joe T. Garcia’s – Rangers Game – Shin Sei – Bob’s Chop House – Babb Bros BBQ – Messero – Cowboys game – Mesquite Rodeo

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I’d like to recognize a ton of people – all of whom I’ve needed along the way. But I’ll try to keep the list somewhat short. First of all – my coworkers and bosses at Nokia (1999 – 2006) that believed in me and gave me opportunities. That’s truly where my confidence and business knowledge were developed. Pasi Voho and the Luxus crew – some of the best years of my life. Dave DePaul and Russ Pond for the mentorship. And more recently: Art Ortiz, Cesar Millan, Linn Boyke, Cheri Lucas, Colleen Steckloff-Aguilera, and Todd Langston for all of the love and support as I dove into a new industry and a new career. And last but certainly not least – the BDB team. Without them none of this is possible. I love them like family.

Website: www.bevilldogbehavior.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bevilldogbehavior/
Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/bradbevill
Twitter: https://twitter.com/bevilldog
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BevillDogBehavior/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/bevilldogbehavior

Image Credits
Jario Gonzalez (1st image of Brad sitting with all of the dogs in turquoise hoodie) Monika Normand Photography (photos 2-4; both pack walk photos and the team pack walk photo) Paige Walker (last 2 photos; Brad and Andrea + 3 dogs, Brad in checkered tank)