ABOUT US

Larissa

My name is Larissa Vargas, Born and raised in Jersey City, I am the owner of Downtown Woody’s Grooming Salon. Since I was a little girl I have always been obsessed with loving animals and knew my life had to include them but did not know what path I wanted to take in the pet care industry. My interest in safe, stress-free grooming started when my family dog Woody went to the groomer and always came home with a bad/choppy haircut, stressed, sad and even sometimes injured. I hated seeing him go through that every time he got groomed. I was sure that there was a better way, and that no pup should go home as Woody did.

I was an EMT at Jersey City medical center and Ridgefield PD at the time when I finally looked into pet grooming and decided to make the change. I knew I always wanted to work with animals so this seemed to be a good path. Years before becoming an EMT I was also a vet tech but it was really tough emotionally for me at the time and I needed a different way of working with animals. In 2009 I decided to enroll in online grooming school while being a full-time EMT. As I went through the courses I taught myself to groom on my own with what I had learned and it was like second nature to me and I LOVED it. In 2009 I worked at a very fast paced chain salon just to put myself through a “boot camp” type of experience to learn every aspect of the job then in 2011 I moved on to be a salon manager / lead groomer at a brand new local Salon. Unfortunately I got badly injured and was out of work for almost 8 months but within that time I knew I was ready to take a chance to go out on my own and start my own business, so I utilized my time to take all the steps to start my own business. Now, here I am and here is Downtown Woody’s Grooming Salon. :)

This Salon is dedicated to my first Son my pup Woody RIP