Serenity Ranch Kennels Rises from the Ashes

Serenity Ranch Kennels (SRK) Training Center held a ribbon-cutting for the opening of their second location in the downtown historic district of Flatonia, Texas at 109 W. South Main Street on Nov. 24. The event was well attended by SRK‘s professional training team members, and local business and pet owners.

Serenity Ranch Kennels has been in business in Fayette County since 2006. The company first started by specializing in raising quality Labrador Retrievers. They develop a national following for their dogs and have placed dogs from Alaska to New York City and all places in between.

The company expanded their kennel offering in 2016 to provide basic and advanced obedience training for pet dogs both on and off leash. They currently train over 400 dogs each year at their beautiful 120 acre ranch, six miles north of Flatonia. “We have people from all over the State of Texas that bring their dogs to our ranch each year for training in our highly effective boarding and training programs”, said Jay D. Crouch, cofounder and head trainer.

Although we do a great job in training, both dog and owners in basic and advanced obedience, we have hundreds of clients that we’ve trained for over the years that have an interest in furthering their education with follow up group classes and private lessons.

We made the decision to purchase the historic building at 109 W. South Main St. in 2018. We saw this beautiful historic building (which once was the first hospital in Fayette County built in 1896) to be a way to expand our kennel offering to provide further education, and a lower cost alternative to our successful board and train programs.

The building was not only suitable for our business expansion, but the second floor has been remodeled for rentfree housing for our training team. As fate would have it, the pandemic put things on hold from 2020 to 2022. Little did we know we had yet another disaster that we would face in 2023 when the adjacent building, (only 5 feet to our west) caught fire and burned to the ground in October 2023.

Although our building didn’t catch fire, thanks to the valiant efforts of the Flatonia fire department and the majority of the water in the tower being placed on our building, we did receive a significant amount of smoke and water damage during the battle to preserve this 129 year-old historic building.

After the help of a professional smoke and water restoration company, our team here at Serenity Ranch Kennels went back to work on the remodel of the second floor, as well as the full restoration of the first floor retail space.

“I couldn’t be more proud of our team of dedicated people here at Serenity Ranch Kennels for putting in all of the hard work and effort to restore this wonderful old building. In the meantime, our training team continue to provide quality training and grow our board and train business here at the ranch.

We will not only be able to provide group classes and private lessons for continuing education for dog owners in our new location, we will also have a grooming service as well as a pet supply store coming soon to that same location.

“We’re now in a position to be able to provide proven dog/ owner training services by way of group classes and private lessons that we have developed at the ranch over last nine years” said Jay D. Crouch, cofounder and head trainer.

Registration for classes in December are starting now. Space is limited. For information on their special grand opening discounts and free evaluation of your dog call (512) 619-8662 or visit their website at www.srkdogtraining. com.