Women in Business: Harnessing a passion for pets
Kathryn Helt always dreamed of being an entrepreneur. Creating and marketing are her strengths but a running theme throughout her life has been her love of dogs. Combining those passions led to the start of Leonardo and Kate, a business that is the best of both worlds for Helt and one that addresses an important need for her canine buddies.
Professionally, Helt’s experience is varied, but her careers each provide background that lends itself well to her new venture. First, Helt spent five years in elementary education and then worked in advertising sales.
“Now I work for a funeral and cemetery company – my full-time job – as community outreach, and I've been doing this job for 13 years,” she says.
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But along the way there were always dogs, or at least the dream of having them.
“I can remember when I was little, I saw this English Bulldog puppy, and it was the cutest dog I had ever seen,” Helt says. “Its name was Raisin. I just remember it was so funny and cute. And I thought someday I'm going to have one of those. Well, I got out of college, got my first teaching job, and I thought, OK, I'm ready to get an English Bulldog.”
The cost and size of the breed led her to choose a Boston Terrier instead. And yes, she named one of them Raisin. Now years later, Helt’s current pups, French Bulldogs Teddy – a certified pet therapy dog who visits hospitals and assisted living facilities – and Bear Bear, are also “squishy, flat face” bully breeds.
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“Even with the Boston terriers, I noticed that if you get a collar that's long enough to fit around their neck, the natural sizing out in the dog market is that it gets wider, too, because they think a bigger neck means a bigger dog, like a Lab or a Golden Retriever,” Helt says. “They're bigger dogs and they weigh more, and of course, collars aren't done by weight. They're done by just the circumference of the neck, so they get wider and then they have these big buckles.”
Helt says bully breeds have breathing issues and very delicate throats. Their body shapes are different from larger dogs with the same sized neck, so collars and harnesses need to reflect that unique shape to be comfortable.
“My desire to design a better harness came from not being able to find ones that would be strong, soft, beautiful and fit well,” Helt says. “I purchased one a few years ago that was supposedly a good choice. It was very cute, but it came up too high on their neck, the inside lining was rough and caused Bear Bear to have skin issues and, scariest of all, the fastener metal loop actually broke when Bear Bear darted after another dog suddenly.”
Helt’s creations are designed in Greenville and crafted in Italy in the same workshops that make high-end human bags and accessories. Helt has added to the line, which now includes leashes, collars and other accessories for those “classic fit” pups.
This dog-focused life is a dream come true. Helt found her way to it in due season.
“I do have four kids,” she says. “The youngest just finished her junior year of college, so like many other women, it has allowed me more time and energy to spend on my own passions and working on my own dreams, for the time I have beyond my day job. I’m naturally a caring, empathic person, and now that my focus isn’t as much on the kids – although I do have two of them home for the summer – I’m able to devote more of my extra time to caring for the dogs and growing my business.” Learn more at leonardoandkate.com.
This article originally appeared on Greenville News: Women in Business: Harnessing a passion for pets
