Pet Euthanasia Starts With a Choice Most Families Never Knew They Had.
Jennie Johnson left school at sixteen. She built a childcare company from nothing, ran it for seventeen years, and earned an MBE for training the people who cared for other families’ children. Then her cousin mentioned a service she planned to close: visiting homes to carry out pet euthanasia.
Jennie listened to what that service meant to families and took it over. Today she leads Vets at Home as cofounder and CEO, working alongside Mike Crawford. Together they run a national network of vets who bring a calm goodbye to the living room, the garden and the favourite bed.
In this PETBIZS interview, Jennie explains how her team chooses vets for their values as well as their credentials, why clear pricing comes first, and what happens after the appointment, from a handwritten card to grief support. One belief runs through every answer: how things end matters.
Thank you for joining PETBIZS, Jennie. You co-founded Vets at Home to bring compassionate, at-home pet euthanasia to families across the UK, and your work offers a level of care that goes far beyond a typical veterinary visit. Before we dive in, can you introduce yourself and share what led you to build a business around one of the hardest moments a pet owner will ever face?
I’m Jennie Johnson MBE, co-founder and CEO of Vets at Home. My background is in building businesses that care for families, although my route into this particular business came through my cousin.
She had spent a couple of years working as a self-employed home euthanasia vet. When she opened her own independent veterinary practice, she planned to close that side of her business. As she told me about the work, it became clear just how much it meant to the families she supported and the difference it could make to a pet’s final moments. It struck me as something worth continuing. I took over the business and, together with Mike, set about building a national network of vets so that we could make this option available to as many families as possible across the UK.
Your MBE recognition came from building family centered organizations before Vets at Home even existed. How did that earlier work shape the way you approached building this business?
I built my childcare company, Kids Allowed, from nothing and ran it for 17 years. Very early on, something surprised me: some of the qualified colleagues we recruited did not have the depth of knowledge I had expected.
I had left school at 16, but in my mid-thirties I went back to college to complete a Level 3 childcare qualification myself. I wanted to understand the gap. My experience was that the emphasis was on helping students pass their assessments, while my priority as an employer was to have highly skilled colleagues who could put their knowledge into practice.
That led me to establish our own training academy, delivering childcare and leadership qualifications with meaningful learning at their heart. That work was the basis of my MBE.
The thread running through all of it was excellence: being an excellent employer, providing excellent care and supporting families properly. I have brought those expectations into Vets at Home. We are looking at an established sector with fresh eyes and asking how we can improve the experience for everyone involved: our central team, our vets, our cremation partners and, above all, the pets and families receiving our care on one of their hardest days.
What was it about traditional in clinic experiences that convinced you at home pet euthanasia needed to become a real, accessible option rather than a rare exception?
My starting point was seeing the difference my cousin’s home euthanasia service made. This has always been about making sure families know they have a choice.
We surveyed nearly 2,500 pet parents who had experienced euthanasia. Among those who had experienced it at home, 98% said they would choose home euthanasia again in preference to a clinic.
For many pets, home is where they feel most relaxed: familiar smells, familiar sounds, their own bed and their favorite people. I often think that, if I could choose the circumstances of my own final day, I would want to be at home with the people I love. That helps explain why this option matters so much to families.
There is compassionate care in veterinary clinics too, and some families will prefer that setting. What matters to me is that every pet parent knows home euthanasia is available and has the opportunity to choose it where it is appropriate for their pet.
You co-founded Vets at Home with Mike Crawford, who spent years building operations at Apple and Nike. How do your backgrounds complement each other in running a business this emotionally sensitive?
Mike and I have very different skill sets, which is important. If we both brought exactly the same things, we would probably spend our time tripping over each other.
Mike is our Chief Product Officer. He focuses on how technology can improve the experience for families, vets, cremation partners, and the central colleagues coordinating appointments. His corporate background brings a considered approach: he thinks deeply about how something should work and takes the time to build it well.
I have spent the last 25 years working in businesses I have built from scratch. I am an entrepreneurial thinker and a problem solver, always looking for ways to improve the service and delight the people using it.
You will often see photographs of us around the kitchen table, brainstorming how to make things easier or remove unnecessary steps. Those conversations become improvements to our technology and the way we work. Mike has plenty of ideas of his own, but I do joke that the list of work resulting from our conversations usually ends up on his desk rather than mine.
Your site’s guiding line is that how things end matters. How does that belief translate into the practical decisions you make about delivering at home pet euthanasia to families?
Pet parents give enormous thought to every part of their pet’s life: food, exercise, training, grooming, vaccinations, and keeping them well. Yet end of life is still a subject many people find difficult to discuss. That leaves a knowledge gap at precisely the point when families need understanding and support.
“How things end matters” is about giving that final chapter the attention it deserves. It is the full stop at the end of all the chapters in the book.
In practice, that means helping families prepare through resources such as The Last Kindness, our e-book. It explains what they might notice, the choices they have, and what to expect. It guides them through the experience without pretending there is one simple answer for everyone. When they contact us, we can take on the arrangements for both the vet and aftercare, according to their wishes. We arrange collection around how much time they want afterwards, and we follow up with a handwritten card and signposting to bereavement support. Our care extends beyond the appointment itself.
Every vet who visits a family through Vets at Home for at home pet euthanasia is RCVS registered and chooses this work specifically. How do you find and select vets who are suited to this kind of care?
Appropriate qualifications, registration, and clinical competence are essential. Alongside those, we look closely at values: kindness, calmness, emotional intelligence, and how a family and their pet will experience being in that vet’s care.
During onboarding, we speak with vets, check their registration and identity, and review available information about their work. Many already run their own home euthanasia services, so we can also read the feedback their families have shared.
It continues after onboarding. We build relationships with our vets, check in after appointments, and ask families for feedback. Suitability is something we keep paying attention to.
We have also documented the “Vets at Home way”. Our vets retain clinical autonomy, which matters to them and to us. Our shared expectations cover the communication, consideration, and teamwork that help the whole experience run smoothly, including keeping our central team and cremation partners informed. It is similar to what I learned in childcare: qualifications are essential, but the values someone brings determine so much about how that care feels.
Walk us through what a family actually experiences from the moment they call you to the moment the at home pet euthanasia visit is complete.
Two things matter from the beginning: kindness and efficiency. Families can call, use our website, speak with us on WhatsApp or email, depending on what feels easiest for them.
Our central team gathers the information needed to understand the request and assess whether our service is appropriate. We then notify nearby vets in our network. Our internal target is to confirm an appointment within 20 minutes of first contact, for the day and time the family needs, where possible. That is a target for arranging the appointment, rather than the vet arriving.
Having a confirmed time gives families some reassurance. They know help is coming and can return their attention to their pet.
We handle payment and the advance paperwork centrally so the vet can concentrate on the family and their companion. At the visit, the vet assesses the pet and makes the final clinical decision about whether euthanasia is appropriate. They answer questions, explain what will happen, and work at an unhurried pace.
Our approach includes sedation first. The vet meets the pet wherever they are most comfortable, whether that is their bed, the garden, or on the floor beside their family.
If requested, a local cremation partner collects the pet at the time agreed with the family. Some want collection shortly afterwards; others want more time. We arrange that around their wishes. We also send a handwritten bereavement card with forget-me-not seeds and signpost families to grief support.
You aim to secure a local vet within twenty minutes of a family’s call. What had to be true about your operations for that kind of speed to become reliable rather than a rare best case?
Our technology makes that speed possible. When we started, we coordinated everything manually, and the time between taking a call and confirming an appointment was much longer.
Now, the information gathered during triage feeds into workflows that connect the right people and automate as much of the coordination as possible. That allows our central team to spend their time supporting families while the system helps move the arrangements forward.
In one particularly urgent case, we took the call, found a vet and arranged a cremation partner within four and a half minutes. The vet was at the home within an hour. That was an exceptional example, but it shows what well-designed technology can enable. Around 80% of our appointments are for the same day or next day, so that efficiency matters. We aim to give families an answer quickly. If we cannot help, we tell them promptly and signpost them elsewhere.
Pricing for at home pet euthanasia starts at £270 on your site, with visit fees and cremation itemized separately. Why did transparent pricing feel like a non negotiable part of this business?
Transparent pricing is simply how things should be. It has been part of our approach from the beginning.
Before a family commits, we can tell them exactly what the home euthanasia visit will cost and what their chosen aftercare will cost. Most families need to consider both, although some choose burial and do not require cremation.
It would be unfair for someone to understand the cost of the vet visit, proceed on that basis, and only later discover that the aftercare is beyond their budget. They need to understand the whole journey so they can make an informed choice. For me, fairness is part of excellence. Families are already dealing with enough uncertainty. The price should be clear.
Dr. Sinéad Bennett reviews every piece of medical content on your site as Clinical Lead. How involved is she in shaping the standards your vets follow during an actual visit?
There is a small correction to the premise of this question. Dr. Sinéad Bennett is our non-executive veterinary director and supports our clinical standards and guidance. We also work with vet Rebecca Goodwin, who reviews and signs off medical content.
Medical information we publish, whether in a blog or on social media, is signed off by either Sinéad or Rebecca. That oversight matters because people need to be able to trust what they read. Sinéad’s role supports the clinical foundations of our service, while our vets retain autonomy to make appropriate clinical decisions for the individual pet. Alongside that, our documented Vets at Home way sets expectations for communication, care and coordination throughout the visit.
Some families choose at home pet euthanasia specifically so their pet can stay in a familiar room, on their own bed, surrounded by people they know. How do your vets prepare for a visit that has to feel calm rather than clinical?
A great deal starts with the person arriving at the door: their demeanor, their kindness, and their willingness to take time.
Our vets receive the information gathered by the central team, with the advance administration already handled. That gives them the space to focus on the pet and family.
They answer questions, explain what is going to happen, and talk the family through the process. They meet the pet where they are comfortable, even if that means kneeling on the floor or being out in the garden.
There is clinical expertise behind everything they do, but the family should experience that expertise through calm, thoughtful care. The appointment is unhurried, and the surroundings can remain familiar and personal.
You arrange cremation and aftercare with a trusted local partner before the visit even happens. What made you decide to build that logistics work into the core of Vets at Home rather than leaving it to families to sort out afterward?
When someone calls us, they may already be distressed and overwhelmed. Asking them to organize another part of the process themselves can add to that burden.
We want one conversation with us to be enough to put the arrangements in motion, if that is what the family wants. They can understand the options and costs beforehand, tell us their wishes, and know that everything has been coordinated.
That includes deciding how long they would like to keep their pet after the visit. Many families want collection shortly afterwards, but some want longer. We arrange collection accordingly.
Our cremation partners are local and often small independent businesses. For families choosing individual cremation, ashes are often returned personally, sometimes within 24 to 48 hours, depending on the partner and arrangements. The point is to make a difficult experience feel personal, considered and joined up.
You have grown coverage for at home pet euthanasia across cities including Manchester, Liverpool, London, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, Preston, and Brighton. What does expanding into a new city actually involve behind the scenes?
It involves building relationships with vets and local cremation partners, completing our due diligence, and bringing them into the network.
Some vets already provide home euthanasia independently. We do not require exclusivity: they can run their own businesses, work in practice or belong to other networks alongside ours.
Where there is limited provision, we also support vets who want to establish their own home euthanasia service. We help them understand what is involved and work through the process of setting up. In that sense, we help grow the provision as well as connect existing services.
We are also preparing a free guide to becoming a home euthanasia vet for interested delegates at the London Vet Show. We want vets to understand the practicalities and the opportunity to do meaningful work, whether alongside an existing role or as their main business. Expansion means having the right people and arrangements in place to support families properly.
Your reviews mention vets arriving within an hour during genuinely urgent situations. How do you balance same day availability with the calm, unhurried pace families need once the vet is actually there?
We start by being calm ourselves. When a distressed family contacts us, reassurance and a clear explanation of what we are doing can help take some of the panic out of the situation.
We gather the information efficiently and coordinate the appointment. The vet then receives a well-triaged request with the advance administration completed. They travel safely and arrive ready to support the family.
The speed comes from the organization behind the scenes. It does not require the vet to rush the conversation or the procedure. Once there, they take the time needed to explain, answer questions, and care for the pet. Families are often enormously relieved to see them. Our job is to carry that reassurance through the visit. We can be quick to organize help while remaining calm in how we deliver it.
You also work with veterinary practices that want to offer at home pet euthanasia to their own clients without building the service themselves. How does that partnership model work in practice?
A busy practice can find it difficult to release a vet, and sometimes a nurse, for a home visit at short notice. Many requests are for the same day or next day, which makes that particularly challenging.
Working with us gives them another way to help. They can say, “We cannot attend today, but we work with a partner who may be able to. Would you like us to pass your details on?”
With the family’s permission, we take the arrangements forward. Afterwards, we keep the practice informed about what happened and when, so the care feels connected.
Some practices are understandably cautious about referring such a sensitive appointment. We can explain our specialist approach, the standards we work to, and the feedback families give us. A family’s experience at the end of a pet’s life can influence their relationship with the practice for years afterwards. Helping them access the care they want is an important part of looking after that relationship. We want our service to feel like a thoughtful extension of the practice’s care.
You offer grief support resources to families after a visit. Why did you decide your responsibility to a family did not end the moment the appointment was over?
The appointment may have ended, but the family’s grief has not. “How things end matters” includes what happens afterwards and how people are supported as they adjust to their loss.
We send a handwritten bereavement card with forget-me-not seeds and signpost families to different forms of grief and bereavement support.
People experience loss differently, so it matters that they can find support that suits them. We want families to know that their companion mattered and that there is somewhere to turn if they need help. For us, that is part of providing a thoughtful service throughout the whole experience.
For a family who has never considered at home pet euthanasia and assumes a vet clinic is simply how this moment always happens, what would you want them to understand about the alternative you have built?
I would want them to know that they have a choice.
For many pets, home is where they feel safest and most relaxed. They can remain in their own bed or favorite place, surrounded by familiar people, smells, and sounds. Families can be with them in a setting that feels personal.
We can arrange both the vet visit and, if needed, the aftercare, taking much of the organizational burden off the family. A clinic will be the right choice for some families and circumstances. What matters is that people understand their options early enough to consider what they want, rather than discovering afterwards that another approach might have been possible.
The Last Kindness guide on your site walks families through this decision in detail. What questions do you find come up most often from people who are still deciding what to do?
The biggest question is, “When is the right time?” Closely followed by, “Am I doing this too early?” and “Have I left it too late?”
People often hope for a moment of complete certainty, but it can be much more difficult than that. There may not be a single unmistakable moment that removes every doubt.
We help families pay attention to their pet’s quality of life, the changes they are seeing, and the balance between good days and bad days. Our quality-of-life tool and The Last Kindness guide can help them observe and understand what is happening.
We also listen. Sometimes people need the space to explain what they are seeing and what they are frightened of. These resources support conversations and informed decisions. The attending vet still makes a clinical assessment of whether euthanasia is appropriate for the pet. Our role is to help families feel less alone in a decision that can be profoundly difficult.
Vets at Home has earned nearly a perfect rating across more than 170 Google reviews. What do you think families are responding to most in how you deliver at home pet euthanasia compared to their expectations going in?
Two things come through repeatedly: kindness and efficiency.
Families contact us at a moment when they may be frightened, upset, and struggling to find help. Being treated kindly matters enormously, and so does getting a clear answer quickly.
When we confirm an appointment, they know help is coming. They can stop making calls and focus on their pet. Then the vet arrives with the calmness, patience and care that the family needs.
The coordination matters too: knowing what it will cost, having aftercare arranged and being able to spend the time they want with their companion. I think families respond to feeling looked after throughout. Kindness and efficiency together can make an enormous difference on a very difficult day.
Running a business built entirely around at home pet euthanasia, one of the hardest days in a family’s life, must take an emotional toll on your team as well. How do you support the people who do this work day after day?
Relationships are central to how we support people. We check in, stay in touch, and speak with vets after every appointment. If someone has had a particularly difficult visit, a personal gesture such as a handwritten note acknowledging their patience and care can mean a great deal.
We also make sure our policies support their wellbeing and safety. If a vet feels unsafe before entering a home or during an appointment, they can leave without completing the procedure and still be paid in full. We want that decision to be supported by our policies, with no financial penalty for protecting themselves.
Some of our vets describe the emotional experience as different from euthanizing a pet they have treated for years, whose family they know well. That is their experience, and it does not mean this work is without emotional demands.
They also speak about the privilege of helping a pet have a peaceful death and the meaning they find in families’ feedback. We currently signpost vets to organizations offering support, and we are looking at additional in-house resources. This is an area we want to keep improving for both our vets and our central team.
How do you train a vet to slow down for at home pet euthanasia when their entire career up to that point may have been shaped by the pace of a busy clinic?
It begins with selecting people whose values and approach suit this work. Many of our vets already provide home euthanasia, and they understand the importance of giving families time.
We reinforce those expectations through onboarding and our documented Vets at Home way: answering questions, explaining what is happening, communicating thoughtfully, and allowing the appointment to feel unhurried.
We also organize the work so the vet can concentrate on the part only they can do. Our central team handles the advance administration and coordinates the arrangements around the visit.
Clinical autonomy remains with the vet. Our role is to provide a supportive structure in which their expertise, calmness and kindness can come through. We continue those conversations as we work together and learn from family feedback.
You registered the business as The Pet Euthanasia People before adopting the Vets at Home name. What does that original name tell us about how narrowly or broadly you saw this business when you first built it?
We liked The Pet Euthanasia People because it did what it said on the tin. It was clear about the service we provided and reflected our specialist focus.
Veterinary professionals were generally comfortable with it. Euthanasia is a familiar medical term in their working lives. Some pet parents, however, found the name jarring, particularly when they were already facing something upsetting.
We listened to that feedback and chose Vets at Home because it clearly describes what we provide: veterinary care in the home. It is straightforward, easy to spell, and feels gentler for families facing a difficult decision. The name changed, but the purpose remained: helping pets and their families experience compassionate end-of-life care at home.
Where do you see the next phase of growth for at home pet euthanasia, both for Vets at Home specifically and for how the UK veterinary industry treats end of life care more broadly?
For Vets at Home, we want to complete our national coverage. We have already made considerable progress. But there are still pockets where we need more vets, so growing and supporting the network remains a priority.
More broadly, I want end-of-life care to become a conversation people feel able to have. Families should have the opportunity to understand what decisions may lie ahead, rather than assuming their pet will simply pass peacefully in their sleep.
Our Good Life Plan encourages people to think about their wishes while their pet is still well, when the decisions feel less immediate and emotionally overwhelming.
I would like every practice to discuss home euthanasia as an option where appropriate. Besides, I would also like every pet parent to understand the choices available to them. Better information helps people advocate for their companion and plan for the care they want. Ultimately, I want a planned, supported goodbye to become more common, with fewer families reaching a crisis without knowing where to turn.
If another founder wanted to build a business around a similarly difficult, emotional moment in someone’s life, what is the one piece of advice you would give them before they started?
Walk the walk.
For the first 12 months, I answered the phones myself. I arranged appointments, spoke with vets and liaised with cremation partners. That experience was invaluable because it helped me understand what families actually needed.
I did the same in my childcare business. I spent time in the rooms, talked with colleagues and listened to families. You cannot design an exceptional service without understanding the people receiving it and the people delivering it.
If you want to build a business supporting people through difficult emotional moments, you have to sit in those moments with them. That is how you learn what matters and build a service that genuinely meets their needs.
As we wrap up, what do you want pet owners across the UK to understand about at home pet euthanasia, and about the kind of goodbye you believe every family deserves to have?
I want pet parents to know that they have options and that it is all right to think about them before the moment arrives.
We put so much love and care into our pets’ lives. Thinking about their final chapter is another part of that care. It gives us the chance to understand their needs, consider our wishes, and know where to find help.
For many families, being at home allows their companion to remain somewhere familiar, with the people they love around them. For others, a clinic will be the right choice. Every family deserves clear information, kindness, and the opportunity to make an informed decision with appropriate veterinary guidance.
We cannot remove the sadness of saying goodbye. We can help make it calmer, more personal and more supported.
How things end matters.
Let’s Wrap It!
Thank you, Jennie, for sharing your time and your vision with the PETBIZS community. Your work proves that pet euthanasia can feel calm, personal and supported, not rushed or overwhelming. Our readers now see how kindness can change a family’s hardest day. When families learn their choices, they gain room to plan a goodbye that fits their pet.
We hope this conversation inspires vets, practices and advocates to talk openly about end of life care.
