About us

The Grateful Dogg is a unique dog-related service provider in the Fox Valley, WI area.

We provide training services as well as dog-walking, pet sitting and any other animal-related needs. We handle all ages and breeds of dogs from young puppy to sweet senior and from Chihuahua to Great Dane.  We also provide pet sitting services for just about any animal.

We know that your animals are part of your family and we treat them as though they are a part of ours.

Melissa Pezzuto-Heiting is a Certified Professional Dog Trainer and AKC Canine Good Citizen Evaluator. She is a member of the Association of Professional Dog Trainers, Pet Professional Guild, and Force Free Trainers of Wisconsin as well as certified in Canine CPR & First Aid. She is also a Director for the Wisconsin Boston Terrier Rescue and active in the Wisconsin rescue community.  She has been involved in training and rescue for over a decade and in 2014 completely shifted careers and started teaching group classes and training professionally full-time.  She specializes in shy and fearful dogs and has extensive experience working with puppy mill and under socialized dogs. 

Melissa shares her life with her husband Mike who also enjoys training and competition. They have 3 dogs, “The Girls”; Maggie (Collie mix), Penny (Cattle Dog mix) and Delilah (Boston Terrier) and one cat named Jordy who runs the house.  A special place will always be in her heart (and a tattoo on her leg!) for her first dog Koa. She is the inspiration for all that we do and all the animals we rescue. “Koa” means brave & bold in the Hawaiian language and is what we strive to be.

“We love our dogs like they are human, but we have to respect that they are animals and don’t know our human language and customs. We want to teach them our language and what is expected of them. We want to celebrate their success and reward the correct choices while learning from failures and mistakes. Most of all we want to have fun. We should enjoy our dogs, for their time with us is way to short. Patience, love, kindness and a mutual respect will go a long way in training and make for a happy owner and happy dog.”