Interesting Journeys into Petpreneurship: Christian Corvaglia

I conducted this interview partly in English, partly in Italian. Christian's English is limited, but his product speaks every language. I asked him to tell me his story in Italian so we captured it properly, and then translated everything afterwards. What came through was the story of a young Italian founder who grew up with dogs, started building things at 18, and invented something that solves a problem every dog-friendly hotel in the world deals with but nobody had properly addressed.

I started with the obvious question. Did you always love dogs?

"I was born with a dog, since I was very young we always had dogs."

Christian grew up in Puglia, in southern Italy.

He started working at 18, not in the dog industry initially, but the connection between dogs and his professional life was already forming. When the idea for a self-service dog washing station came to him, he did not write a business plan, he did not pitch investors, he built one with his own hands.

I asked him how he tested the first prototype.

"I put the machine in a hotel," he said. "During the summer. I let people use it."

That was three years ago. He placed his first unit, which he described as a big cabin, in a hotel and watched what happened. Real dogs, real guests, real conditions, on the beach in Italy. He iterated from there.

When Did You Know This Would Work?

I asked him when the magic moment came, when did he know this was going to be successful? "I started three years ago," he said, all I did was build new models.

"And now I am starting to think about expansion."

I love that answer.

Three years in, fully bootstrapped, no outside funding, and he is only now beginning to feel that the world is going to love how washer dryer units. He is not selling a dream. He is building a business, one machine at a time.

Your dog deserves better than "pet friendly." See why →

Show Me What You Have Built

Christian shared his screen and walked me through the product range. I have to tell you, the Italian design is beautiful. These are not ugly utility boxes. These are properly designed, good-looking units that would sit comfortably in the grounds of a five-star hotel. The first thing he showed me was the original MVP.

His first was a big unit, the very first prototype. Then the current range.

I asked him about the flagship cabin, the Husky.

It costs around 18,000 to 19,000 euros. "Beautiful Italian style," I told him.

"Very sexy."

He smiled. I told him if I had a five-star hotel with big gardens, this is perfect.

Absolutely perfect.

Then he showed me the outdoor unit, the Akita, at around 15,700 euros. He has already installed one of these indoors at the airport in Sardinia. An international airport. That tells you something about where this product can go.

The indoor unit, the Barboncino, comes in at 13,700 euros.

"This is a really professional, nice-looking unit," I told him.

"This is fantastic work. Well done."

Then he showed me the entry-level unit, the Bracco, at around 2,300 euros.

A small station, great price point, perfect for hotels that want to test the concept or need multiple units spread across a large property.

Every single model washes and dries. That is the key innovation. I asked him to confirm: all your models dry as well as wash?

"Yes. We are the first company in Europe and the US with a dryer inside."

First in Europe. First in the US. Patented. That is genuine innovation.

He also showed me the shampoo dispenser built into the units and the mobile application. You scan a QR code to unlock the machine. The app shows the machine's location on a map. You can buy a credit pack or pay for a single wash. Checkout goes through Stripe, supporting Apple Pay and Google Pay.

"Beautiful return on investment," I told him. He said its real.

How Do Hotels Make Money From This?

I put a scenario to him. I said, imagine I own a hotel in the English countryside. Dogs go out walking in the fields every morning. They come back covered in mud. They walk through my lobby, my corridors, into the rooms. Mud on the carpets. Mud on the furniture. It is a nightmare. So I call you. You install a unit.

Is this very expensive for me?

He told me it depends on the size, but no, it is not very expensive. And the hotel does not just solve a problem, the hotel makes money. Dog owners pay to use the station. It is a revenue-generating amenity, not a cost centre.

I asked about the return on investment for a hotel that buys a unit.

Christian walked me through the numbers in Italian, and they are strong. A hotel installs the unit, charges guests per wash, and recoups the investment while solving the dirty dog problem permanently. Large hospitality venues, he explained, typically install two or three Bracco units spread across the property for quick rinses, plus one premium station for full washes.

But Christian also made a point that I had not considered.

He said sometimes the hotel owner does not see dirty dogs as their problem. But the guest does. The guest takes their dog to the sea, the lake, the river, and then has nowhere to wash the dog before going back to the room to wash them in the bathtub. That is a guest problem. The hotel that solves it differentiates itself.

"By the beach, by the lake, by the river," he said.

He is right, this isn't just a product for hotels in muddy fields.

The Elisa Connection

I asked Christian if he knew Elisa Guidarelli, the most famous dog woman in all of Italy, and one of my favorite people. "Yes, I work with her. She helped me start."

He has Elisa advising him! She knows more about dog friendly hospitality than anyone I know, she is the person who trains Italian hotels to be dog friendly.

Elisa helped Christian secure his first hotel client in Italy.

The first cabin installed in the B2B market came through her introduction. I know Elisa through my work with Roch Dog, so it turns out this is a very small world.

"She's very clever," I said. "Super smart. She knows this business in Italy."

He agreed. Elisa owns dog-friendly brand in Italy. She is the real deal. And the fact that she backed Christian early tells you something about the man.

Travelling with your dog? Find certified hotels →

The Climate Problem

I told Christian something he needed to hear. Italy is beautiful, but it is not the best market for his product. There is not enough rain. Not enough mud. The Mediterranean climate means dogs are not getting caked in dirt every day.

"This product," I said, "you should be selling to hotels in the countryside where there is rain, in northern countries, in America, where there are rivers and mud, where dogs get dirty every single day when they go outside."

He agreed.

He already has one machine in Luxembourg, so the international expansion has started. But the real scale is in the UK, Scandinavia, the American countryside, coastal and riverside hotels everywhere. Those are the markets where hotels face this problem daily, they say they don't mind muddy dogs but housekeeping does.

What Comes Next

Christian has 20 machines installed across Italy and Luxembourg, all bootstrapped over three years. He has two patents pending. He has a working app with Stripe integration. He has a hybrid business model: B2B hardware sales, annual SaaS fees for software maintenance, and a B2C pay-per-wash app with six machines live.

He is now raising his first round of investment to expand the B2C side, taking self-service stations out of hotels and into public spaces like parks and city centres where dog owners need access to a wash station. The hardware-plus-app model means every unit generates recurring revenue from day one.

Three years, bootstrapped, two patents, 20 machines, and a product that nobody else in Europe has built. Christian Corvaglia is 21 years old.

Remember his name.