Author: Emily Leayman

FALLS CHURCH, VA — Laura Tartaro-McGowan and her son Ian McGowan come from different work backgrounds — nursing and retail, respectively. Tartaro-McGowan was director of Northern Virginia’s first outpatient surgical center in the 1980s and later worked for Home Health. But what brought them together to work together in a business were their family dogs.Their first dog grew to five, and the family looked for ways to care for the dogs and manage their weight. “We want to make sure that what we’re doing is healthy and what’s best for our animals,” Ian McGowan told Patch. “And that’s when we…