We offer a Turnkey Training program in Chicago, where we train your dog at your home while you are at work. This a convenient and highly effective solution for busy dog owners who want fast, lasting results without the time commitment of daily training. One of our professional trainers will work directly with your dog in their everyday environment, and focus on practical behaviors like loose-leash walking, polite greetings, crate training, and other specific challenges you're facing. Your dog receives focused, one-on-one attention using positive reinforcement methods that create real behavior change. Each week, we meet with you to transfer the training, answer your questions, and ensure consistency. It's personalized, convenient, and designed to fit seamlessly into your lifestyle.
Program Snapshot
- Format: Our trainer comes to your home to train your dog, including lots of outdoor walking, while you are at work
- Sessions: 3 training sessions per week for 3 weeks
- Progress meetings: 1 progress meeting per week with you, typically on weekends
- Price: $1,500 for the program, plus any parking fees
- TrainTrack: Access to our training portal for reviewing exercise videos and any other recommendations from your trainer
Why Turnkey is So Beneficial
- Your dog works directly with a trainer: Sometimes the people in your dog's life may be inadvertently contributing towards its behavior, including you, your significant other, dog walkers, kids, or roommates. By having your dog work only with the trainer and nobody else, we can eliminate external factors and achieve results that you may not have thought possible.
- Focused consistency: We have the time to put in lots of repetitions in a very focused way, in different environments such as on elevators, near el tracks, down busy sidewalks, and in stores. Many people do not have the time, energy, or focus to do so.
- Training system: We use proven techniques and progression to get your dog to respond very favorably, right away.
A Happy Turnkey Training Customer
Dog Trainer
Jessie was amazing for turnkey training! She was super communicative, impactful, and was able to adjust to our specific needs. We will be continuing to utilize Jessie and Tucker Pup's for our pup's needs.
Lola Lamme
Program Details
- Number of sessions: 3 sessions per week with your dog, for 3 weeks
- Progress meetings: 1 progress meeting per week, typically on weekends
- Session duration: Typically 45 minutes with your dog per session.
- Location: We come to your home without your present during the sessions, if you live in our travel radius (see below for travel radius)
- Equipment included:
- Treat pouch
- Starter set of treats
- Optional clicker
- Walking harness
- TrainTrack: You will have access to TrainTrack, where you can watch videos of training techniques we reviewed with you, so you can maintain consistency once the trainer leaves.
Price and Payment Options
- Credit card
- Payment installments
- PayPal Credit, where you can pay back the amount in any time frame that you want, but if you pay it back within six months, it is interest free
FAQs
How will you gain access to my home?
If you live in a high-rise, ideally we would get the key from your front desk each session. If you live in a house, it is ideal that we get the key from a lock box you would attach to your fence. We try not to keep keys, but can do so as a last resort throughout the program. If so, keys are kept by the trainer, not stored at Tucker Pup's.
Can the trainer come to my home if my dog has guest reactivity?
Initially we can meet outside of your home and try to have your dog get acclimated to the trainer, then possibly go into your home together all at once so your dog sees that the trainer is not a threat. Having said that, if your dog shows reactivity towards the trainer once the program starts and creates an unsafe risk, we would likely not be able to continue this format and could discuss standard private lessons with you.
Can you work on behaviors based on fear or stress?
Depending on the behavior and the severity, this may be possible. For example, if you dog is nervous around the el tracks, elevator, and so forth, we could work on desensitization strategies. If your dog is severely reactive or has extreme separation anxiety, these would likely not be appropriate for our Turnkey Training program, but instead our Behavioral Modification program.
Are you going to train my dog, and I never have to do anything differently on my end?
No trainer in the world can make this promise. We are going to put repetitions on your dog and build his trust and responsiveness towards the training process. However, success will also depend on how execute the handling skills going forward. If you stop being consistent with what we taught you, your dog will likely revert back to previous behaviors in short order. The good news is that each week, we will show you everything you need to know, so it is not too overwhelming all at once at the end of the program.
Why are the training sessions with my dog 45 minutes instead of 60 minutes?
Training can be very tiring for many dogs, and we have found that after 45 minutes, their attention span and responsiveness can start to decline. We want to keep your dog very motivated about training and not practicing that he can ignore the cues.
Will you be working mostly indoors or outdoors?
We can work on any behaviors that you want to address within the scope of manners or light behavioral issues. Certainly some of them can be indoors, but most often, these will involve going out into the real world.
Will my dog be responsive to a stranger instead of me?
Once we gain your dog's trust, which will involve you in the beginning, most of them will work with our trainers quite well. We can typically make faster progress in this one-on-one setting, because we know how to immediately use the most effective cues, body language, and troubleshooting strategies to get results.
I use a prong collar / choke chain for my dog when going on walks. Will the trainer still use these when working with my dog?
No, we will remove these tools, which are not necessary, can cause your dog to distrust you, and therefore not be responsive to the training process. Our goal is to show you how to have a great listener who walks at your side on a loose leash, without needing anything like that besides maybe a harness. We have done this with countless other dogs whose owners once used these tools. We need you to trust us on this, and you will be happy that you did.
Our Travel Radius
One of our trainers can home to your home if you live within our travel radius. We routinely go all throughout Chicago each day, including to Lakeview, Lincoln Park, Bucktown, Wrigleyville, Gold Coast, River North, downtown, East Loop, West Loop, South Loop, and all neighborhoods in between.
These boundaries go north to Irving Park Road, east to the lake, south to Roosevelt, and west to Western Avenue.
If you live a few streets beyond these boundaries we can likely still come to your home.
Otherwise, you would need to come to our training facility.
Our Trainers Travel All Over Chicago
Why Hiring Us is Better Than Going it Alone
It’s not as simple as it looks. Many people try, then either give up — or unintentionally make their dog’s behavior worse before reaching out to us.
Why our training programs beat DIY:
- Avoid wasting many hours sifting through conflicting, incomplete advice that is often detrimental — follow a structured, proven plan instead
- Get immediate expert feedback on your technique and what your dog is actually experiencing
- Avoid common mistakes that can severely limit your dog's progress
- We'll show what adjustments to make when your dog isn't responding
- Use TrainTrack to track progress and get ongoing guidance
- Stay consistent with guidance and accountability throughout the process
- Eliminate the frustration of trying different methods that don’t consistently work
Positive Reinforcement Methods
Tucker Pup's only uses positive reinforcement, which combines the use of rewards, an encouraging tone of voice, and relaxed body language. We do not use aversive methods include prong collars, choke chains, shock collars, poking, yelling, or leash popping. If you are using any of these with your dog, we can help you successfully stop, and still get the results you want.
Positive reinforcement gives you the best chance of success, and can be the fastest way to get results. Aversive methods cause distrust, fear, and potentially pain or discomfort, all of which can be detrimental to getting the results and relationship that you want.
Common questions:
- Do I need to carry treats for the rest of my dog's life? Treats are for teaching behaviors - once your dog can reliably perform, treats can be phased out at your discretion.
- Do I need to carry treats at all times? No. If there are times where you are not carrying treats, our methods can still work.
- Can I use a different type of reward than treats? It may be possible to use something else your dog values, such as a favorite toy.
- Is positive reinforcement too soft for my dog? Not a bit. The best way to build reliable skills is through trust and motivation. Being tough with your dog can cause him to shut down, have anxiety, ignore you, and not truly learn.
- I have tried treats, but they don't work for my dog. You were likely using low-value treats, including from a store. We will recommend high-value treats that are irresistable for most dogs, including in high-distraction environments.
- Will it take longer to achieve results? This is a common myth. Positive reinforcement can create faster results than aversive methods, because your dog is motivated to listen to you, and truly wants to learn.
- Is it bribery? No! All animals learn behaviors from being rewarded, including humans. You wouldn't go to work for free, would you? Motivation + repetition = new behaviors.
If you are hesitant, please trust us on this one and feel free to ask us questions.
A Happy Turnkey Training Customer
Yelp has listed Tucker Pup's as one of the top 100 local businesses in the country in 2025. We are the only pet business who made the list from Chicago, and the only pet resort / training business who made the list nationally.
See the List
TrainTrack Platform
Re-Watch Training Exercises on Your Device
The trainer will show you the exercises in person, then you can access TrainTrack to see the homework and other helpful information. Many exercises include videos, and all of them include instructions. It also includes handouts and a documentation of what you covered. This is incredibly helpful because there is a lot of information to take in, and it can be hard to remember everything that was demonstrated and discussed.
In addition, you can log your progress on TrainTrack as you are working on your home exercises. This can be invaluable for ensuring that you spend enough time, in various settings, for your dog to learn the methods thoroughly.
For private lessons, you can even upload videos to your trainer, and they can watch them in between sessions to help provide advice.
TrainTrack works on any Internet-connected device, so you can use it on your mobile phone, even when you're on a walk or working outdoors.
TrainTrack is used for all of our training services, including private lessons and classes.
To access TrainTrack, you must log in to our website. On your Customer Center, you will see the link to TrainTrack towards the top of the page.
Neighborhoods We Serve
Tucker Pup's is located in the West Loop / Fulton Market District neighborhood. People come to us from all over Chicago, especially from Bucktown, Gold Coast, Lake View, Lincoln Park, Old Town, River North, River West, South Loop, Streeterville, Ukrainian Village, University Village, West Town and Wicker Park.
