Our Story

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Founder Matthew Slack holds an MBA and has spent over a decade hands-on in the dog training industry, not as an outsider who spotted an opportunity, but as someone raised inside it. Long before The Luxe existed, he and his family ran AgapiK9 and Olympus K9, training and certification programs built over more than 50 years and tens of thousands of dogs. It was inside that original training model, not a startup pitch deck, that the gap in the industry revealed itself: dogs are context-dependent learners. They learn best where the behavior actually needs to happen, in the home. Trainers often offer a crash course, hand the dog back, and disappeared. Owners are left to maintain results alone, with no system and no one to call when behavior backslid.

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The Luxe Method

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That gap, fragmented vendors, inconsistent standards, results that fade once the trainer leaves, is what The Luxe Method was built to close. Every dog trains in the home, where it matters most. Month one front-loads the foundation. Every month after, training is maintained and progressively advanced, sustainably, not crammed into a two-week sprint that fades by month two. Between sessions, the Luxe app delivers ongoing, system-led support, so progress never depends on remembering what a trainer said three weeks ago. It's the standard every Luxe trainer is held to.

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Why The Woodlands and surrounding areas

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The Luxe: Canine Club brings that 50-year standard to Texas, built for busy families who want results that hold, handled by one provider instead of a patchwork of vendors.

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This isn't a brand built on inclusions. It's a brand built on a standard, run by the people who set it before anyone called it luxury.

A Legacy Backed By Real Credentials:

The Luxe: Canine Club's training system is grounded in over 50 years of combined, hands-on canine expertise, not borrowed authority, but verified, third-party-recognized credentials that few brands in this industry can claim. Matt's father in-law and Director of Training, Pando Stepanis, has worked with tens-of-thousands of dogs over his career, is one of the only Certified Civilian Master Trainers recognized by the National Association for Professional Canine Handlers (NAPCH), the organization responsible for certifying Police K9 teams across North America. His expertise spans K9 detection (narcotics, explosives, bed bugs), IGP sport, and Ministry-standard explosives protocols, and he is a member of the International Association of Bomb Technicians and Investigators. This isn't a marketing claim, it's a credential earned through decades in working K9 environments most trainers never enter.

That standard is what runs through every session The Luxe delivers.

The Team Behind The Standard:

Matt Slack, Founder & CEO, combines an MBA's business acumen with a lifelong commitment to canine development, leading thousands of families toward better-behaved dogs and smarter pet ownership, in Canada and now across Texas.

Patty Slack, Chief Administrative Officer, once the youngest Canadian to title a dog in the world-class sport of Schutzhund/IGP, Patty now ensures every operational detail of The Luxe runs with the same precision the training itself demands.

Brent, Chief Operating Officer, the operational backbone ensuring excellence at every touchpoint of the client journey.

Elyse, Chief Marketing Officer, a seasoned editor for national television networks, translating five decades of expertise into the trust families feel from the very first interaction.

As an FYI only, "Master Trainer" is not a universally regulated title across the dog training industry, so it can be used more loosely elsewhere, and we always encourage families to look at where a credential actually comes from. What makes our team's expertise complete is pairing those rare, earned distinctions with something equally important: thousands and thousands of hours spent training real family dogs across every breed and behavior challenge, which is where the day-to-day skill of reading and troubleshooting a dog's behavior is truly built.

Together, this team doesn't just train dogs. We elevate families, empower communities, and bring a verified, decades-proven standard to every household we serve.