The Woman on the Floor
She was 26, three months out of veterinary school, and a woman on her living room floor was crying so hard she couldn't breathe.
Not because her dog was dying. Because of how he was dying.
The emergency clinic had no time for her questions. The euthanasia was clinical, rushed, done on a cold metal table surrounded by other people's emergencies. Her dog was terrified. She was traumatized. And three weeks later, Dani McVety was standing in that same woman's living room, with her dog in his own bed, with a syringe.
That living room visit in Tampa in September 2009 was the first call of what would become Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice — the largest network of veterinarians dedicated entirely to end-of-life care for companion animals in the United States. Today it operates in 37 states with over 400 doctors, serves 13,000 families a month, and generates an estimated $35 million in annual revenue.
McVety built it without a business plan. Without a loan. Without anyone telling her this was a real company.
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The Real Story
Dani McVety grew up in Tampa and spent years volunteering with human hospice patients before she ever applied to vet school. She didn't go into veterinary medicine because she loved animals more than other people. She went in because she had watched what a good death looked like — and what a bad one cost.
"I saw how hospice gave people permission to grieve. I wanted to bring that to the human-animal bond."
She graduated from the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in May 2009. By September of that year, she was working emergency medicine and noticing something: when families came in for end-of-life care, the clinic was too busy to give them what they needed. Time, space, honesty about what was happening. The staff did their jobs with compassion, but the system couldn't slow down.
She started taking house calls. A few at first. Then more.
"People would cry on my shoulder and tell me this was the first time anyone had explained what was actually happening to their dog. Not because other vets didn't care. Because there was no time."
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She didn't quit her ER job. Not right away. Lap of Love was a side gig — something she thought might grow into a small part-time practice.
She brought in Dr. Mary Gardner, her vet school classmate, in 2010. Gardner had a background in computer programming and helped build the software infrastructure that would later allow the business to scale beyond a single doctor. By 2012, they had franchised the model. By 2013, revenue was growing 50% year over year.
The business didn't scale because of marketing. It scaled because word spread. One family told another family. A vet in Arizona called. Then one in Colorado. Everyone had the same story: they had nowhere to send their clients when it was time.
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The Numbers
McVety has never publicly disclosed exact revenue figures. But here's what we know:
- Founded September 2009 — $0 outside capital
- 562% total revenue growth from 2013 to 2017
- Estimated ~$35M annual revenue today (Growjo estimate, 2024)
- January 2020: Cortec Group completed majority recapitalization with McVety and Gardner