How to teach door manners for deliveries and guests

Choose a spot the dog can see the door from but cannot reach it: a mat or a cot four to six feet back, out of the swing of the door and off the path of whoever is coming in. A leash, tethered to something solid or held by a second person, so the dog cannot rehearse the bolt while it is learning. A recorded doorbell and knock on your phone, because the real bell is the hardest version.

Treats, small and plentiful, in a jar on a shelf by the door so you never have to leave the spot to pay. A release word, 'break' or 'free', that ends the wait. And a helper, a family member first, then a neighbor, willing to ring, wait and walk away twenty times while you train. Last, a household rule: nobody opens the door until the dog is on the spot, or the dog learns that some people are worth barging.

The visitor is the biggest saboteur. The dog holds the spot beautifully, the guest walks in, and the dog gets a face full of attention when it launches at them, which pays the jump handsomely. Brief every visitor: ignore the dog until it is released and sitting, then greet at the dog's level. The second failure is letting the real doorbell ring fifty times a week while you train the recording twice; the bell keeps meaning chaos.

Put a note over the bell asking couriers to knock softly, or disable the chime for a month. The rest are timing errors: opening the door while the dog is standing, because someone is waiting in the rain; releasing the dog straight into the visitor's legs; sending the dog to the spot as punishment after a bad greeting. Every door opening is a rep, good or bad, and the bad ones count double because the excitement is so high.

Crate and household manners are on the list for the one-week Foundation board and train, and the four-week Dean's List Canine Campus works household manners, neutrality and impulse control on real outings with pick-up and drop-off. Calm & Connected, for adolescents, new rescues and adult dogs, addresses the stranger concerns that make a door hard. In a private session from $94, Gabriella Pope, our Director of Training & Canine Behaviorist, trains at your own door with your own bell.

Hand it over when the dog barks at the door and cannot take food, when it has bolted before and you are managing it with body blocks, when a guest has been knocked down or frightened, or when the greeting includes a growl or a stiff, hackled stare at visitors. Those are arousal and stranger issues that a spot and a sit will not fix alone. Start with the training form; we reply within an hour on business days, and every program is fear- and force-free.