What does cat grooming at a salon entail?

It depends on the salon. Certain salons have a lot of experience with cats. If the facility's right, like when there are not many dogs and cats together in kennels, and if it's more like a mobile grooming salon, grooming can be done without any sort of medication or sedation. If cats are groomed routinely as maintenance, only doing it every so often is sufficient. Grooming at our veterinary facility entails a lot of medical grooming on cats, which can be challenging. Across the board, we provide sedation for the cats when they get grooming to make it as comfortable and as safe as possible. We coordinate with our medical and our grooming staff to be able to support that type of professional grooming. That allows us to do a good job, especially with these matted cats, in as safe a manner as possible.

I will throw this out there: I am not a groomer. I just know my knowledge from when I come and pick up my cat from his grooming appointment. But I know they do a thorough brushing, usually with a detangler product, and then they will do a bathing, blow dry, and shave. Your preference and the condition of the coat determine how much shaving is involved. Oftentimes, they'll recommend doing an ear cleaning and trimming of the paw pads. Some places will do brushing for you or have some dental gel that they'll put on for a little added bonus for their grooming. I encourage you to call your cat groomer to see what their procedure is, but that's the gist of what to expect. I know there's probably a lot more out there that I am not a pro on, so I will gladly help steer you toward reputable cat groomers if needed.