Saturday, September 11, 2010

Disappointed

I had to hit PetSmart today to get some cat litter. I was hoping to avoid it since it's the big Pet Adoption Event, but the CatFather made it clear that if I didn't get some fresh litter soon he had ways of making me regret it. You'd think that after being rescued from being tossed out in the street in a box that he'd be happy having unlimited food, water, litter and a daily hour of Judge Judy in return for holding down the couch. Not him. He demands, I do. He's got a Sicilian code of honor.
But I digress...
The dogs were set up in cages by the entrance, so you couldn't go in the store without passing them. I checked out the info, it had the name of a rescue on the holders of the cages, and a few of the dogs were from the local kill shelter. Good thing. I spoke to the woman for a few minutes and she was pleasant enough. I went into the store where the cats are kept. There was nobody there with the cats.
Other than the breed(s) of the dogs, there was very little information. Nothing about age, gender, temperament, any training, nothing. There was no information being handed out about the rescue itself.
A major fail in my opinion.
I've slaved volunteered for a rescue for many years. I've either sweated through my clothes or froze my ass off at events like these to put the word out about our rescue. You need to have information available to anyone who even glances your way. Anybody who said a word to me got a flier. I've never gone to an interview or speaking engagement without some kind of printed information to pass out to my listeners.
Small local rescues operate on a shoestring, are usually one person (mostly woman) operations. After the animals in their care are fed and vetted, there's little else left to spend on getting the word out publicly. Free publicity in any form is a godsend to these rescues. To be able to set up in a pet store with a ton of weekend traffic (and all pet people too!), with a campaign that is nationally advertised is a dream come true to many rescues. To be so poorly prepared and lack information to give out about your rescue is a travesty.
To have nobody there representing the cats was even worse.
I'm hoping the events at other PetSmart stores were better than this one.

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