Lort Smith and Pets @ Home join forces to save pets!

Letter from the Lort Smith Animal Hospital...

As a leading animal welfare organisation, we have been concerned by how little things seem to have changed despite years of campaigning with regard to the selling of animals in pet shops and the associated animal welfare problems. After much debate and discussion, we decided the best way to bring about change would be to work with a leading player in the industry and chose Australia's first ever pet care department store, Pets at Home. From the UK and one the leading pet care retailers in the world, they had already began to address some of these issues, but were looking for help and guidance on how to take this even further.

Our work together over the last few months has produced a number of "Australian first initiatives". One of our first major announcements is that Pets at Home has agreed that they will no longer sell ANY cats, dogs, kittens or puppies in their existing flagship Narre Warren store or in ANY of their planned new stores Australia wide. Even more importantly, Pets at Home has decided to STOP kitten and puppy sales well before the Christmas period. They recognise this is the worst time of the year for impulse buying, with even more animals at risk of needing to be re-homed in the New Year once the novelty has worn off.

The significant part of this announcement is that we will be jointly launching the first Lort Smith Animal Adoption Centre, in mid to late January at Pets at Home's Narre Warren store. Lort Smith Animal Adoption Centres will then open in all Pets at Home stores making it possible for us to reach hundreds more potential adopters for our animals than we could ever possibly hope to reach from our North Melbourne shelter.

The Adoption Centres will be staffed and run in exactly the same way as the Lort Smith on-site shelters at the Hospital, with all animals vet-checked, wormed, desexed, microchipped, vaccinated and subject to the Lort Smith standard 28 day health guarantee. All animals for re-homing remain under the care of Lort Smith until adopted and it is important to note that Pets at Home will not and have no intention of making a single dollar from the Adoption Centres.

We are very excited by the potential industry changes we hope to catalyse over the next three years and hope you will join us in making this unique partnership a great success. ... Further details on the Lort Smith Animal Hospital, Pets at Home partnership can be found on our website www.lortsmith.com or call Jill Gustave, Development Office on 03 9321 7214.

Reference: www.lortsmith.com

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