News April 2011

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Big Publicity for Your Cat Adoption Events with a Side of Kitty Litter
Food Bank Program Feeds into Spay/Neuter Voucher Program
93 Shelters Want Your Vote
God Help the Ones That Purr
iMARC - the Ultimate Pet Tag Engraver

Big Publicity for Your Cat Adoption Events with a Side of Kitty Litter
Has your agency tried free pet adoption events yet? Recent published research from the ASPCA has demonstrated that waiving the fees on cat adoptions results in:

• Decreased length of stay during the fee-waived promotion
• Increased adoptions
• No impact on total revenue

Many shelters have been conducting fee-waived adoption promotions with great success. And this success can be yours as well – with two added perks. Conduct a fee-waived adoption campaign this June, for Adopt-a-Shelter-Cat Month, and you could receive national media attention courtesy of Fresh Step® and the ASPCA, not to mention valuable coupons for Fresh Step kitty litter. To participate:

• Register your feline promotion by May 1 to get your campaign national coverage including:
  • promotion on both Fresh Step and the ASPCA's Facebook pages
  • listing on a map of fee-waived adoption events on aspca.org (which receives 1.47 million visitors every month)
  • mention in email alerts to the ASPCA's 1.8 million members
• In July, share your fee-waived story with the ASPCA. The first 50 shelters to submit qualifying fee-waived adoption events will receive coupons for $500 worth of Fresh Step kitty litter.

Learn more about conducting fee-waived events, including tips and profiles of successful campaigns.

Food Bank Program Feeds into Spay/Neuter Voucher Program
Helotes Humane Society (HHS) in Helotes, TX, operates a successful pet food bank that serves low income families in Bexar County. The animals who benefit from the food bank are required to be neutered, but many of the clients cannot afford the S/N surgery. The ASPCA Grants Program awarded HHS $1,500 to offer screened food bank clients spay/neuter vouchers to be used at local low-cost clinics. The ASPCA funds were added to a grant from the San Antonio Area Foundation since this project is part of a larger San Antonio-area initiative to conduct 1,000 spay/neuter surgeries by 2012. HHS partnered with Hill Country Animal League and, to date, the vouchers have been used for 327 free surgeries, including 91 pets owned by local college students.

Thinking about starting a voucher program or even linking your pet food bank with vouchers? HHS suggests:

• Budget for transportation, increased phone expenses, staff time, and program marketing.
• If possible, dedicate one staff member or volunteer to manage the voucher program.

Additional resources:

• Download this form to make the pet food bank donation ask easier.
• Review the voucher program run by Capital Area Humane Society (Columbus, OH)
• Learn how to submit a grant application to the ASPCA Grants Program.

Join the action and let your voice be heard. The fifty agencies with the most online votes will be the contestants in the $100K Challenge. Pick your favorite shelter of the 93 contenders and help vote them into the Challenge. Vote once every day through midnight ET, April 15, at www.votetosavelives.org.

God Help the Ones That Purr
Jacksonville, FL's Feral Freedom program is a "return-to-the-field" model. Semi- or un-socialized cats who appear to be thriving outside – and who are not under immediate threat of harm – are spayed or neutered and returned to where they came from. Could a Feral Freedom program assist cats in your community? Learn More>>

iMARC – the Ultimate Pet Tag Engraver
Our thanks and sincere appreciation go out to iMARC for their very generous donation of an iMARC Pet Tag Engraver plus 300 tags for our use at the HSUS Animal Expo. Stop by the ASPCA booth to learn more about our ID ME research, get your own personalized tag, and submit an application to take the tagging machine home to your shelter! Discover iMARC at imarcengravers.com.