PHOENIX--(BUSINESS WIRE)--PetSmart, PetSmart Charities and thousands of animal welfare partners across the U.S. and Canada will have lots of love in store this February. From February 16 – 18, adorable, adoptable pets will be featured in nearly all PetSmart’s 1,600 plus stores in the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico for the first National Adoption Weekend of 2018. PetSmart Charities and its adoption partners hope to find forever homes for more than 25,000 pets during the event.
“Watching a family fall in love with the perfect pet is one of the most heart-warming things you’ll see,” says David Haworth, DVM, Ph.D., and president of PetSmart Charities. “And while adopters are most certainly saving and enhancing the lives of shelter pets, the human-animal bond is a mutually beneficial relationship. Recent research shows that pets bring their fair share of benefits to the lives of their new pet parents, too.”
A 2017 survey commissioned by PetSmart Charities and conducted by Wakefield Research found ninety-three percent of pet parents said they had experienced at least one health benefit from their pet. The benefits range from increased physical activity and weight loss to improved mood and decreased stress. The same survey showed when respondents were asked who would be more helpful to them when facing a difficult time in their lives, their pet or a therapist, seventy-nine percent of respondents selected their pet.
The Simatos family in North Michigan would most certainly agree. In January 2018, they adopted a dog named Sophie from the Humane Society of West Michigan, which is one of PetSmart Charities’ adoption partners. Sophie was unique in that she was the first dog the local Humane Society had seen with a cleft lip and palate. While some may have thought her cleft lip and palate would make Sophie harder to adopt, to Alicia Simatos and her young family, it only made her more perfect.
“As soon as we saw Sophie, we instantly fell in love with her. We have a young son, MJ, who was born with a cleft lip and palate…just like Sophie. From Sophie’s gentle disposition and their shared experience, we knew that she and our son would be kindred spirits. We can’t express the amount of comfort and unconditional love she has brought to our lives, and how much confidence she has given our son,” said Simatos. “Sophie reminds us all of what love truly means.”
Sophie’s ability to bring smiles to just about everyone she meets has earned her a new position as the office therapy dog at the Cleft Lip & Palate Foundation of Smiles in Michigan.
Bring Love Home this National Adoption Weekend
Shelter pets of all ages, types and sizes will be looking for love and hoping to find their forever home at PetSmart Charities’ February National Adoption Weekend. From February 16 – 18, more than 3,500 animal welfare organizations will bring adoptable pets into nearly all of PetSmart’s 1,600-plus stores in the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico with the goal of finding homes for more than 25,000 pets during the weekend adoption event.
Looking for A Different Way to Show Your Love of Pets?
Every PetSmart store will be collecting pet food donations at the check-out that will be provided to local shelters and PetSmart Charities’ adoption partners following National Adoption Weekend. So even if you’re not ready to adopt a pet, you can still help a pet in need.
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National Adoption Weekend Details: |
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Date: |
Friday, February 16 – Sunday, February 18, 2018 | |||
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Time: |
Friday and Saturday: 9 a.m. – 9 p.m. and Sunday: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. local time | |||
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Location: |
Nearly every PetSmart store across the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico. | |||
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Visit www.petsmart.com to find a store near you. |
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A Free Gift for Those Who Adopt:
Regardless of which type of pet you choose to adopt, or where you adopted, PetSmart offers a free Adoption Kit* that provides important content that helps to integrate a new pet into the family. Click here for more information about PetSmart’s Free Adoption Kit. *Adoption papers are required.
About PetSmart®
PetSmart, Inc. is the largest specialty pet retailer of services and solutions for the lifetime needs of pets. At PetSmart, we love pets, and we believe pets make us better people. Every day with every connection, PetSmart’s passionate associates help bring pet parents closer to their pets so they, together, can live more fulfilled lives. This vision impacts everything we do for our customers, the way we support our associates and how we give back to our communities. We employ approximately 55,000 associates, operate 1,600 pet stores in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico, as well as more than 200 in-store PetSmart® PetsHotel® dog and cat boarding facilities. PetSmart provides a broad range of competitively priced pet food and products, as well as pet-focused services such as dog training, pet grooming, pet boarding, PetSmart™ Doggie Day Camp™ and pet adoption. PetSmart, together with non-profits PetSmart Charities® and PetSmart Charities® of Canada, invite more than 3,500 animal welfare organizations to bring adoptable pets into stores so they have the best chance possible of finding a forever home. Through this in-store adoption program and other signature events, PetSmart has facilitated more than 7.6 million adoptions – more than any other brick-and-mortar organization. The company’s portfolio of digital resources for pet parents includes PetSmart.com, petMD.com, Pawculture.com, AllPaws, an online pet adoption platform that helps potential pet parents find the perfect pet to adopt based on their home, family and lifestyle, as well as BlogPaws, the world’s first pet blogger and influencer network. Through these digital platforms, PetSmart offers the most comprehensive online pet supplies and pet care information in the U.S. In celebration of its 30th anniversary, PetSmart launched its Buy a Bag, Give a Meal™ program in March 2017. For every bag of cat or dog food purchased March 1 – Dec. 31, 2017, PetSmart donated a meal to pets in need and beat its goal of 60 million meals with more than 63 million meals generated through this leading philanthropic program. In May 2017, PetSmart acquired Chewy.com, a leading online retailer of pet food and products in the U.S., which operates as an independent subsidiary.
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About PetSmart Charities®
PetSmart Charities, Inc. is a nonprofit animal welfare organization with a mission to find lifelong, loving homes for all pets by supporting programs and thought leadership that bring people and pets together. In addition to finding homes for almost 500,000 shelter pets each year through its in-store adoption program in all PetSmart stores across the U.S. and Puerto Rico, PetSmart Charities provides funding to non-profits aligned with its mission through four key areas of grant support: Preventing Pet Homelessness; Helping Shelter Pets Thrive; Supporting the Bond Between People and Pets; and Emergency Relief and Disaster Support. Each year, millions of generous PetSmart shoppers help pets in need by donating to PetSmart Charities using the pin pads at checkout registers inside PetSmart stores. In turn, PetSmart Charities efficiently uses 90 cents of every dollar donated and has become the leading funder of animal welfare in North America, donating about $300 million to date. PetSmart Charities, a 501(c)(3) organization, has received the Four Star Rating from Charity Navigator, an independent organization that reports on the effectiveness, accountability and transparency of nonprofits, for the past 14 years in a row – placing it among the top one percent of charities rated by this organization. To learn more visit www.petsmartcharities.org.
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About PetSmart Charities® of Canada:
PetSmart Charities of Canada is a registered Canadian charity with a mission to find lifelong, loving homes for all pets by supporting programs and thought leadership that bring people and pets together. In addition to finding homes for more than 25,000 shelter pets each year through its in-store adoption program in all PetSmart stores, PetSmart Charities of Canada provides funding to registered charities aligned with its mission through four key areas of grant support: Preventing Pet Homelessness; Helping Shelter Pets Thrive; Supporting the Bond Between People and Pets; and Emergency Relief and Disaster Support. Each year, millions of generous PetSmart shoppers help pets in need by donating to PetSmart Charities of Canada using the pin pads at checkout registers inside PetSmart stores. In turn, PetSmart Charities efficiently uses 89 cents of every dollar donated and has become a leading funder of animal welfare in Canada, donating nearly $12 million to date. PetSmart Charities of Canada is a member of Imagine Canada and is independent from PetSmart, Inc. To learn more, visit www.petsmartcharities.ca.
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