Houston, Texas, USA-based Natural Pawz pet supply and grooming chain celebrated National Pet Day on April 11 by donating 100,000 pounds of dog food to local animal shelters and rescue groups.
The donation purportedly was the largest pet food donation in the city’s history, and was four times larger than the company’s recent annual donations. The donation, valued at US$250,000, will feed 5,000 shelter dogs for six to eight weeks.
The food was donated by Merrick, Nature’s Variety and Petcurean. For every pound of Nature’s Variety purchased, Nature’s Variety donated a pound, with a total donation of 10,000 pounds, which went to the city’s the Rescue Bank National Pet Food Distribution Program.
"Natural Pawz’s generous donation is a huge benefit to the Rescue Bank community in Houston,” said Elizabeth Asher, executive director, Rescue Bank. "Nature's Variety is a great food; receiving 10,000 pounds of puppy food at the height of puppy season will help us support the smaller rescue groups that struggle with resources. In turn, more puppies will be saved from shelters or the streets.”
Natural Pawz warehoused and inventoried all 100,000 pounds of food and delivered 30,000-40,000 pounds to the City of Houston BARC Animal Shelter, 35,000 pounds to the Houston Humane Society, and 10,000 to the Rescue Bank. Twenty other local rescue groups each received 700 pounds of food.
"We really wanted to spread the food out as much as we could to affect as many people as possible,” said Biff Picone, who co-owns 15 Natural Pawz stores. "We wanted to do something that made a statement in Houston and increase awareness and that’s what we think we did.”
