Petland: Making Life Better (for its Shareholders)

The international pet store corporation Petland is making several animal welfare groups snarl at the company's alleged sale of puppy mill puppies. Though their corporate slogan is "Petland Pets Make Life Better!" the animal lover and the taxpayer alike should ask themselves if they can tolerate this misleading, corporate PR.

For the past two weekends, local groups Spay Austin Coalition, Best Friends Animal Society Network, Action for Animals, and animal rescue supporters teamed up to protest the opening of a new Petland store. This campaign is part of a national front to urge consumers not to buy pets or pet supplies from any Petland stores. They claim Petland buys its puppies from large-scale puppy mill operations, where breeding dogs spend their entire lives in filthy cages. In addition,

Puppies are routinely shipped overland by truck or by air as cargo, often traveling hundreds of miles to pet shops across the country. Injuries and fatalities en route to pet stores are common and deplorable, yet they pale in comparison to the conditions their parents endure until their death at the mills. The euthanasia of millions of animals at shelters due to a lack of adoptive families compounds the tragedy of mill animals enduring a miserable existence to satiate the demand for their offspring.

They also report that a major supplier of Petland puppies, Do-Bo-Tri Kennels, has been repeatedly charged with violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act.

Why is this store still in business?!

According to store website, Petland currently has 140 stores in the U.S. and 63 in foreign markets, and growing. FixAustin says the city shelter euthanized around 5000 animals in 2005, about a 50% kill rate.

Julia Hilder, President of the Spay Austin Coalition had this to say.

As part of their PR ploy, Petland stores team up with local animal shelter programs, placing homeless pets. They claim to have placed over 100,000 pets over the last four years. But they only sell puppies and kittens, which means they are obviously more concerned with profit. They must have figured out that consumers go ga-ga over small animals. But if they were really "an avid proponent" of spaying and neutering as they falsely claim, they would require all stores to spay and neuter their pets before they sell them, not SOME of them. Instead of putting up informational posters in their stores about s/n, they would actually tell consumers to adopt from their local shelters instead.

But that would be too honest.

The Town Lake Animal Shelter, and other local shelters, should have seen through this corporate PR, but instead, you have small nonprofit groups educating the public about why puppy mills are wrong, why Petland is ruining efforts to adopt homeless animals, and why you as a taxpayer shouldn't stand for it. Travis County taxpayers spend close to $6 million a year to manage the surplus pet population according to AHS Ferals.

But since many cities haven't figured out an effective way to control pet overpopulation, small feral "trapping" groups will take the initiative to address overpopulation in their residential areas. At last weekend's Petland demonstration, I was fortunate to meet and chat with Sister Dawn, a Franciscan nun in the Orthodox Catholic Church who rescues (and spays/neuters) feral cats in her area. She told me that her religious order teaches stewardship for the environment "including caring for all God's homeless creatures--human and animal."

I think that's a great lesson for all of us. But whatever guides your beliefs, please don't support chains like Petland. Instead, shop at stores that support animal rescue (in practice).