On imagery, adoption events and celebrating success

You may have seen this picture already. According to Facebook, nearly 200,000 people have.

But I'm sharing with a bit of commentary.

Last weekend I had the pleasure of presenting at the Best Friends No More Homeless Pets Conference about the s tory of KC Pet Project. 

As a part of my presentation, I featured 11 things that I felt our organization has done very well and has been a big part of our success. Four of them are represented in this photo. 

1) The power of adoption events -- this photo was taken last night, after a 3 day long ASPCA Mega-Match-A-Thon event. During the 3 day weekend, we partnered with two other area shelters. KCPP alone adopted out 228 pets in the matter of 3 days. In total, more than 700 pets found homes in our community. Events create momentum and get animals into homes. Animals in homes saves lives.

2) Getting everyone on the bus -- it's incredible to have an entire team working to save lives. Whether it's asking the morning cleaning crew to come in at 3 am to clean kennels so we can open earlier, or our front lines adoption team, or our veterinary team working overtime to get all animals altered, or our social media/promotions team, everyone has to be involved and be on board with saving lives. This is a big part of our team. But it's definitely not all of them. 

3) Celebrating Success -- People like to support successful organizations, and staff needs to take time to celebrate success. When you adopt out 228 animals in 3 days, that's a cause to take time to celebrate.

4) The power of positive imagery -- people love positive stories. Share them. And share them visually. This picture tells an amazing story -- of a happy (and worn out) staff, of empty kennels, and lives saved. 

It was a good weekend. 

One key that isn't shown in this picture, is the importance of volunteers. Our volunteer group stepped up big time to make sure every adopter had someone working with them, to have great, easy to digest bios on the kennels, and overall just provided a tremendous amount of support for us all weekend. Thank you volunteers. We couldn't do it without you.

Note #1: Remy, the dog in the picture, is actually owned by one of our staff members and was the mascot of our 2012 Mega Match-a-Thon. She came back to visit and celebrate with us. Don't feel sorry for this dog, I guarantee she's spoiled.

Note #2: I have no idea what Matt is doing on top of the kennels. 

Comments

[PitOwnr]

Congratulations on a great job.
It's too bad that those empty cages can't be filled with irresponsible, lazy and abusive pet owners instead of the pets themselves.

[Friends of Newark NJ Animal Shelter]

Congratulations on a great job and well-deserved success. Very inspiring!

[Christine]

Awesome photo and news! Thank you to all the people who helped, AND the public who agree with adopting and saving lives; they are also "on the bus" (if surveys are correct, that's at least 71 percent of the public). No Kill is only possible because of all of you!

[Kathy]

I have run MoKan Border Collie Rescue for 13 years and have pulled dogs from the shelter before KCPP and after. Let me just say you are doing a FABULOUS job. The change is obvious since the leadership changed and the staff you have cares and works so hard. Be very proud of yourselves.

[Brent]

Thank you Kathy. I really appreciate the kind words. It's harder work than I would have imagined, but I'm so glad people like you can tell the difference.

[pitbull friend]

Wow. This is an incredibly beautiful picture! Congrats to all of you!!!

[Dog hero]

Another success for dogs.

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