November 2, 2008Comments are closed.attitude, shelter procedure
Price is a signal, a story, a situational decision that is never absolute. It’s just part of what goes into making a decision, no matter what we’re buying.
Seth Godin
I’ve written before about why I think ‘bargain’ rescue pets are a bad idea, but today over at the No Kill Nation blog respected rescuer Sue Cosby has put together three essays on why we should not only allow discounts, but where necessary give pets away for free.
Discounted adoption fees can help dramatically boost attention for the shelter and the animals and help sustain higher rates of lifesaving.
I first read about discounted adoption fees when I saw a small story, years ago, about a little shelter. When they were so overcrowded and were facing a mass killing they decided to do ‘free’ cat adoptions for one weekend.
What happened? They had an empty shelter by the end of the weekend. They were shocked and amazed. They never expected that sort of community support. They had never expected that much interest in their animals and they were relieved that the killing was abated for the time being.
What I’ve discovered is that instead of trying to compete with the breeder or pet store, we are often competing just as much with ‘free’ pets from friends and neighbors.
So what could be bad about such amazingly great results in the face of high kill rates? What’s bad, and why I respectfully disagree with Sue’s take on free pets, is that chasing the ‘FTGH’ market not only limits our operations by making every adoption a complete financial loss, but that free pets aren’t very attractive to the majority of the pet owning public.
People purchase pets for many different reasons, but the type of pet they purchase always comes back to one motivation; their perception of who they think they are.
Most people get a pet free because that’s how they’ve always done it. No amount of pet shop pizazz or purebred promises are going to attract them or change their world view on what pet ownership is about. Pets just aren’t something you pay for.
But here’s the kicker;
Even if you compete directly with these free pet ads and drop your price to $0.00 – you’re still not going to get them to adopt from you. Why? Because you have to see yourself as ‘someone who would own a rescue pet’ before you’ll adopt. And that has nothing to do with price and everything to do with perception of self.
People adopt a rescue because they want to feel good about saving a life. Because the prices are cheaper than pet shops and breeders. Because they’ve had adopted in the past and would like to do so again. Because it’s a trendy thing to do that they can tell their friends about. Because they’ve heard about rescues on the internet and are intrigued. Because their friends have adopted and they’d like to follow suit. And/or because they don’t want to raise a baby pet.
Very, very, very rarely – maybe so rarely as to happen nearly never at all – would the reason be ‘because rescue pets are free’.
So what happens to the ‘pet shop set’ when we give our pets away FTGH?For every FTGH pet purchaser, there a dozen people who can both afford to pay for their pet and who would never consider a free to good home ad. They might adopt from us if we made them our target, told a story that appealed to their world view. Except the story we’ve chosen to tell is that our pets are free! And what does this potential adopter think?
Free? Only faulty things are free. Or common things. Things that nobody wants. I don’t want a free pet – I want a great pet. I’ll just pay for one thanks…
The story you tell about your pets is everything. These people don’t see themselves as someone who would get a pet for ‘free’. Their perception of what it is to be a pet owner includes ‘good things cost more’.
Sure, if you have a giant, media-driven campaign promoting your ‘Free Pet Drive’ you’ll likely empty your shelter. But chances are if you had ANY giant media campaign, based on any promotion or open day you’ll see a surge in adoptions.
However, by offering our pets for free, our rescues fail to make any sort of profit on adoptions and see us out of pocket a couple of hundred of dollar each time we do ‘business’ (at least the cost of desexing). And those other pet owners; the ones who would have happily paid your adoption costs should you have told the right story? They’re completely turned off because you’ve not told a story that’s about their perceptions of themselves.
We shouldn’t be looking to lower our cost – we should be working to increase our value. And we do that by focusing on the huge ancillary benefits of adopting. We need to tell the story that each and every adopter is a hero. We have to sell our rescues as a resource for pet owners, able to offer a personal appraisal and pet matchmaking service. We’re need to emphasise that our pets come temperament tested, vet checked and with a lifetime returns policy.
Sure, making our story about ‘free’ is much simpler, more immediate and takes much less effort. But if we’re truly interested in growing our industry then we have to do away with the crutch that is ‘the free pet’.
