Stop the Cycle of Cruelty - Adopt Don't Shop in a Pet Store This Christmas

Photo credit: Frank Schemberger

Today's Christmas Pet Store Puppy is also from the former Petland store in Pewaukee, Wisconsin. Thankfully, this store has now closed. A small independent store took it's place for a few months, but that has also closed.


 This Golden Retriever pup could not lay across the wire floor of his cubicle without scrunching his head on the display glass. He has only a rabbit waterer to drink out of. Conditions that are so unsettling that many consumers might feel compelled to buy this puppy just to get him out of there so he can stretch his legs and feel the ground under his feet.


What happens to the puppies that don't sell? This disturbing thought is often what drives a purchase. But "rescuing" that pet store puppy just allows the vicious cycle to continue, the puppy miller will breed more pups to supply the pet store to sell to well-meaning, but mis-informed consumers.

The cycle has to stop. And although I have no hard evidence, and only anecdotal accounts; I don't think the puppies that don't sell come to the terrible end that most shoppers fear.  They are either discounted until they do sell, or if the store is going to go out of business, a shelter or rescue will step in to take the last remaining pets.

Please, adopt don't shop this Christmas. Let's stop the demand for pet store puppies. Then they will either close (as this store did) or find another, less cruel way to make a profit and stay in business.


Thank you to my friend and Wisconsin Voters For Companion Animals advisor, Frank Schemberger for providing the photos and the details of the Christmas pet store puppies. A series of these photos and writeups are circulating on Facebook and in local Wisconsin on-line publications. Frank has worked tirelessly over the last several years, photographing and exposing the cruel pet store trade in the Midwest.