Best Friends Animal Society Strut Your Mutt Returns to St. Louis

St. Louis —Best Friends Animal Society, a national animal welfare organization dedicated to making the United States No-Kill by 2025, and Chem-Dry, the world’s leading environmentally-friendly carpet and upholstery cleaning service, are teaming up to help local animal rescue groups and shelters raise funds for their lifesaving work.

St. Louis is one of 14 communities nationwide participating in Best Friends Animal Society’s Strut Your Mutt which brings together passionate people to raise money to save the lives of homeless pets. On the day of the event everyone’s fundraising efforts are celebrated with the group dog walk, followed by a fun-filled festival where four- and two-legged participants of all ages can take part in activities like doggie yoga, pet portraits, music, contests and more.

Best Friends® Strut Your Mutt® St. Louis will be held Saturday, Sept. 22, 2018 at Tower Grove Park, 4256 Magnolia Ave, St. Louis, MO 63110, from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. The fundraising goal is $30,000. Last year, 500 people raised more than $40,000 for lifesaving programs, such as spay and neuter services, adoption events and more.

Local resident and Chem-Dry owner, Billy Sparks will be participating at this year’s Strut Your Mutt event. Sparks will have a booth set up to provide pets and families a happy healthy home. Visitors who stop by the booth will be offered up to 10 percent off P.U.R.T (Pet Urine Removal Treatment) services and a free estimate on their homes. Additionally, cans of Chem-Dry’s World Famous Spot Remover will be available for purchase. For more information on participating rescue groups and shelters, festival events, directions to venue, etc. please go to this link.

“We could not be more thrilled to build on our fundraising efforts in our second-year partnership by playing an active role in Best Friend’s Strut Your Mutt Events in Austin and across the country,” said Dan Tarantin, CEO of Harris Research, Inc., parent company to Chem-Dry. “Pets are beloved members of so many families we serve every day. So, finding a way to involve our franchise partners in these community events is a perfect fit for us to continue educating families to create happy and healthy homes for their pets while also encouraging rescue pet adoption.”

Every day in America’s shelters, more than 4,100 dogs and cats are killed, simply because they don’t have safe places to call home. But if we work together, we can reduce that number to zero. Best Friends Strut Your Mutt Austin an important community event to help save animals’ lives.

Julie Castle, CEO of Best Friends Animal Society said: “Best Friends Strut Your Mutt launched in 1996 in Salt Lake City and that first year everything that could go wrong did, but we did not give up. Now Strut Your Mutt is a movement-wide benefit and a primary fundraising platform for hundreds of local rescue groups and shelters around the country – some groups even raise their entire operating budget off this one fundraiser. Best Friends produces the events and invites local organizations to use it as a turnkey fundraiser.”

Nationally the fundraising goal is $2.4 million. Each year, hundreds of partnering organizations participate in Strut Your Mutt to raise money needed to save lives in their own communities. Together in 2017, 300 Best Friends Network partners raised nearly $2 million.

For people interested in saving the lives of homeless pets that don’t live in a city that hosts a live event, there is Strut Your Mutt Day, on October 27, a virtual fundraiser that allows people to raise funds online for Best Friends Animal Society or a participating local animal welfare group in their area. Last year, more than 200 people raised more than $100,000 for lifesaving programs, such as spay and neuter services, adoption events and more.

To get involved, start your own fundraising page or donate to an existing team please visit StrutYourMutt.org.

Special thanks to national sponsors Chem-Dry, BOBS from Skechers, Instinct by Nature’s Variety, and Modern Dog Magazine

About Best Friends Animal Society

Best Friends Animal Society is a leading national animal welfare organization dedicated to ending the killing of dogs and cats in America's shelters. In addition to running lifesaving programs in partnership with more than 2,200 animal welfare groups across the country, Best Friends has regional centers in New York City, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Salt Lake City, and operates the nation's largest no-kill sanctuary for companion animals. Founded in 1984, Best Friends is a pioneer in the no-kill movement and has helped reduce the number of animals killed in shelters nationwide from 17 million per year to about 1.5 million. That means there are still more than 4,100 dogs and cats killed every day in shelters, just because they don’t have safe places to call home. We are determined to get that number to zero by the year 2025. Working collaboratively with shelters, rescue groups, other organizations and you, we will end the killing and Save Them All. For more information, visit bestfriends.org.

To become a fan of Best Friends on Facebook, go to Facebook.com/bestfriendsanimalsociety. Follow Best Friends on Twitter (@BestFriends) and Instagram (@BestFriendsAnimalSociety)

About Chem-Dry

Founded in 1977, Chem-Dry is the world’s leading carpet and upholstery cleaning service with a network spanning 55 countries and serving over 11,000 homes and business a day worldwide. Its green-certified solution and proprietary Hot Carbonating Extraction cleaning process provide a deeper clean, allow surfaces to dry faster, and leave homes and workplaces healthier. In addition to being ranked the number one carpet cleaning franchise by Entrepreneur magazine for 30 consecutive years and ranked among the top 10 concepts in the magazine’s list of Top Home-Based Franchises for 19 consecutive years, Chem-Dry has been ranked as the world’s Best House & Office Franchise in the 2018 Global Franchise Awards. For more information about Chem-Dry and to find a local operator, visit www.chemdry.com, or for more information on franchise opportunities, visit www.chemdryfranchise.com. Chem-Dry is owned by Harris Research, Inc., which is also the founder and owner of the fast-growing N-Hance Wood Refinishing franchise and the owner of Delta Disaster Services, an award-winning property restoration franchise.