Best Friends Animal Society’s Strut Your Mutt Returns to Phoenix

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.

Phoenix is one of 12 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® Phoenix will be held October 19 at Cesar Chavez Park from 9 a.m. to noon. The fundraising goal is $80,000. Registration starts at 9a.m., walk begins at 10 a.m. and event ends at noon.

Dr. Chem-Dry Carpet & Tile Cleaning, owned by Jorel Cook, will be participating in Strut Your Mutt for the third year in a row. The local business will be hosting a table at the Strut Your Mutt event, offering pet giveaways like frisbees, bandanas, cans of the Chem-Dry’s World Famous Spot Remover, and giving one lucky winner a free carpet cleaning service. For more information on participating rescue groups and shelters, festival events, directions to venue, etc. please go to https://support.bestfriends.org/site/TR/General?pg=informational&fr_id=1450&type=fr_informational&sid=1010.

“We could not be more thrilled to build on our fundraising efforts in the third year of our partnership with Best Friends by playing an active role in their Strut Your Mutt Events in Phoenix and across the country,” said Dan Tarantin, CEO of HRI, 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 about how 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 Phoenix is 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 like Chem-Dry participate in Strut Your Mutt to raise money needed to save the lives of shelter pets in their own communities.

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

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 over 55 countries and serving 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 31 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.