National nonprofit Petco Love and Charleston Animal Society are encouraging pet lovers across the Lowcountry to be good neighbors and help lost and found pets in their neighborhood be reunited with the families that love them.
National Good Neighbor Day on September 28th is a holiday which engages neighborhood goodwill and encourages a sense of community. Some ways to be a good neighbor include: keeping an eye out for pets who might be missing from home, and uploading a photo of a lost pet in the Charleston area to Love Lost. Love Lost is a national lost and found pet database which uses image-recognition technology to help families reunite with their missing pets via one photo, and its free and easy to use.
If neighbors in the Lowcountry find a lost cat or dog, they can upload a photo to Love Lost to make the cat or dog visible to pet parents searching for their lost pet. They can also search “lost pets” on Love Lost to see if the pet parent has uploaded the pet’s image and information. Good neighbors can even create social media posts via Love Lost, which help reunite pets across multiple platforms including the Ring/Neighbors app, Nextdoor, and Facebook.
To celebrate National Good Neighbor Day, Petco Love releases Pawparazzi, the third animated short series in its MY RUFF DAY campaign (You can watch the short here). Pawparazzi features a feline influencer, Lily, who accidentally goes missing from home. The story follows her journey trying to get home, told from her point of view. Luckily a good neighbor, a woman who sees Lily terrified in an alley close to home, goes on Love Lost and clicks on the “I found a lost pet” tab. She uploads a picture she took of Lily and is matched with Lily’s mom and is able to reunite them.
"We encourage pet parents to talk with their neighbors in their community if their pet goes missing or if they find a lost pet, because so many missing pets are found within miles of their home," said Christina Ellwood, Charleston Animal Society Director of the Animal Resource Center, CAWA. "We also want our community to use Love Lost. There's nothing more rewarding than reuniting families with their beloved pets. We're confident Love Lost can lead to many more happy reunions."
Love Lost has reunited nearly 60,000 pet parents across the U.S. with their best friends who went missing. “Our mission is to reunite all lost pets, like Lily, with the families that love them as quickly as possible,” said Petco Love President Susanne Kogut. “We urge pet parents to register their pet on Love Lost today, in case the unthinkable happens, and their pet goes missing tomorrow. Together, we can Unite to Reunite, and help pets, pet families, and shelters all over the country.”
Register your safe-at-home pets in the free Love Lost database here. Love Lost can help people in almost any language, and it provides privacy for those who use it. Other ways you can help when you find a lost pet are checking for tags on the pet’s collar to look for contact information. If there are no tags, take them to a Petco, vet, or shelter like Charleston Animal Society to scan for a microchip. You can also call your local animal shelter and vet’s office and report that you’ve found a lost cat or dog.
You can even be prepared to help lost pets get home quickly in your neighborhood by creating a “found pet kit.” Click here for more tips on what to do if you find a lost cat or dog. Join the conversation @PetcoLoveLost on Facebook, Instagram and X. Together with pet parents, good neighbors, and partner animal shelters, let's Unite to Reunite and help keep pets where they belong -- at home, with you.
