You’ve probably heard about the bill being passed by the State of New York that bans pet stores from selling puppies, so I thought I’d offer my perspective and clear up some confusion because people have been asking questions.
They’re calling it The Puppy Mill Pipeline bill and the idea is a good one: get rid of puppy mills. As an animal lover I couldn’t agree more. The problem is this bill does nothing to affect puppy mills. You would think that would be a pretty important part. Instead, they are banning the sale of puppies at retail pet stores, thinking that puppy mills will just throw up their arms, sigh, and close down. Obviously, that is not going to happen. They will continue selling puppies online through various websites. In fact, closing stores like Allie’s will drive everyone who wants a puppy online into the arms of scammers and puppy mills. I’ve looked at those websites and I can’t tell the difference between a legitimate breeder and a scammer, so I don’t see how anyone else can. What the scammers do is steal pictures and videos from legitimate breeders and advertise them as their own, then take deposits from unsuspecting people for a puppy that doesn’t exist. Every week people come into the store and tell us how they got scammed. Please don’t send money to strangers online.
I have the option of having puppies delivered to our door from out of state. Every year I get a call from one of those organizations and every year I turn them down. Instead, we drive in snowstorms, rainstorms, and every other inclement NY weather condition to pick up puppies from breeders we’ve worked with for years, so we can see where they come from with our own eyes, but this doesn’t matter to the politicians and animal extremists. They want to shut everyone down, and throw the baby out with the bathwater. It isn’t fair that we are getting caught up in this very corrupt law funded by animal extremists trying to monopolize the market by forcing everyone who wants a dog to adopt a rescue from a shelter. And while I admire people who adopt rescues with the highest regard, it’s not the right decision for everyone. People should be allowed to choose what is best for their situation.
Every group of people has good actors and bad ones, including politicians. There are certainly pet stores and breeders who don’t take good care of their puppies, but we aren’t one of them. We could not be more incentivized to find the happiest, healthiest puppies from the best breeders, and we could not do a better job taking care of them, and our customers. The transition to a new environment can be very stressful for a puppy. Sometimes it leads to loose stool or an upset stomach that causes them to puke or not eat or drink. Over the last four years, we’ve helped puppies having a transitional issue many times. We do the same protocol every single time and it always works. The only time it didn’t work I knew something else was going on. While we typically have people come to the store, there have been times when I drove to people’s houses on hot summer Sundays, or met people at the store at 7am, or a dozen other examples of going above and beyond to ensure you have a good experience. We stand behind our health guarantee and are here to help in any way we can. We even give out a 24hr phone number, so our customers can call us after hours, and we do our best to encourage people to call us immediately because if you don’t it can lead to problems.
Our breeders are inspected by the USDA, visited weekly by licensed veterinarians, and if they have a retail license, they’re also inspected by the State. Do you know how many senators and assembly members came out and toured our NY kennels before passing this bill? Zero. If they sincerely wanted to cut off the puppy mill pipeline they would ban puppies crossing state lines for the purpose of resale, and focus on refining and improving our NYS breeding standards to the highest degree as an example for other states to follow. Instead, they are banning all pet stores from selling puppies and forcing people online into the arms of scammers and the very puppy mills they are “trying” to stop. This law is the product of everything that’s wrong with our political system and it’s a reflection of the ideological extremism that divides our culture when what we need is pragmatic balance. I can’t help but think “someone” is securing himself a board seat at the nonprofit this law benefits the most after he’s out of office.
The good news is Allie’s will be able to be an independent marketing and delivery service for our favorite NY breeders, so we can continue to provide our upstate NY community with safe access to puppies of the highest quality from local people you can trust. Until the law goes into effect, we will operate as usual in Marketplace Mall where we take excellent care of our puppies and customers.
We will always be here for you, striving to embrace safe, responsible breeding while also encouraging those who want to adopt a rescue, and, most importantly, taking excellent care of you and the puppies.
Stop in anytime! We’ll see you soon!