The Blue CrossTailor-made Rehoming Service

Mandy Jones

Head of rehoming services

Review of Blue Cross rehoming services

What do we do well?

What could we do better?

Competitor analysis

How to ensure people choose a Blue Cross pet?

What we do well

High standard of animal care

Successful matching

Low return rate D 9% C 2%

Short length of stay D 31 days C38 days

98% positive rehomer feedback

What we could do better

“if they want a pet enough, they have to fit around how we do things here“Minimum 3 visits to rehome a dog

Compulsory home check

70% of animals to adult only homes

Multiple restrictions in profiles – children, other pets, time left alone etc…

Too many people leaving without an animal

Competitor analysis

www is an easy source of pets

Consumer culture creates expectation of “quick fix”

If we make it too difficult, people will go elsewhere – this doesn’t make them bad owners!

Creates a market for puppy farmers disreputable breeders

Competitor analysis

Types of dogs admitted

Trend for fashion

cross breeds

becoming evident in

centres

Also trend for Husky

and similar types in

centres

SBT & “types” remain

over-represented

Tailor-made rehoming

Make it easy for people to choose a rescue pet

Treat animals and people as individuals

No standard rehoming criteria or rules

All restrictions based on objective assessments

All potential homes open to individual discussion

Brandy & James

Animals are only half of

rehoming

People of equal importance to animals

Positive animal profiles and high standard of customer care

Children should learn rescue is a good choice

No routine home checks but time to find the right match

Riley & Steve

Home Direct

New to BX, but not new to breed rescue!

Rehome without admission to centre

BX assessment and matching standards maintained

No kennel stress

Lower cost rehoming

Now in 2nd year and over 100 rehomes, all species

Additional space for “poundies” and other welfare work

HD animals all neutered, vaccinated, wormed, chipped etc….no different to centre rehoming

Fostering Services

3 new full time regional

fostering managers

Respite foster carers

Creates alternatives for

animals not suited to

centre life

Link to Home Direct

Sammy & Jane..…and 7

puppies!

Working homes

Good option for

suitable dogs

Research

organisation before

sending dogs

Assistance, medical

alert, any suitable

environment

Border control dog

Sam

Working homes

Not just Labs &

Springers

Medical alert dogs

can be trained to alert

owners of seizures &

other conditions

Tiny is training as a

diabetes alert dog

Follow up

Blue Cross Behaviour Services

Individual staff telephone calls

Customer feedback monitoring

www.rescuereview.co.uk

Life Skills for Dogs

Outcomes 2011

Dog length of stay reduced by 5 days

Cat length of stay reduced by 3 days

Dog return rates reduced by 2%

Cat return rates reduced by 1%

Throughputs increased by 6%

(over 300 additional animals rehomed)

March 2012 dogs rehomed up 14%

Blue Cross and The Kennel Club

Close relationship with PetlogWork with breed rescue with less common breeds and some specific casesHave supported breed rescue with taking in dogs, not just transferring outApprox 39% of dog admissions appear to be pure breed (although very few come in with pedigrees)

Tailor-made rehoming service