“Our customers are awesome,” the thirft store manager said. “And we just want to say thanks for everything.”
PANAMA CITY – Giving back to the community, the Humane Society of Bay County opened its doors Saturday with free food, puppies, kittens and a variety of children’s activities to say thanks.
For the third year, the Humane Society Thrift Store, 1408 Harrison Avenue, held its annual customer appreciation day Saturday. Dozens of visitors stopped by for food, a variety games or to shop for various thrift store items.
All of the proceeds generated by the store go toward the Humane Society, known as the “Igloo” at 1600 Bay Avenue, which is Bay County’s only no-kill animal shelter.
As volunteers handed out hotdogs, children jumped around in a bounce house and Humane Society staffers signed up potential pet adopters, manager of the thrift store Brenda Leader said the event wasn’t specifically meant to raise funds for the non-profit shelter’s operations.
“Our customers are awesome,” she said. “And we just want to say thanks for everything.”
One example Leader gave of the community support the Humane Society has received was in the wake of a recent tragedy. One of their employees, Todd “Clint” Scheiderer, died in February after a car wreck while driving home from work. In the wake of the fatal crash, students from Bay Haven Charter Academy reached out to create an area on the Humane Society’s property called “Clint’s Corner,” where employees can take breaks from work.
While he was alive, Scheiderer devoted endless hours, on and off the clock, to taking care of the animals, the shelter and staff. Leader said Scheiderer supported the shelter because it gives the community a place to surrender animals they can either no longer care for their pet — for health or financial reasons — or they are in a situation where they cannot keep their pet.
“Even when people in the military get orders to go overseas, they have a lengthy process to get their pet to go with them and they don’t want to see it go to a kill shelter,” Leader said. “They either have to go through that process, find someone to take their pet or bring them to us. And we have a lot of active military in our community.”
Among the activities for Saturday’s customer appreciation, visitors could participate in raffles, “Chinese auctions” or get free nail clipping for their pets.
Leader said the Humane Society will also be hosting a free shot clinic on June 9. Pet owners can get the standard shots for their pets as well as a rabies vaccine, which generally isn’t offered at other shot clinic events.
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