Halo calls itself “America’s Best-Loved Holistic Pet Food” and I can assure you that is doubly true in the cities and towns where the Dog Film Festival traveled this past year! In those destinations, Halo gave 10,000 bowls of pet food to the shelter that was our partner and beneficiary in that location, through Halo’s partnership with Freekibble.com and the GreaterGood.org.
Halo was a Founding Sponsor of the Dog Film Festival when it debuted a year ago, in October 2015 – when it was only my crazy dream to celebrate the love between dogs and their people, while benefiting the animal welfare organizations that bring them together. It was an idea that Halo understood instantly and wanted to help build: in addition, they wanted to give 10,000 bowls of their holistic pet food to whichever group was getting 50% of our ticket sales.
When the Festival first traveled to Los Angeles back in June of 2015, Halo actually gave 10,000 bowls of food to both of the animal welfare groups that benefited from the Festival ticket sales: the Lange Foundation in West Los Angeles and Downtown Dog Rescue – which assists the pets of the homeless on Skid Row.
Seattle Humane received 10,000 bowls, as did Lollypop Farm in Rochester, NY, the Berkshire Humane Society, the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons and, in Chicago, PAWS offered the food to one of their partner shelters that needed it more. San Diego Humane Society and Front Street Shelter in Sacramento both made good use of the premium pet food.
In New York City, our beneficiary was the Mayor’s Alliance for NYC’s Animals, which services 150 rescue groups. They had to choose one of their welfare partners that could actually take delivery of such a vast quantity of food and it turned out that Posh Pets (which had volunteers on the sidewalk in front of the theater in NYC with adoptable dogs) has a hospice sanctuary where they had enough storage capacity.
Here’s the translation of “10,000 bowls” of food:
If the shelter wanted a mix of dog and cat food, then it was calculated roughly 5:1, which meant 10K bowls is about 2,000 lbs. of pet food! If the shelter needed only dog food, 10K bowls was equal to 2,500 lbs. of Halo’s food, which my dogs have been enjoying all their lives!
Tracie began her career as a radio personality with a live show – DOG TALK® (and Kitties, Too!) – on the local NPR station in the Hamptons, Peconic Public Broadcasting (WPPB) from Southampton, New York (the show is now also carried on the NPR station Robinhood Radio in Connecticut and the Berkshires). DOG TALK® won a Gracie® Award (the radio equivalent of an Oscar) in 2010 as the “Best entertainment and information program on local public radio” and continues weekly after more than 450 continuous shows and 9 years on the air. Tracie’s live weekly call-in show CAT CHAT® was on SiriusXM satellite radio for seven years until the Martha Stewart channel was canceled in 2013.
Tracie lives in Vermont where the Radio Pet Lady Network studio is based, on 13 acres well-used by her all-girl pack – two lovely, lively Weimaraners, Maisie and Wanda, and a Collie-mix, Jazzy.