Who would have thought that a former fighting pit bull owned by disgraced NFL football player Michael Vick would end up as a docile darling visiting young schoolchildren?

Thanks to the efforts of our friends at Best Friends Animal Society, former fighters such as Hector have transformed into loving pets. The trainers at the Utah-based Best Friends took this fighter with battle scars scattered about his compact maple-brown body and trained him to love: he is now a gentle therapy dog who visits nursing home and hospital patients. And thanks to you, our loyal customers, Halo was able to donate 43,000 cans of Spot’s Stew to Best Friends to provide the animals at the Best Friends sanctuary with top-quality nutrition.

Hector now lives with a Minnesota family, and he’s appeared at a local elementary school as part of a lesson on compassion and empathy. Says teacher Amber Anderson: “I hope that these children never forget Hector’s story, and that they learn to treat animals and people with compassion; there is a connection between how we treat animals and how we treat people.”

Best Friends Animal Society, the nation’s largest animal sanctuary, wrote about our 43,000 can donation of Halo Spot’s Stew in its newsletter. We’re grateful for the acknowledgement, but were especially thankful for the comments of John Garcia, BFAS DogTown Manager and star of the National Geographic TV show “Dog Town.”

The article explains that, “Best Friends understands the importance of proper nutrition and a balanced diet. That’s why we were so excited about the very generous donation from Halo.”

Then Garcia commented, “Not only do our dogs love Halo Spot’s Stew, the quality of which is absolutely amazing, they find the Liv-a-Littles treats to be so irresistible that we can get them to do just about anything. Liv-a-Littles have made our trainers’ lives a lot easier!”

Thanks so much for the kind words, Best Friends. Most of all, keep up the extraordinary work for animals in need!