A Highlands-based cat cafe recently passed a notable milestone: 10,000 adopted cats.
Purrfect Day Cafe founder and “purrprietor” Chuck Patton said it's the first cat cafe in the country to reach that number of adoptions.
He said getting cats and kittens placed with good caretakers is their main goal.
“As hard as we work here, as much as we love the cats, every one of these kitties are going to homes of people in and around the area and around the region,” Patton said.
Kittens 9,999 and 10,000 went home with couple Riley and Allen Truong.
“We were grabbing brunch with her [Riley’s] cousin, and they have cats, and recommended that we come to Purrfect Day, just play with some and get a good experience. And we ended up coming home with two,” Allen said.
Both Riley and Allen said they were unaware how close Purrfect Day was to reaching 10,000 adoptions.
“We had no idea, actually, and our intention was to just get one,” Riley said. “But we thought about it some more, and we wanted to get two, so that they'd have each other, and it so happened to be the 10,000th one.”
The Truongs said the kittens, named Rosie and Stassi, have settled into their new home well.
“We started getting them onto a routine as far as feeding and sleeping and playing,” Riley said. “They love just playing with each other and being together. So I'm glad we ended up going with two and yeah, we just kind of got used to them, and they've gotten used to us.”
Rosie and Stassi are just two of the thousands of cats to come through Purrfect Day Cafe’s door and onto forever homes.
Purrfect Day opened six years ago and quickly became a popular spot for people to hang out and bring new family members home with them. The business has reached an average of 1,700 annual adoptions within its first year.
Patton said the work Purrfect Day has done would not be possible without its partnership with the Kentucky Humane Society.
“The Kentucky Humane Society here is every day, except for Mondays, and they come in here and check up on the kitties,” Patton explained. “The shelters do an amazing job of all of the medical care, the intake. I mean, it just takes a heart of gold to work that job, and they've done all that really well.”
The Kentucky Humane Society gives similar credit back to Purrfect Day for its contrition in finding cats homes.
“By having a partner like Purrfect Day Cafe, we can actually save more cats' lives across all of Kentucky,” said Kentucky Humane Society marketing director Andrea Mattingly. “It's been a huge, huge, huge deal for animal welfare, especially with helping us save cats' lives here in Kentucky
Nearly a week after the 10,000th adoption, Purrfect Day was bustling with people as kitten after kitten found their new home. Counting towards the next 10,000.
