By Nancy E. Hassel, LIPetPlace.com

What happens when you combine the talent of a local Long Island Pet Professional and an award winning no-kill animal shelter?  The world gets a revolutionary new way to meet pets that are up for adoption, live right on your computer! Introducing AnimalRoulette.com. AnimalRoulette.com is an incredible new technology that is going to put a new spin on pet adoptions – and transform the way potential adopters can search for pets.  Being launched to go live at Kent Animal Shelter in Calverton, NY this Saturday, July 17th from 1 to 4pm – this new site, the first of its kind in the pet world was designed by Michael Ayalon, CEO of PetWebDesigner.com.

The buzz about this amazing new website has already attracted the media attention from ABC NY News, News 12, Newsday, PetSide.com, Farmingdale Observer, Levittown Tribune, Babylon Beacon and many more.  Ayalon was thinking of a way to use this type of technology to help more animals get adopted, virtually if you will.  After six months of development, Ayalon was ready to a launch the website and happened to meet Pam Green the Director of Kent Animal Shelter at a recent Long Island Pet Professionals networking meeting.  Green was on board and said, “We are always looking for new ways to expand the number of pets adopted, so it makes sense to offer people looking to adopt a pet more than just a photo. They should be able to see the pet’s disposition live in order to determine if the pet would make a good addition to their family. AnimalRoulette.com gives us that ability.”

With technology taking us places we have never before been, why not let it take us to your local animal shelter, or one across state?  This technology enables potential adopters to view animals waiting for that furever home in a live meet and greet video chat online.  Viewers on AnimalRoulette.com just need a webcam and audio hooked up to their computer so they can interact with shelter staff and talk to them about the pet that particular shelter is showing.  If the potential adopter is not really interested in that pet, then they can simply hit “next” and it will bring them to another randomly selected pet in a different live video chat room, hence the “roulette” in the name.  This Saturday, all the pets that will be debuted on AnimalRoulette.com will be pets currently available for adoption at Kent Animal Shelter.  So if you live in NYC and cannot physically get to Kent on Saturday and you want to see how a pet is, presents itself, interacts with shelter staff, other animals, you can do so from the comfort of home on your computer.  All adoptions will go through normal adoption procedures through Kent if you do decide you really want to adopt one of their pets you meet while on AnimalRoulette.com, you can simply fill their an online adoption form on Kent’s website, www.kentanimalshelter.com.  

Another fantastic part of this is that if you have small kids and you can’t make it to a shelter, this will eliminate finding a babysitter as the entire family can “meet” the pet live online.  Also the noise in a shelter on initial visits result in people passing by that dog in the corner of the run or the one that is jumping and barking.  So often overlooked pets will really benefit from this as well.  People will see how great that pet is, once out of its kennel run, and in a quieter room for the live intro online.

Ayalon said, “I know how much shelters in this country struggle to find homes for their animals, and I felt that today’s opportunity of real time on the Internet provided the perfect place for pet lovers all over the country to see what’s available.  We hope to make this video and audio technology improve the adoption rates for shelters all over the United States. Kent Animal Shelter was the perfect partner for the project because of their outstanding work as a no-kill shelter since 1968.”

Due to this great new idea, the ASPCA also recently named Ayalon their first ever “Animal Hero of the Week.” 

So if you have been thinking about adopting a pet and were apprehensive as to what you might find in a local animal shelter, this is the perfect outlet to see the remarkable pets looking for love and a home.  Log onto www.AnimalRoulette.com this Saturday, July 17 from 1 to 4pm and meet your new best friend.

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