We have an incredible contest going on right now which will last until this time next year. It’s called Feed Pets In Need. This contest allows people to vote for their favorite Iams Home 4 the Holidays shelter/rescue. Each month, the TWO organizations with the most votes win a free month’s worth of pet food from Iams!

And it’s really easy to do.

Go to the www.IH4tH.com website.

Iams Home 4 the Holidays web site header

Click on the little dog and cat icon, at the top right side of the page:

Click "Cast Your Vote"

You will need to register because you are allowed only 1 vote per day. P&G’s Privacy Policy means you totally control ANY personal information you provide in your registration. You also totally control whether or not you receive our newsletter.

Registering is painless.

Once you’re registered, you can vote!

Find your favorite shelter or rescue by choosing the State (or Canada) and the city.

Sort the organizations by the shelter/rescue name or the name of the city.

Click on your favorite shelter/rescue to highlight it, then click “Vote For Shelter!”

When you hit the vote button, a new window will open with the rules of the contest. Make sure you read them at least once. Then at the bottom of the rules is a check box and an OK button. For your vote to register, check the check box and click OK.

Click the check box AND the OK button.

You will then see who’s currently getting the most votes, and who our past winners are!

(I blocked out my vote to keep it private.)

This is sooooooooo easy!! Many shelters/rescues have started up campaigns to get their supporters to vote. Check with your favorite Iams Home 4 the Holidays shelter or rescue–this is something you can do for them that takes only a few moments of your time. GET OUT THE VOTE!!

The Mason Business Center.

Pulling into the parking lot, I got a good view of our new dog park!

Our new dog park.

On our first day in the new office, the dog park is not quite done yet. But very soon it will be!

I knew I was in the right place when I saw this sign at the door!

The dog elevator.

Because there are so many people working at the MBC (the Mason Business Center), we wanted to be considerate of people with allergies and people who would (I know you’ll find this hard to believe!) rather not be around dogs. So there is a specially designated elevator specifically for people bringing their dogs to work. You can see by how it’s decorated that it’s very dog-friendly! Our dogs also have their own stairwell—for pooches who’d rather have the exercise of walking up stairs instead of the ease and comfort of an elevator ride.

The walls inside of the elevator are also decorated.

This is a huge facility, so it’s helpful to have directions to Pet Care.

This is the entry into the Pet Care section of the facility.

A touch of our old home!

This dog statue used to sit outside of one of our larger meeting rooms in our old home. It’s one of the first things you see when you come into our new office area!

Kersee, our first VP for Canine Communications

Kersee was our official door greeter up until 2002. I had not ever seen this portrait of her, but I recognized her instantly! She was a great dog, and it’s fitting that her portrait be at the gateway to our office.

The plaque beneath Kersee’s portrait.

Claudia, our first VP for Feline Communications is also remembered.

Clawdia's Plaque

When I walked into the Pet Care office area, I was amazed at the order! Boxes were where they were supposed to be, everybody was unpacking (and having a great time), and by 10 AM we were all back to work as if we had lived in this new office for years!

The clutter of unpacking in Consumer Relations.

Getting everything put away

Almost done!

A few boxes left to unpack.

What a beautiful facility, and a great place to work! I am amazed at the attention and care given to make our area look so pet-oriented! There are dog and cat murals painted on all the walls!

All the walls have dogs and cats on them!

The style of this mural is very retro for us

The style of portrait of the dogs and cats which make up our wall murals has a lot of sentimental value for me. When I first joined Iams in the ‘90s this was the style that had been used on many of our marketing materials.

A Terrier tilts her head with interest.

Another touch from our old home—the little statue of the puppies in their bed that sits between these two desks.

A version of our Mission Statement runs through each mural: “P&G Pet Care exists to enhance the health and well being of more dogs and cats.”

Back at our old home, we named our conference rooms after breeds of dog and cat. The Mason Business Center is big enough that room numbers matter. Of course, that doesn’t stop us from giving each of our new meeting rooms over to a specific breed of dog or cat and putting up the art work that “flavored” our meeting spaces in our old home!

The plaque that named the Siberian Husky room came south with us and now marks a new meeting space.

Our new version of the Retriever room.

The ceiling of the meeting room directly outside of Consumer Relations has paw prints on it!

Here’s a quirky whimsical welcome at the entry to a Pet Care area.

One of our new break rooms.

Within a couple of hours, Jen is moved in and focused on work!

At the start of this post I posed a question: Could we really pack up our 2,000 boxes, our artwork, and all the bits and pieces that make an office a home and resume working at a brand new location on the next business day?

Oh yeah! No problem!

Next: An Iams & Eukanuba Celebration!

The “For Sale” sign went up in early September.

So we spent September and part of October going through all the stuff we had accumulated during the time we live in our buildings on Poe Avenue.

And then, suddenly, it was our last week in the building. The week started with a “garage sale” and silent auction. A lot of that stuff that we had collected–stacks of branded tee shirts, pens, notebooks, clocks, watches, along with used office supplies—were all put in one room and we each purchased some memories to take home. And much of the dog and cat oriented art work that we had collected over the years was put up for silent auction. Our garage sale and silent auction raised over $7,000 for the United Way of Greater Dayton.

Shelley finishes packing in between phone calls.

Marti is nearly finished packing.

Boxes waiting to be loaded.

Sue, Consumer Relation’s move captain, has got it all under control.

Even with our downsizing, there seems to be no end to the boxes!

By Friday morning every cubical and office had a sign that said, “Checked and Ready to Move!”

 Friday October 23 was moving day, and we were required to be out the door by noon. Of course, it rained. If I was of a maudlin frame of mind, I might say that the sky cried to see us leaving. But I’m far more cynical—it rained because it made things more inconvenient and wet.

Marti got saturated loading last minute things into her car.

The ramp is down, the boxes are getting loaded.

One last look at our sign.

Over the weekend, the moving company would deliver our boxes to our new home.

Next: Iams & Eukanuba Find a New Home!

You’ve probably heard of the AKC (American Kennel Club) and the CFA (Cat Fanciers Association). Have you heard of Meet the Breeds?

 A few weeks ago (October 17 & 18), some of my co-workers were at the Javits Center in New York City (wish I had been able to go!) where they attended the AKC-CFA Meet The Breeds sponsored by Pet Partners, Inc. This really cool weekend event allowed people to “meet” 160 dog breeds and 41 cat breeds. Each breed had its own designated space that was designed and decorated to reflect the breed’s attributes, characteristics, history, and heritage. People attending the event were able to pet the dogs/cats/puppies/kittens and to question and talk to breed experts. What a great way to learn about different breeds of dogs and cats!

My buddy, Jason Taylor (from our External Relations team), was there to present a contribution to two outstanding organizations, the Bulldog Club of America and the Winn Feline Foundation. 

Munch looks on approvingly as Jason presents a check for $10,000 to Evelyn Heath of the Bulldog Club of America's Charitable Fund. To Munch's left are Adam and Deirdre Nardelli, Munch's owners.

Have you seen the Iams dog and cat ads we’ve been doing lately that call attention to the fact we’ve added prebiotics to our pet foods? The two breeds starring in these ads are the Bulldog and Cornish Rex. In fact,  the canine star of the ads — Munch the Bulldog – was at Meet the Breeds!

Everybody at Iams fell in love with Munch when we first started looking at his photos and video. He has such personality! That Saturday at Meet the Breeds, Jason and Munch presented a donation to the Bulldog Club of America. We know that they will put our contribution to good use to support the breed.

Janet Wolf, the executive director of the Winn Feline Foundation receives a check for $10,000 from Jason. On the left is David White of the CFA holding Artie the Cornish Rex.

The next day, it was Artie’s turn to shine. Artie is a Cornish Rex, and he is a magnificent example of his breed—sleek, healthy, and beautiful. The Cornish Rex is the breed of cat featured in our new marketing campaign for Iams Cat food. That Sunday, Jason and Artie presented a donation to the Winn Feline Foundation, to help honor and celebrate the unique Cornish Rex breed.

What an incredible event!

The grand total at the end of week 6:

309,353 pets adopted!

Here the breakdown:

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

Do you have a favorite shelter that you would like to see win some free food?

Feed Pets in Need-vote for your favorite Iams Home 4 the Holidays shelter. Each month, for the next 13 months, the shelter with the most votes gets a month’s supply of free food!

The Life’s Better Sweepstakes-You and your favorite Iams Home 4 the Holidays shelter could win a FREE YEAR of food!!

• Send in the registration card included in the adoption kit you receive when you adopt a pet from an Iams’ Home 4 the Holiday’s shelter
• You can also enter online.
• Every pet owner registration card also enters the shelter for a chance to win a free year’s supply of Iams Pet Food!
• There’s a total of four drawings (2 per dog parents and their shelters, and 2 per cat parents and their shelters)
• Official Rules, for those who like to play by them.

SHELTERS/RESCUES: It’s never too late to join us! We’re going to get 1.5 million pets into furever homes by the New Year!

Hilary Swank and Mike Arms enjoy a photo op at the Helen Woodward Animal Center with K9 buddy Andy

Dave with Katie and Lacey

Over the short time that I’ve known Dave (he’s been part of Eukanuba for over a year), I’ve learned to really appreciate his passion for dogs. And any time an opportunity presents itself, he’s the first to jump up and yell “I feed Eukanuba!” 

1. What pets share your life?
We have a 12 year old Yellow Labrador Retriever, Katie, who picked out from a breeder. I was deploying quite frequently as a US Marine at the time, and Katie kept my wife company and a lot less lonely during my absences.
About a year ago, we recognized that Katie, as most older dogs do, was starting to slow down, and be much less active. We thought it would be a good idea to find a puppy to keep her company. As luck would have it, while doing a store-check one weekend with my kids, we happened upon a rescue-adoption program, and just fell in love with our second dog, Lacey (because she likes to chew shoelaces). She is now 8 months old, and is a mixed breed, probably primarily Chow and Black Lab. Her tongue is spotted and her hair stands on, but she also howls like a Beagle and jumps straight up like an English Springer Spaniel, so there’s no telling what’s really in her family tree!
At any rate, she and Katie get along great. Katie’s activity level has gone way up, and Lacey has a great companion to show her the ropes around the house.

John (of Avenue K9), and Dave participate in "Pins for Pets" at our recent blogger summit.

2. What is your pet’s most unusual habit?
We took Katie, as a puppy, to the beach. We thought that she really liked licking the sand off her paws, but later realized that she was eating the sand. She had pure sand poops for the next two days!

3. What’s your favorite story about participating in a dog event?
I really enjoyed participating in the Morris Animal Foundation “K9K” Event – a walk to help raise funds to cure canine cancer, held in Sep, 2009, in Estes Park, CO. The locale was fantastic – right at the edge of Rocky Mountain National Park. Not only did we get to enjoy all the great dogs that participated, but also the Elk that really covered the landscape

4. What is your favorite part of working at Pet Care?
I truly believe in our mission “to enhance the health and well-being of more dogs and cats.” The science and research behind our all-natural food really gives credence to this mission. We’ve feed Eukanuba or Iams products to both our dogs for their entire lives, and both dogs thrive on the true nutrition that these products deliver.

Dave cuts the ribbon on the new agility course at the PAWS shelter in Middletown, Ohio.

Our guests (Caroline, Amy, Lana,  Nicole,  John, Dr. Janet, Dr. Eric, Karen and Skeezix) arrived on Wednesday September 9 in the afternoon. Our first activity was a get-to-know-you dinner at a very nice restaurant. Karen and Skeezix were the last to arrive–in fact, they were driven directly from the airport to the restaurant where we had just started on the appetizers.

As we sat around the table getting acquainted, we talked about our pets. Karen (also known as the Food Lady, or FL, on Skeezix’s blog), told us that she never traveled anywhere without her cat, Skeezix, and did we want to meet Skeezix? (Remember, Karen came to the restaurant directly from the airport, and she came in with a large shoulder bag which she had pushed underneath the table when she sat down next to me.)

Meet Skeezix? We’re in the middle of a fancy restaurant….does she mean that her cat is in that big bag she had pushed under the table? Poor kitty, stuffed in a bag under a table!? What if the wait staff saw him?–we’d be thrown out! Does the hotel know she’s traveling with her cat? What would we do with the kitty the next day when we toured our Pet Health & Nutrition Center?

I looked across the table at my boss, Marti. Her eyes were glazed and the size of our dinner plates. I watched her reach for her cell phone and I knew she was about to make a call in search of a kitty sitter. Everyone else at the table watched Karen, and we all expected to see a furry feline at any moment.

Next to me, Karen leaned down and pulled her bag out from under the table. I watched as she opened it. All I could see were her laptop and some file folders–was the kitty hiding in the part that was still under the table?

And then, she pulled out the Flat-Cat!

Skeezix Joins Us For Dinner.

Skeezix-the-Flat-Cat was an immediate hit with all of us and became our blogger summit mascot. He had dinner with us. And then joined us for ice cream.

Marti, Karen (AKA the Food Lady), Skeezix, and Nicole

Caroline, the FL, and Skeezix

Discussed kitty politics with Caroline, who is a staffer for the famous Romeo-the-Cat.

Skeezix Enjoys a Beverage

Skezzix went bowling with us, where we competed in the first ever Pins for Pets Tournament (more about that later).

Kitty and OJ? Great way to start the day!

 Skeezix entertained us during breakfast, 

Skeezix, Karen (FL), and Kris

and acted as tour guide when my voice gave out. Skeezix even made friends with my Substitute-Bailey while the humans talked with Dan Rajczak and other Iams/Eukanuba key people. 

Substitute-Bailey and Skeezix-the-Flat-Cat

Skeezix-the-Flat-Cat is a charmer! (More photos here.) If you visit Karen’s blog or Skeezix’s blog you will find all kinds of photos of him and his travels. Karen told me that she will soon be posting directions that anyone can follow and create their own Flat-Cat or Flat-Dog.

I see a Bailey-the-Bichon-Flat-Dog in my future!

Caroline, who is on staff for Romeo the Cat

Amy, who blogs at Love Meow

Lana from Petside

Nicole from DogTime 

John from Avenue K9

Dr. Janet, who blogs at About Vet Med

Dr. Eric who blogs at The Dogster and Catster Vet Blog  

And Karen, the The Cat’s Meow on Catster blogger, who brought her flat cat Skeezix who blogs at Skeezix’s Scratching Post.

 I am working on an overview of the event which I will post in a few days. For now, check out these wonderful sites!

On our way, Thursday morning.

Patch, Harry, Lisa, Mona, Wheatie, and Dusty

Lisa has been part of Pet Care for 13 years.

1. What pets share your life?   
I currently have five dogs and a cat. Three of my five dogs are adoptions from work, as is my cat. My dogs are Patch (Dalmatian mix), Mona (long-haired Chihuahua), Dusty (yellow Labrador), Harry (Brittany Spaniel), and Wheatie (Pembroke Welsh Corgi). All are over eight.  My cat, Portnoy, will be 17 this year.

 2. What is your pet’s most unusual habit?      
All of my animals have odd behaviors, LOL! But odd as in funny. One of the most endearing things Mona does is greet me at the door when I get home from work, smiling at me like she is gushing “hee hee hee, mommie’s home”! They really are my babies, so nearly everything they do is endearing.

 3. What’s your favorite story about participating in a dog event?
One of the coolest things that happened at the Furry Skurry one year was that I realized Patch was extremely smart. He kept getting behind me as we walked, moving to a particular side at a particular time. What I realized was that he was using my shadow to block the sun in the mildly warm spring day. What a smart cookie!

 4. What is your favorite part of working at Pet Care?
My favorite part of working at Pet Care is the dogs & cats and the difference we make in their lives through our spectacular program. I also love the thought of improving the lives of dogs & cats around the world with what we do with nutritional research. All dogs & cats benefit from our work and that thought enriches my life!

Wednesday at 3 o’clock everybody at work received an email saying that there would be a mandatory company meeting at 8:30 yesterday morning. The message gave us just barely enough time to rearrange our schedules, but not enough time to really sniff out what the heck was going on.

Our Front Door

For several years now, we have all seen many of our teams migrate south to other P&G offices in Cincinnati so that we can take advantage of efficiencies and streamline our work flow (OK, I realize that sounds like corporate-speak—but at least I’m not using words like “synergy” and “leverage”). The number of people actually working from our HQ in Dayton has shrunk considerably to the point of being cut in half over the past couple of years.

I won’t say I lost sleep in speculating on the topic of the meeting, but it was the last thing I thought of as I dropped off to sleep last night, and the first thing I thought of this morning.

So yesterday morning we all trooped in to the biggest meeting room in the building. And the topic of the meeting? We’re going to sell our building after we all move down to P&G’s Mason Business Center (MBC). The announcement was met with hardy applause. Quite a few of the people who work in our Dayton office must commute from Cincinnati.

To me, this is a little bitter-sweet.

Our building at 7250 Poe Avenue became our corporate headquarters in February of 1985. When we moved in, we occupied three-quarters of the first floor. By July of 1990 we occupied the entire 4 floors of the building. Before 1995 we had built a 2nd 4-story building of offices to the north of the original building, connecting the two through a lobby. I started with the company not long after we expanded into the 2nd building. I’ve worked from this building for nearly 14 years.

The Paw over our Front Door

I will miss this old building with the Paw Print carved into its concrete façade.

But I won’t miss our cafeteria—the one at the MBC is much nicer with a larger selection of food and a bank of windows that looks out onto a green space.

Plus our new digs has a fitness center, on site banking, a dry cleaning service, and a little corner shop in case your pantyhose gets a run. There is a beautiful outdoor walk surrounded by lots of trees. We will be investing in an on site dog park, so that we can continue to bring our dogs to work with us. And we will all be together under one roof instead of scattered between Dayton and Cincinnati.

We will continue our relationships with the three shelters here in Dayton. And we get to keep our jobs, which is really the very best part of the deal in this economic climate. Did I mention that it will be 10 years ago in August that we were acquired by P&G? And we are now, finally, moving in together. I think this will be a good thing for P&G Pet Care (AKA The Iams Company).

Here’s what the press release says:

Cincinnati, May 28, 2009 – Procter & Gamble, maker of Iams and Eukanuba pet foods, announced today it will move its North American operations for this business from Dayton to Mason, Ohio.

These operations will now become part of P&G’s Mason Business Center, where the company’s oral care, personal health and pharmaceuticals business are also based.

P&G said that moving its NA Pet Care business to Mason will increase productivity and enhance collaboration among even more of its health care employees at this site. About 2000 P&G employees work in Mason.

About 240 P&G Pet Care employees, currently based in Dayton, will now work in Mason. P&G said it expects the move to begin in early October.

“Our home address is changing but not our commitment to improving the well-being of all dogs and cats,” said Dan Rajczak, vice president of P&G’s pet care business in North America. “If anything, this will help us do an even better job of connecting with our colleagues in health care to bring great innovation to pet care.”

P&G acquired The Iams Company in 1999. Since then, sales of its Iams and Eukanuba brands have more than doubled. The pet food category remains attractive to P&G. It is large, growing and fits well within the company’s core strengths.