Friends For Life Animal Rescue — Local services in Gilbert

Very clean facility with beautiful rooms for each cat, with all kinds of activities for them to play on! The dog runs seemed nice and clean. Each dog run a little small, especially compared to the lovely area the cats have, but definitely clean and well kept. The animals seemed happy, which warms my heart!

However, my 1 star was because of the way I was treated at this Rescue. I just moved to Arizona a few months ago and I have never been made to feel so discriminated against in all my life.

It started from the second we walked in the front door. Not a kind, friendly, warm greeting at all. Just "hi. What kind of pet are you looking for?" sort of greeting. To make this review a long story short, we were hovered behind for each and every animal we looked at. Like, they literally stood there with us at each cat room and dog run. I found this strange as I have never ever been to a rescue, shelter, spca, etc. that an attendant has to STAND there with you at each animal. It's typically you go in and are able to look at each animal with your family and if you have questions about one or are interested in one then you get someone to come help you. Very awkward and rushed feeling when you have someone standing there with you, waiting for you to "finish." A few minutes into looking at the dogs I asked if we could see/meet any of them and we immediately were told "we don't have time to take out a dog for you to see. Since you have kids it is a whole long process to do and we just don't have the time right now." What?? You don't have time to try and find a good match for one of these animals? I absolutely understand having kids we would want the potential pet to meet the kids and be a good match all around for us and them. WHICH IS WHY I BROUGHT MY KIDS WITH ME! I wanted to have them meet whomever we chose to see to make sure we are all a good fit. My jaw dropped and eyebrows raised and I was at a complete loss for words when I was told "we don't have time." Is this not an adoption rescue with the intent on finding forever homes for these animals?

I asked about fostering and was immediately shut down there as well. No information given on how to become a foster home, just told "you have to be a volunteer." Well, ok, how about you explain to me how to become a volunteer then? Nothing.

I used to work at the Sacramento SPCA in California. I was an adoptions attendant, animal behaviorist (particularly the dogs), and also worked in the sick bay. I have worked as a vet tech in numerous veterinary hospitals. I have fostered numerous animals over the years. And I have owned animals all my life, including large medium and small breed dogs, cats, rodents, ferrets, birds, snakes, lizards, and have fostered may others such as rabbits, turtles, goats. All of my pets I have had until they died of old age (or unforeseeable medical issues). Point is, it is unfortunate this Rescue judged the book by its cover (which I am completely unsure what "book" was being judged but it was blatantly obvious from the second we walked in - 'we' being me and my 2 young kids), because had we been given even a minute of an opportunity, I can guarantee 100% we would have been a great home for one of these poor babies.

EDIT, because there is no way for me to respond to your response to my review

That is absolutely not what he told me. I am not lying when I said what I said in my review, and I do not appreciate it being made out that I am making this up. He said exactly what I posted, word for word after I asked repeatedly where the dog was that actually is available for adoption (not the ones that have yet to be evaluated). Of course he isn't going to tell you that's what he said because it was it was rude and unprofessional. As I mentioned, it was a very unfortunate turn out that actually left me feeling awful the rest of the day.

I notice a few other reviews mentioning a grumpy gentleman who greets at the door, so clearly there is a common...

I visited this location last Saturday with my boyfriend, and we were helped by a volunteer, we didn't catch her name but she was an older lady with short blonde/white hair. At first we were interested in Bradley, the 2 year old German Shepherd. But she told us that he wouldn't be a good dog to have because he was too aggressive. Seriously? Dogs can be trained, the aggressiveness can be corrected. He was found as a stray and was probably treated horribly and his aggressive behavior was the result. It's not a problem that can't be solved. Why couldn't we make our own decision of what kind of challenges we wanted to take on? So then we looked at Byson, a 7 month old puppy. My boyfriend and I work opposite schedules, so somebody is always home except for maybe 1-2 hours in the afternoon but that didn't seem to be enough for this lady. She was very rude and asked how we could possibly think we could adopt a 7 month old puppy when there were 2 hours out of the day that nobody would be home. A 7 month old puppy can be in a crate for up to 7 hours, which would have never been necessary in our case. Another couple also looked at Byson right before us, and they were rejected because they lived in an apartment. Do you realize how many people live in apartments? And how many of those people have dogs? And how many of those dogs are actually happy? It's called 'taking your dog outside.' Going for walks, going to dog parks. Apartment living shouldn't be a reason to reject someone trying to adopt a pet. I thought the goal for animal shelters was to get these pets to forever homes, but instead they are finding any reason they can to keep them locked up here, as family after family comes to see them and then leave without them. It's sad, really. We showed up here hoping to bring a dog to their forever home, but because of the poor service and ridiculous rejections, we went to the AAWL Adoption Center and adopted a 3 month old puppy, and he is so happy to be in his new forever home and doesn't mind being in his...

After looking to adopt a dog for weeks we decided to try expanding our search and found Friends for Life and looked at their dogs online and saw one we wanted to look at. From the moment we stepped into this facility it felt very different. We were warmly welcomed and filled out a questionnaire to help determine if a dog we liked would compatible with our lifestyle. We were then walked around and shown the dogs and wow! the facility itself is wonderful. It is three large yards with very large kennels in place so the dogs can roam their kennel and be let out to play in the yard. This was a huge change of pace from places like county or many other adoption centers. We immediately decided if we didnt find a dog here today we would come back as we loved how these dogs were treated! The dogs here all looked so happy!

We were told there were some dogs that just got in that day and they were in the third kennel so we took a look after none of the other dogs "spoke" to us. One of the new dogs was excited to see us but hadnt had his behavioral exam yet or anything so they said to come back the next day. We came back before they opened and as soon as they opened they took us in and they told us about our dog. Loves people, maybe not great with dogs (growls a bit). They let him out to play with us... He grew on us immediately and we took him home to be part of our family. Now we cant imagine life without our forever friend!!! Highly recommend this place. Once we sort out our friend's growling issue maybe we will come find him a friend from here :)

The only thing more friendly than the people here...