Animal Rescuers Without Borders wins givn #SparkTheGood Grand Prize

Congratulations Animal Rescuers Without Borders, Inc. (ARWOB) (San Diego, CA) for winning the givn #SparkTheGood Grand Prize, presented by Posiba. To highlight this exciting story about how the $10,000 prize money will help them with their 2016 goals and save more homeless dogs and cats through pet adoption, we interviewed ARWOB Executive Director Alondra Gomez.

The givn winners were selected based on the most social media engagements (Likes, Shares and Retweets) using the givn app and website that lets users easily share and track donations (monetary and volunteer hours). To encourage fans to help them win this contest, ARWOB sent a message out via Facebook and email asking their supporters to do social sharing thru the givn app.

1. How does ARWOB support the community?

Animal Rescuers Without Borders (ARWOB) is dedicated to reducing the overpopulation of homeless pets and improving the lives of animals through rescue, fostering programs, adoption, and spaying and neutering. The ARWOB group operates primarily in Mexico, and has an office in San Diego, California.

 2. What makes ARWOB unique?

As a border town, San Diego has a lot of animals come across from Mexico. Tijuana and Ensenada don’t really have animal control or animal rescue organizations so ARWOB tries to fill that need. Alondra explained that many times Americans come back across the border with a street dog, and they can’t keep them. Local shelters won’t take animals from Mexico, but to ARWOB, a cat is a cat and a dog is a dog. “We will always give the animal a second chance,” said Gomez. ARWOB also makes an effort to help independent animal rescuers in Mexico in whatever way they can.

3. What does ARWOB plan to do with the givn #SparkTheGood Contest winnings?

Alondra Gomez expressed great gratitude, “This money will go a long way to helping with everything we do. If we don’t have money in the bank, we have to turn an animal away. And we never want to do that.” ARWOB is currently planning to use their givn #SparkTheGood Contest winnings primarily for 3 things: 1) promote a spay and neuter clinic to keep the animal population down, 2) recruit more foster families and 3) provide emergency care for animals to avoid euthanization whenever possible.

4. How did ARWOB use the givn app and social media sharing to win the contest?

ARWOB reached out to their supporters via Facebook and email. “At first, people were hesitant, but once they got the hang of it, it was easy. It was really nice that people could advertise their support in this way. Being able to show a picture of where the money goes is such a powerful thing, one of the most powerful you can do.” Alondra also emphasized that this campaign absolutely increased their end-of-year donations.

5. Looking forward, what are your 2016 plans?

Because there are simply too many animals, ARWOB will continue to focus on pet adoptions in 2016. Alondra expanded, “Most clinics charge between $200 – $500 dollars to spay or neuter a pet, so most low-income families won’t do it. If we can do it for free or for very little, we can get it done for them. They just have to call us.”

At the end of the interview, Alondra Gomez added that anytime they have an urgent situation where an animal faces euthanization, they will use givn to help push out the message through social media. “I am not a social media expert,” Alondra laughed, “but givn worked. It was great to see our community come together for this.”

The givn #SparkTheGood Contest award money will be presented to ARWOB at Posiba with the top 3 winners in San Diego, California, during a special check presentation ceremony on Thursday, January 28, 2016. Congratulations to ARWOB, and thank you givn and Posiba for making a big difference in the community with this contest and givn app.

For more information about ARWOB, visit http://www.arwob.org/. You can also download the givn app to track your giving (monetary and volunteer hours), and/or sign up on the givn website: https://givn.social/.

© Goody Awards 2016