The long road for rescue dog transport: Introducing P.E.T.S. LLC

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“What I didn’t know is that home is just as complicated for Southern dogs as it is for Southern people.” –writer Cy Brown about a discovery made on a haul with drivers for P.E.T.S. LLC, based in Cookeville, Tenn., and specializing in over-the-road transport of rescue dogs from Southern shelters to new homes up North

An item in the “Bitter Southerner” newsletter caught my eye yesterday after it was forwarded my way — an absolutely well-done profile and tale of a big-rig ridealong with one of the drivers of Peterson Express Transport Service, founded by Kyle and Pam Peterson with a distinctly unique purpose for a trucking business.

As writer Cy Brown put it in the story, the Petersons over a decade transformed what was essentially a hobby “of transporting dogs for animal shelters into the premier animal-rescue transport business in the Southeast.”

The quote from Brown at the top speaks to the documented overabundance of homeless dogs in the region, where leash laws and spay/neuter laws are less common as a general rule than in crowded cities in the Northeast, where demand for pets is conversely high. P.E.T.S. as a trucking business helps right than imbalance, along the way saving many animals from death in a kill shelter.

It’s hard to remember any better portrait outside a trucking-specific publication of a business — it’s well worth a read with its tale of Brown’s run as well as the background of the Petersons’ business, employing both drivers and dog walkers, among others. Click through the picture below of the Volvo Brown rode along in on a haul north and east for a series of deliveries with P.E.T.S. team drivers James Ray and Chris Pesch for the full story, with numerous additional photos as well by Tamara Reynolds.

PETS-LLC-Volvo-by-Tamara-Reynolds