Statement regarding report on online puppy sales

Below is a statement to NBC News from Purebred Breeders in response to a Dec. 7 report about puppy mills:

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Statement from Purebred Breeders:

“Purebred Breeders has placed puppies with thousands of families over many years. We have an excellent reputation and a dedicated team of customer care professionals who provide exceptional service. We have a comprehensive breeder screening process in place and a very strict code of ethics required of our breeders.

It is currently estimated that there are over 50,000 dog breeders in the U.S. As a result of our vetting process, we currently work with only 2000. While the vast majority of our breeders are responsible and provide healthy and loving puppies to our families, it has come to our attention that some have not met our high standards. Of the hundreds of excellent breeders we deal with regularly, only six are identified in the complaint sponsored by the Humane Society. After determining that the issues raised with these breeders had merit, they were immediately terminated from our network.

We take these matters very seriously and wish the Humane Society had come to us directly so that we could have acted upon this information sooner. Through our examination of these six breeders, we have recognized areas of possible improvement in our system and have begun a top to bottom review of all our breeders. Any evidence that our high standards are not being met will result in further terminations.

All our puppies undergo a thorough physical exam by a licensed veterinarian and we review these health reports before any puppy is placed. Of the tens of thousands of families we have worked with since 2008, only 11 customers are named in the complaint sponsored by the Humane Society. As is consistent with our normal procedures, all of these customers’ puppies were examined by a licensed veterinarian prior to being placed, most of which were American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) certified, and no issues were noted at the time of exam.  Furthermore, we had already resolved or attempted to resolve all the issues that these customers previously brought to our attention and each customer received or was offered either a full or partial refund.

Our organization is dedicated and committed to providing our customers with healthy and well-bred puppies. An independent survey of all of our customers over the past year was recently completed and we received over 2,000 responses. Our customers gave Purebred Breeders a 4.61 out of 5 overall experience rating, with over 94% of customers giving the company a 4 or 5 overall excellent rating. A copy summarizing the results of this survey is available on our website http://www.purebredbreeders.com/.”