PawPlacer began with a simple love for animals and a teenager's desire to make a difference. Back in middle and high school, I found myself drawn to local shelters - North Shore Animal League, ASPCA, Bideawee, and other small ones - spending countless afternoons walking dogs, socializing cats, and learning from the incredible people who dedicated their lives to animal welfare. Those early experiences shaped not just my weekends, but my entire worldview.
When life got busy with college and then a demanding tech career, I couldn't volunteer as often. But something kept nagging at me - not just missing the joy of helping animals, but remembering the daily frustrations I witnessed. Shelter staff and volunteers, people with hearts of gold, were constantly battling with outdated software. "The system is down" became a dreaded phrase. Simple tasks like updating a pet's status or finding medical records turned into time-consuming ordeals. The tools meant to help were actually holding everyone back. Adopters got frustrated, volunteers got burnt.
After building e-commerce platforms and working at Kraken's cryptocurrency exchange for years, I decided to volunteer again at a local shelter. What I found was shocking but not surprising - the same clunky software was still there, unchanged. It wasn't just one shelter - this was an industry-wide problem that nobody had solved. Not because it couldn't be done, but because traditional software companies saw limited profit potential in serving small-to-medium sized shelters and rescues.
That's when PawPlacer was born - not as a startup chasing venture capital, but as a passion project entirely self-funded and driven by a simple mission: to give smaller shelters the tools they deserve. I could have sought investors, but keeping PawPlacer self-funded was a conscious choice. It means we answer only to our users, not to shareholders demanding aggressive growth, questionable ethics, or steep pricing. Our sustainable, independent model allows us to offer the platform for free or at minimal cost while continuing to improve it based on real feedback from the community.
Working with early users - small foster homes who took a chance on us - was incredibly enlightening. Their feedback shaped every feature, every button, every workflow. As word spread and larger shelters joined, we learned even more. Each suggestion and criticism helped transform PawPlacer into something truly useful for the people who needed it most. We're proud to say that we have built entire features based on individual shelter requests, and we'll keep doing that as long as we exist.
Today, we've grown from a one-person project into a double-digit international team, but our heart remains the same. We're still that passionate volunteer who saw a problem and decided to fix it. We're still entirely and comfortably self-funded, which means we can stay true to our mission forever: providing shelters and rescues with intuitive, affordable tools that make their vital work easier. PawPlacer isn't just software - it's a commitment to the animal welfare community, evolving constantly to meet their needs. As we scale, we will hire as needed, but we will never lose sight of our core values. We will never compromise on our commitment to the people who make the world a better place for animals.
The platform will never be "finished" because we believe there's always room to improve, always new challenges to solve. But one thing will never change: our dedication to supporting the incredible people who dedicate their lives to helping animals find their forever homes.
PawPlacer is completely free for small shelters and remains the most affordable option for larger ones. Sign up today to see if it meets your needs—we think you'll love it! If not, let us know how we can improve. You, individually, can change the platform, and that's not a platitude.