Aww.
As Austin's Blue Cat Cafe turned one (and dealt with some gnarly vandalization), San Antonio's Cat Cafe launched a GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign to help open its doors. Casey Steuart, who registered the nonprofit 4 Pawsitive Change Inc. AKA San Antonio Cat Cafe, is hoping fans of cat cafes and kitties will put their money where their mouths are by helping to raise $20,000 through GoFundMe.
As of this posting, the campaign has $405 pledged through several donors. Steuart, who has met with lenders for the project, says the fundraising goal is high to hit the ground running with a large space off Broadway and 410 across from the San Antonio International Airport complete with an actual cafe. At $20,000, the goal is just a third of Austin's Blue Cat Cafe's (which surpassed its goal by just over $2,000), but it is the largest for a San Antonio eatery to date. Before they opened, Earth Burger fundraised $10,000.
Steuart has spent several years doing TNR (trap, neuter, release) work in San Antonio. She hopes to help take cats and kittens off the streets by fostering them at the SACC, where the cats will hopefully become socialized and accustomed to people. Steuart hopes to turn the industrial space into a large living room-like kitty sanctuary where visitors and potential adopters can visit with the cats with programming that'll hopefully include music, trivia, yoga and more.
"We want to hit the ground running with the right space and right possibilities," Steuart said.
Cat cafes have been in the states since late 2014 and are springing up throughout the country with Texas now the proud owner of two kitty palaces (Blue Cat Cafe in Austin and The Charming Cat Cafe in Lewisville outside of Dallas).
The San Antonio Cat Cafe incentives range from free admission, snack and a drink for $20 to naming rights for one item, a party for 30, return passes for guests and a lifetime pass for donors that pony up $1,000 ore more. Head over to the San Antonio Cat Cafe's GoFundMe page right meow to read Steuart's business plan. Meanwhile, I'm off to find some Zyrtec.
