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Australian Dog Lover
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Easing the Pain of Farewelling your Furry Friend
For many, the grief of losing a beloved pet is
akin to the loss of a close family member.
In days gone by, pet owners would either leave
it to their vet to ‘thoughtfully’ dispose of their animal, or watch dad dig a
makeshift grave in the backyard where the family would gather to say goodbye.
However, times and expectations have changed,
leading to massive growth in the pet cremation industry as people now have a
desire to keep their cherished furry friend with them forever in a dignified
form.
“Be it a dog, cat, foal, alpaca or snake, the
grieving process is the same,” said founder and director of Pet Angel Funerals
Tom Jorgensen.
“South-east Queensland is home to 3.5 million
people, and hundreds of thousands of those are pet owners who sadly lose their
animals and want their much loved pet to be treated with grace, dignity and
respect, just as we do our human family members when they pass.”
Pet Angel Funerals, headquartered in
Molendinar on the Gold Coast, has been supporting locals and vets since March 2015.
Tom said a specific, moving personal
experience sparked his desire to start a pet cremation business.
“It all started when I was working on a
building site next to a vet clinic and I saw a woman leave looking very
distressed. She was holding a large plastic bag and I realised that she had
just lost her dog – it was inside the bag,” said Tom, who had been in the
building industry for more than 45 years before founding Pet Angel Funerals.
“I immediately knew there must be a better,
more compassionate way to support people when they lost their pet. “I remembered the horrid experience I had when
I lost my own dog Sophie and started researching. This is when I found out that
so many pet cremation services existed that were operating in a very corporate,
uncaring way.
“There was clearly a space for someone to do
it in a more humane, caring way.”
While Pet Angel Funerals is already the
largest pet cremation service on the Gold Coast after only five years of
operation, the team aims to become the biggest service provider in south-east
Queensland.
“We are currently cremating around 400
individual pets a month on the Gold Coast alone, but we certainly have the
capacity to support more people,” he said.
The Molendinar premises includes a specialist
facility, a fleet of vehicles that help to deliver on the promise of guaranteed
pick-up and delivery of pets that have passed away, handmade caskets and urns,
and a special Remembrance Room designed for people to spend precious time with
their pet before cremation occurs.
“We have first-class techniques for cremating
animals. We understand that some companies use separators in their incinerators
to be able to cremate up to six animals in one chamber,” he said.
“We don’t do that – we have chosen to use
custom-made crematories from Lago in Florida that don’t create smoke, and each
cremator has three individual chambers so that we can ensure that no ashes are
mixed up at all.
“Sadly, we are not in a position to cremate
larger animals such as horses, however we do take care of smaller-sized animals
such as large dogs, foals, and have even cremated more exotic animals such as
alpacas and snakes.”
Transparency is key to the company’s success.
“Something else that we take pride in is
offering the opportunity for anyone to visit our premises at any time,
unannounced, so that people can see how we operate day-to-day,” said Tom, who currently
works alongside a team of seven staff.
“If people want to be here when their pet is
cremated, we ask them to come in early so that the crematory is cold and they
can view their animal going inside its special chamber. The temperature inside
the crematory can be between 1000 and 1200 degrees Celsius, which is why we
only offer the opportunity to witness the first cremation of the day, should it
be especially requested.”
For Tom, it is all about creating an
experience for pet owners to ensure that the loss of a pet is handled in the
most compassionate, personalised and pain-free way as possible.
“Nobody enjoys dealing with the loss of a pet,
but if we can do anything to make the process easier for those who are
grieving, then we know we have done our job right.
“Those are the stories that really distress us
because we believe that pets and their owners are owed a service that is
completely transparent so that they can have faith that their pets are being
cremated in an ethical way that sends them to their final resting place with
grace and dignity.”
About Pet Angel Funerals
Pet Angel Funerals is a family-owned business dedicated
to helping pet owners say goodbye to their beloved animals with grace and
dignity. Founded in 2015, it is one of the largest and most-trusted pet
cremation services in south-east Queensland, guaranteeing all cremations are
personalised and individual. State-of-the-art crematories and custom-built
facilities allow Pet Angel Funerals to focus on offering affordable and
compassionate pet cremation services that aim to make the difficult grieving
process as painless as possible. To find more information on how Pet Angel
Funerals can be of support, visit www.petangel.com.au.
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