More than 14,000 people visit Carolina Tiger Rescue in Pittsboro each year to tour the sanctuary of tigers, lions, leopards and other animals living in large natural habitat enclosures on a 55-acre site.
During 2014, Carolina Tiger Rescue worked with ESC to enhance its marketing and communications, stressing its role as a sanctuary and its dedication to education and advocacy for the care and preservation of animals like those it houses.
“The consultants were wonderful to work with,” said Pam Fulk, executive director of Carolina Tiger Rescue, when discussing the ESC consultants on her project. “We had a very good experience.”
As a result, she said Carolina Tiger Rescue is taking a more proactive approach to marketing, with special emphasis on training its tour guides to explain its mission to visitors and to seek to broaden support of the organization.
Providing a Sanctuary
The central mission is to serve as a sanctuary, which is not only a generic term but a legal one under a federal law that recognizes Carolina Tiger Rescue as the only wild cat sanctuary in North Carolina. Sanctuaries do not breed, buy or sell the wild cats in their custody. “We provide them a home for life,” Fulk said.
Their animals are rescued from unfit situations or are donated by people or organizations that cannot care for them. For example, one cat, a serval, was taken by animal control officers from a small filthy cage in a Hendersonville backyard and now lives at Carolina Tiger Rescue. Four tigers came from a small family zoo in Alabama.
Many of the animals, according to Fulk, are purchased as pets when they are small but then outgrow the capabilities of the owner. It is legal in North Carolina to own wild cats as pets, with no restrictions. Hence the need Carolina Tiger Rescue works to fill, with a staff of 14 full-time and two part-time employees and more than 170 volunteers.
An Aggressive Plan
Increased fundraising is part of the three-year plan developed with ESC consultants to help the organization gain members, donors and business supporters.
Carolina Tiger Rescue is on its way to building six new big cat habitats, which is financed through an $84,000 fundraising campaign. The new facilities would house up to 12 more tigers or lions.
“We need to prepare as fast as we can for new rescues,” Fulk said. “Most of our requests are to rescue tigers and other big cats. We want to be able to say ‘yes’ to the next requests, and ESC’s guidance will help make that possible.”