E-Roll | Dog Adoption

Falling in Love With A Puppy Orphan

In honor of National Rescue Dog Day on May 20th, we have a special edition of E-Roll: The adoption story of EPIC Creative’s Art Director, Emily Gunkel, and Human Resources Manager, Lindsey Anderson. Lindsey has been fostering dogs in bully breed dogs for 10 years. And more recently, she has become Emily’s “puppy peddler,” helping her family adopt two dogs. Learn more about their story below.

Approximately 4.1 million shelter animals are adopted each year, according to the ASPCA. Whether you’d like to add a “family member,” foster, volunteer or make a donation, there are many ways to help. In Wisconsin, you can visit the Wisconsin Humane Society to get involved.

Transcript

Emily: I can’t imagine Epic without dogs; it would just be less exciting.

Lindsey: Dogs are so ingrained in the day-to-day office culture at Epic that I think it would just be weird not to have them around.

Emily: I have two dogs: Opal and Molly.

Lindsey: I have five: Barley, Summit, Ellie, Myrtle, and Freya.

Emily: This is Lindsey Anderson. She is my puppy peddler. Actually, she’s HR manager at EPIC Creative.

Lindsey: This is Emily Gunkel. She is one of our art directors, but she is also a fellow bully breed lover.

Emily: In terms of the EPIC culture, I think probably 90% of people either have a dog or a cat or some kind of animal. People will migrate to different areas if they know a dog is here.

Lindsey: We’ve got a conference room called Bark, and so what we’ve asked all of our employees to do is bring a picture of your pet in and put it in a white frame. And so we’re starting to create this gallery wall of all of the pictures on there, which is really super fun.

Lindsey: So I’ve fostered for, gosh, almost 10+ years now. I had a foster, this little white ball of sass, and the minute I picked her up I was like, “Oh, God, I’m in trouble. I don’t need another little white sassy dog.” And I’d had her for a couple days, and—knowing Emily also loves the bully breeds—I had shared a picture with her. And she’s like, “No, no, no, we’re not ready to adopt again.” I was like, “I’m just sharing because she’s super cute.”

Emily: She melted my heart.

Lindsey: My favorite part of rescue and being a foster is seeing how grateful the families are to have the dogs as part of their world and seeing the dogs happy. Most people think they have to donate a ton of money or a ton of time to make an impact, and the reality is that it’s the smallest gesture sometimes that make the biggest impact.

Emily: I’m forever grateful to Lindsay for connecting me with these two animals because they’re my fur babies.