Catoro Cat Cafe needs your help to stay open

Two years ago, Dan and I fell in love with this adorable little cat cafe that was themed like a magical forest. Inside, there were so many cats that you could meet and adopt, and you could get bubble tea, and it was a really sweet, nice experience. We noticed that we felt calmer when we were there and we missed the cats when we were gone. But– there was a big problem. The business was $350,000 in debt and losing money every month. The original owners had been burnt out by the long-term effects of COVID-19 and had struggled to keep things going. So yeah, the business was for sale, but it was also about to shut down forever.

A few people said to us “just let them go out of business and then buy their inventory for pennies on the dollar.” Which made business sense… but what about the cats? What would happen to them in the interim?

The cats are the soul of Catoro. And a soul is something precious that can’t be explained away with money.

While Catoro is structured as a for-profit business, it’s never actually made profit that the owners could withdraw and use to live on. Right now, Dan and I pay ourselves a salary that works out to $20/hr (if we worked 40 hours a week, which we don’t). Many of our staff earn more than us - because they work very hard, and they love our cats, and we want to do our best for them.

In the last two years, thanks to your generosity and love for cats, we have been able to find homes for over 400 rescue cats who otherwise would have nowhere to go. Some of these cats came to our rescue partners as strays, some were carelessly abandoned, some tearfully surrendered. These cats have meant so much to us. As I’m writing this, I’m looking at my cat Panda. He is asleep on a blanket I folded and placed on our radiator. We live in a heritage building, and our cats love to sleep on the warm radiators and look out the window.

Catoro is housed in an old building, too. You might not realize it, but it is over 100 years old now. It used to be two spaces, but was merged into one to create Catoro. In the last hundred years, our building has housed a deli, a butcher shop, a halal market, a grassroots community center, Anna’s cake house (before they moved just down the street) and a myriad of other businesses that folks in the neighbourhood might remember from times before Google street view.

Eventually, Catoro will not be here anymore and something else will take its place. If you stand outside our building and look down the street, you’ll see a lot of buildings that show what ours will become in a few years. Tall towers, with condos, and some retail space at ground level. When the new building is built, all our neighbouring businesses will be gone and there will only be space for two new ones. Noor, Hail Mary’s, Barbarella, Klasik Inasal, and Commercial Picture Framing will all be gone.

So if our time here is limited, you might wonder what the point is to help a struggling business–again. Why waste your money on something with limited time, that constantly needs community support to exist?

When we ran our incredible GoFundMe in 2022, I wrote to you about a dying cat we nicknamed Mr Bones that Dan and I fostered until his last days. This sick little cat broke my heart in so many ways and we still talk about him all the time. He was sweet, and loving, and frail. On his last day, I fed him as much raw steak as he wanted to eat. We took him to the vet and cried while his little heart stopped beating. We held is tiny paws and told him we were sorry we couldn’t save him.

Since 2022, we have made it our personal mission to try and help some of the sickest cats. In animal rescue, you have to make your peace and know that you can’t save every cat. Life will run its course, and we will lose some too soon, and it will be just as hard every time. With your help and support, we have literally saved the lives of cats who would otherwise have been put down.

First, you helped us save TinTin. This beautiful white Persian cat was sickly and lethargic. We didn’t know exactly what was wrong with him at first, but we knew it wasn’t good. You helped us heal him from FIP with cutting-edge medical technology. TinTin got adopted by a family who adopted their other cat from us and he is still happy and healthy. The cost of Tintin’s care was around $20,000– but we’d do it again if we could.

Then, you helped us save Frankey, who not only had FIP but also had been shot and still had lead pellets lodged in his abdomen. He went from an emaciated, empty shell of a cat to a fat little menace who terrorized the cat forest and loved us all. He has also been adopted by an incredible family who fell in love not just with his story but with his spirit. Frankey was really fortunate to be accepted into a clinical study on FIP, which reduced the cost of his care to around $5,000.

We’ve also helped so many other cats in that time - cats you might not have heard about, because we didn’t want to overwhelm our audience with sad stories of sick cats. But there have been quite a few, and if you’d like to hear about some of them, I’d be happy to share their stories too.

Now, as the holiday season is gearing up, Dan and I are stressed and struggling. Catoro has fallen behind on bill payments and vendors as well. We’ve had supply chain issues that have impacted our cat supply customers.

Because Catoro was set up and designed from an animal welfare perspective, it’s difficult to reduce our costs. Some expenses for us are fixed: staff labour, to care for the cats. Someone has to be here every day, even if we’re closed. The hydro bill, so we can do laundry and wash dishes. Cat food, because we have 40 cats that need to eat. We budget around $1500 per month to feed all the cats, but we’re almost always over budget.

When cats come into Catoro, if they come from our rescue partner, we are very fortunate that the rescue covers any medical bills the cats incur while in our care. We still pay for the cats’ food, litter, enrichment, and staff to care for them and clean up after them. But if the cats don’t come from one of our regular rescue partners, Catoro foots the bill for all medical expenses. That’s usually about 20% of the cats at Catoro. We also don’t keep any adoption fees, so every time a cat is adopted, the only way we make money to cover those vet bills is when they pay admission to meet the cats or buy drinks and merch.

In the last two years, we have learned lessons about the strength and fortitude of cats. About how their love and affection can have transformative power on us as humans. About how every cat is deserving of love, even the ones who try to scratch your face off at first.

I have so many stories I’d love to tell you: About Benji, who was like a wildcat, and now goes paddle boarding. Angel, the beautiful white cat with one eye and three legs. Tyson, the semi-feral cat who slowly transformed into a snuggly baby with the daily dedication of one volunteer. Macy and her brother Mack, who lived (and pooped) in our tree and got adopted by a family whose young children saw how much the shy cats deserve love. Dana, who escaped from her foster’s home and was missing for six weeks. Goose and Balto, who struggled to thrive in the cat forest and were always losing weight, but were so sweet and loving. Steve, the cat who had been kicked in the face but was so sweet and loving anyway. Lucky and Rusty, two senior cats whose owner passed and had nowhere to go. About Daizee, the grouchy matriarch who was so sassy. In a very dramatic and comedic turn of events, her owners decided to change her name to something much different: Daisy!

I could tell you all these stories from memory. And so could Dan. And so could many of our staff– some of them never even met these cats. And so could the hundreds of folks who have adopted these cats from Catoro in the last two years.

A while back, Dan bought us two tickets to see his favourite artist of all time - Bruce Springsteen. The concert was last week. The night of the concert, Dan sold the tickets so we could afford cat food for the cats at Catoro. He loves the cats and he loves Catoro, but if you know Dan, you know he also loves music, and I could tell that was a hard choice for him.

Writing this post makes me feel like a failure as a business owner and an animal rescuer. But, simply put, we’ve run out of money. If you could help us keep our lights on, our staff paid, and our cats fed, we would be very grateful. We are just two small-town kids trying to build on a vision of a magical forest full of cats. We want to create a place where there is a rich and vibrant community, where folks can connect with animals and with each other. And where the most vulnerable cats have care, safety and refuge.

If you have some extra cash in your pocket this holiday season and have been thinking about giving back to the community, we would deeply appreciate your support. We will gratefully accept contributions and no amount is too small.

With love, laughter and kitty litter

Annah & Dan