We were lucky to catch up with Darrin Wilson recently and have shared our conversation below.

Darrin, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

Pibborafi’s mission is to help as many volunteer-run animal rescue shelters as possible by donating a portion of sales from custom-made children’s toy plushies designed after real rescued dogs. Each plushie’s sales help the rescue that dog was rescued from.

Pibborafi started by chance when I decided to recreate our rescued Boston Terrier, Angus, as a plush gift for my (then) wife. She was elated and posted the gift on social media. Dozens messaged her back asking where could they get one. I decided to order a small run of 1500 dolls and christened them ‘Wugadogs’. He sold out fast so I launched a small business in 2013 doing people’s rescued dogs in plush.
In 2016, I changed the name to Pibborafi and began doing many other people’s rescues in a new, palm-sized design and began donating 30% of net to the rescues and shelters where each dog was found.
We launched an annual global contest “The International Pibborafi Rescue Hero Contest” held exclusively on Instagram where the public votes for which dog gets to be the next Pibborafi Rescue Hero Plushie from hundreds of submissions.

Darrin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I grew up with rescued dogs, cats, rabbits. Any domesticated animal that needed rescuing, our family took them in. One of my earliest memories is of myself laying in a stroller being licked liberally on the face by our Dalmatian. In my teens and twenties I took jobs walking people’s dogs before I landed in freelance graphic design.

Being so busy with graphic design I began to miss the company of animals and decided to find a way to somehow help rescues. While thinking about how best to do this, my (then) wife and I adopted a Boston Terrier, named Angus, from a small breed rescue in Toronto. It was then that I decided to surprise her with a custom plush of Angus as a gift. She posted the doll on social media to show people and we began to get inquiries about how to buy one. I started selling them and christened the venture ‘Wugadogs’.

In 2016 I rebranded the company Pibborafi and began creating many more dogs (the owner of the dog gets 12 of their Pibborafi Rescue Hero plushies free with free shipping, we then add their Rescue Hero plushie to our stable to sell), donating 30% of net proceeds to the rescues who rescued the dogs. Each retail tag features a QR code that leads to their specific rescue story as told by their owners. I also began working with rescue organizations to donate the plushies that they could sell themselves, or fundraise with. Some rescues, holding silent auctions, raised hundreds, sometimes thousands, of dollars… all goes toward medicine, food, and care for the animals.

As word of Pibborafi spread, we began to attract a core following on social media, all of which were rescue moms and dads. many news stations covered the International Pibborafi Rescue Hero Contest and rallied local dogs who were nominated. As Pibb began to make more and more plushie dogs, our audience reached out to us and let us know they appreciated everything that we were doing and that it was an honor to become the next Pibborafi Rescue Hero. Posts of the plushies spread over social media and attracted the attention of Drew Barrymore and Pibb landed a mention on her show.

What really sets us apart from other “your pet as a plush” companies, is that we only do rescued dogs. Dogs bought or purchased from a breeder do not qualify as Pibborafi Rescue Heroes. And with the Contest and voting selection process, we have become the lottery of the doggie-in-plush business. And many rescue shelters benefit from selling or fundraising with them.

I am most proud of the way Pibborafi has opened up the communication between our audience members themselves to engage their passion for rescuing. Many enjoy sharing their own stories of how they became Pibborafi Rescue Hero plushies, voicing their appreciation of how we are trying to promote “different-is-beautiful” and “adopt-don’t-shop” mantras, and that is what I am most proud of.

What do I want new fans to know about us? Just that we exist and what we do. To know that they have a kindred spirit out there in the rescue community that cares as much about rescuing animals as they do.

How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?

The key we have found is to monitor social media comments four or five times daily, when new messages come in, answer them promptly, address issues promptly and courteously, and don’t be afraid to talk to them like you are a friend. They will appreciate the openness and brand loyalty filters down from that dialogue and relationship you make with the customers. Granted, you must be a relatively small outfit to deal with customers in this fashion but that’s how you build brand loyalty.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

Initial funding for the first few shipments (several thousand dollars) came from my savings. After selling through, you could finance small subsequent production runs with the proceeds… these were not large production runs, which was the key to self-financing.

Contact Info:

• Website: pibborafi.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pibborafi/
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/pibborafi
• Twitter: @pibborafi