Ecostar Award

Ecostar Award, Montana USA

In February of 2010, CatTamboo™ Pet Toys received the EcoStar Award for our environmental efforts. We felt honored to be among the other 27 small businesses that won the award.

That February, we gathered in the capitol city of Helena, MT at the capitol building, in the rotunda. Our Montana governor (Brian Schweitzer) gave a wonderful speech about our heritage in relationship to nature. Montanan’s have always been good stewards of the land and those who where not didn’t make it out here.

It was impressive to see how much other companies have done to help our environment. In the future, we had hoped to see many others join this event, but once you’ve won the honors those who participated will bring other businesses along or encourage them to make some changes. In 2012, CatTamboo™ Pet products got more green with the introduction of a new program. The program involved collecting wild game birds from Montana, Wyoming, Washington, and South Dakota. Comparing the statistics of how many game birds are shot each year, the numbers of wasted natural resources are staggering. Our networking goal for 2013 was to process multiple hundreds of each species including ducks, geese, wild turkey and pheasant. Now it is 2015 and we are still striving to make use of these otherwise wasted natural resources. Click here to learn more about our Game bird conservation program and the statistics on how many game bird hunting licenses are pulled each year in Montana alone and what that equates to in terms of feather and feather toy numbers. The fact is that most game bird feathers are wasted because collecting and processing them is a challenge and expense. It is much easier to just hook up a supplier from China. But we have the same values as all Ecostar award winners in our commitment to make the planet greener, and we love supporting the US and Montana economies.

Another development from 2012 game bird conservation efforts is happening this fall of 2015 with the possible addition of yet another feather resource and feather type. We are researching the possibility of adding white domestic turkey to the mix. White turkey feathers are strikingly beautiful and make awesome cat toys.

In addition, we have large scale plans that will continue to take plastic waste out of the environment and employ Americans for production and distribution of our made in the USA pet toys.

February 9, 2011August 31, 2015

Wild Game Feathers – Wanted

Why Wild Game Feathers?

We use wild game feathers to make our interactive cat toys and feather toys for small dogs and other pets like ferrets. As part of our policy and effort to conserve our natural resources, we are asking all locals from Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, and surrounding areas to save your goose, peacock, and turkey feathers! Millions of wild game feathers are thrown in the trash each year in Montana alone. When you add up the waste nation wide, it is truly astounding how much of our natural resources are wasted.

We will purchase wild game feathers from you to make it worth your effort, and you can feel good about sharing in our mission of creating a Greener Planet! Naturally we ask for donations first, but please don’t let that stop you. Everybody knows that recycling isn’t a great way to make money, but it is a good thing to do and we make it simple.

Click here to Contact Us via email or call customer service at 406-534-9707.

Thank you!

August 22, 2010September 1, 2015

Billings MT Fair Success

A Big Thank You !!!

We had an incredible response at the Montana State Fair this last week. Sales volume was very good and literally thousands upon thousands of people got to see CatTamboo™ pet toys in action!

We had many responses that I thought were really fun and we learned a lot from our customers (many who have been with us since last year).

My two favorite comments that we got about a dozen times are:

(1) “Are these just plain feathers or do you put something special on them that makes my cat go that crazy?” (These were asked in all seriousness!) Indeed it is interesting what happens when you effectively combine all the primary senses of sight, sound, smell, and taste.

(2) “Oh good, we’ve been looking all over for you! We came to the Fair just to get your cat toy!”

In the evenings, it was fun to watch how some people were captivated by the mysterious bird-thing flying through the air. Some thought it was a bat. On occasion, someone wouldn’t notice (the bat!) until it was near their shoulder and then they would quickly duck and run! I always found that funny!

Especially after their friends got laughing at them 🙂

We got enough of the French tickler comments that I seriously considered putting up a red light for the midnight crowd! I could advertise it with a big question: Red light or Blue light Special?

Then we had the cat people phenomenon which was always funny and happened quite often.

Some wonderfully dynamic individual would pretend to be a cat and leap for the toy!

Soooo fun~! and always good for business! Good times at the Billings MT Fair!

Thank you again for all who stopped by our booth at the Billings MT Fair or took an interest in our pet products. We had a wonderful experience and will definitely be there again next year!