Reading the ENTIRE ad and GOOGLING location before contacting

Ok, this has been kind of driving me up the wall lately because it's been happening a lot.  And by a lot, I mean, like lately, 1 in every 2 people who contact me.

So, here's what happens.  I get an email or text from someone saying hey, would like to adopt your ___________, how do I go about that.  And so we talk and I explain and say there's an adoption form and all that, and they say send it to them.  So I do, and somewhere in there, I get an email that goes something like this....

"I noticed you're in Munster, IN.... that might be too far"

And then there's talk about borrowing cars and all that, and in the end, they end up saying, it's too far for them to go, and so they can't adopt.

The "too far" part I completely understand.  Today I got texts/email from someone in Maryland.  I agree, too far.  Now, if someone wanted to drive here from Maryland, I'm not going to stop them.  But I would say the average person isn't driving that far for a pet.

Now, the one today didn't waste a ton of time because there wasn't a ton of talking, and we'd only gotten as far as me sending the form before they realized we were too far.  But in some instances, I've written books in emails to answer their questions, explain care, go over every possible thing they need (which is fine, I would prefer to educate people so they know what they're getting into)... only to find out they're states away.  Which really, especially now considering how little time I have between work and just cleaning cages and running the rescue, I try to minimize the time that gets wasted doing pointless thing. 

I wouldn't get aggravated about this is if I didn't have location or anything like that.  But the website has our location in Indiana on the contact page, and for the people who see an ad for one of our adoptable animals outside of the website... well, let me give you an example.  Here is an example of an ad we currently have up.  It's a rat ad, but the chin ad is similar, just substituting the word "chinchilla" for "rat".  Ad is in italics:

We have several rats that are looking for their forever homes.  We currently have 2 males that were born on 1/15/2013 and are 5-6 months old.  All of these rats are black hooded.  All of these rats have normal ears.

We also have a black hooded male rat that does not like other rats and needs to be caged by himself.  He is very sweet and will come up to the front of the cage for treats and pets.  He is the most social of the males, he simply does not get along with other rats.  He is about 5-6 months old as well.  He can be adopted by himself

All of these rats are still young.  They are very sweet and playful.  They are a bit shy, but once you have them out of their cage, they do well with being handled and petted.  They have been handled often since birth.  They do not bite.  They all get along well with other rats (except for the one male rat caged separately).

As with all our rescues, these rats will come with some food to start you out (our mixed soy-free diet), some chews/treats, and a printed out version of our rat care packet. We also have additional supplies for sale -- many of the things we sell for chinchillas work great with rats as well (they like the hidey houses, the hammocks, and so on), and we also sell lab blocks at $1.25/pound.

Regardless of past rat experience, all potential homes will be asked to read our rat care packet and fill out our adoption application/rat questionnaire. If you are unwilling to do this, please do not waste our time or yours. No rat will go to a new home without an adoption application being filled out - no exceptions.

These rats are located in Munster, Indiana (zip code 46321).

We only adopt our rats in pairs or groups, unless you are looking for a cagemate for a rat you currently own. 

The adoption fees is as follows: 

--one rat: $10

--pair of males: $15

For more info and pictures, visit our website - http://www.nwichinchillas.com/availablechinchillas.htm

If you are interested in these rats, would like to see additional pictures, or have any questions, please let us know. We also do have other rescue critters up for adoption as well. You can email us at amgajda@sbcglobal.net or text/call 219-789-0026 for more information or if you have any questions. If you call and there is no answer, please leave a message and we will get back to you.

See all the red?  That's all boilerplate -- things that do not change or get reworded from ad to ad.  Literally, when I write a new ad, I open a current one, change the info in black, and the rest never changes.  Point being, every ad lists that the animals are located in Munster, IN.  With our zip code even, so people don't even have to spell the name, just type the zip code into mapquest.

I do understand that if you search for "chinchillas for sale, Indiana," you do not always get Indiana chinchilla ads.  I've come up with Florida ads, and so on and so forth.  It happens, because many sites, if there are no Indiana ads, will give you other chinchilla ads from other states.  So, no Indiana ads?  Then you get Michigan and Florida and so on.  But... I feel like, first off,the (219) area code should be a clue.  I'm familiar with the local area codes, besides 219, 708, 312, 317, and a few others that I probably could remember if I tried harder.... if it's not one of those...   you're probably too far away.  So, say I'm looking at an ad for a cage for sale and I see an 798 area code, I'd be like hmmm maybe this isn't local? 

But people just see like "chinchilla" and call the number.  It's so frustrating for me because I feel like, how hard is it to read an ad????   And to google the location. 

I will purchase cages and other stuff off craigslist and like say I don't recognize the location.  Like for example, I once went to Red Key, Indiana.  Never heard of it, right?  Neither had I.  It's around Anderson if I recall.  One of those one-stoplight towns.  Anyway, point being, I didn't know where it was, so I googled the town and then mapquested how long it would take me to get from here to there.  It was apparently reasonable so I went.  And that took me all of....5 minutes.  That's all I ask -- read the ad, google the town.