Iams reaches out to bloggers to help get homes for 1.5 million pets in their Home 4 the Holidays Program

Today being Wednesday was my day to post over at the Lip-sticking blog. If you aren't aware (and most of you that read my blog probably are not) Yvonne DiVita, the founder of Lip-sticking, also has a petblog that she writes called Scratching and Sniffings which is sponsored by Purina. So she receives quite a bit of content and requests to blog about pet related products and programs. This one program came from Iams, which reached out to many bloggers to help spread the word. Iams of course is a direct competitor to Purina, so Yvonne wasn't able to write about it. But I can and since I have two dogs and two cats, it's dear to my heart.

So last week I began my annual blogging about holiday promotions and started with this post about the Sephora Claus Twitter promotion. So as promised I'm continuing with the holiday theme, however, this Iams program takes on a much more serious tone that Sephora. Iams is back with their Home 4 the Holidays (IH4TH) program and needs help to place 1.5 million pets into loving homes by January 4, 2010!

Last year, the program’s goal of helping 1 million pets get adopted within three months was outdone when 1,202,701 pets were placed in homes — including Rumi, adopted by two-time Academy Award® winner and 2009 IH4TH ambassador Hilary Swank. You can watch an appearance of Hilary Swank on Ellen speaking about the program here on YouTube.

With nearly 8 million homeless animals in the U.S. today, and almost half scheduled to be euthanized this year alone, the program is needing everyone's help now more than ever. In partnership with the Helen Woodward Animal Center, IH4TH is one of the most successful pet adoption programs in the world and brings together nearly 3,500 animal organizations worldwide. Since 1999, IH4TH has helped more than 3 million animals find homes and hopes to continue breaking the goals they set each year. You can visit them on Facebook and Twitter as well.

With the Feed Pets in Need program, Iams is offering to bring much needed food to Home 4 the Holidays participating shelters by asking visitors to IH4TH.COM to simply cast a vote. Each month, for the next 13 months, the shelter with the most votes gets a month’s supply of free food!

Iams is also sponsoring the Life's Better Sweepstakes which is giving away thousands of prizes to help pets get the most out of life. Part of the promotion includes a $10,000 donation in Iams food to the Home 4 the Holidays participating shelter of the winner's choice.

So check it out and feel free to spread the word. This is a great way for a brand to raise awareness of themselves while giving back to the communities.