I'm a little at a loss, and I thought perhaps someone with experience in
this area could give me their advice.  Our local pet store, the one where
we bought our first ferret and which we visit pretty often to play with
the kits, is all in all a pretty good one.  Their staff seem fairly
knowledgeable about ferrets, several of them have had them as pets, and
they're happy to stand around chatting about them when the store isn't
too busy.
 
There are just two things I'd like them to do.  First, they're keeping
their kits in pine shavings (with a hammock, a couple of tubes, and
sometimes a towel).  Now, I understand that it's much more convenient
for the store, and the kits aren't generally around for longer than
a week before they go home with someone, so it's not an enormous problem.
Still, I'd really rather customers not get the impression that this is
the right thing to do.  Besides, the wood shavings smell terrible, at least
to me, and may give people the wrong impression about what the ferrets will
smell like.  But how can I tactfully mention these points to the store?
 
Second, I'd like to give the store copies of the FAQ, or perhaps a more
condensed version of it, to give to new ferret owners.  But since there's
still a waiting period to buy a ferret in New York (for the permit to
arrive), the store's probably hoping to sell a few books (the Barron's one)
rather than giving all the information away for free.  (They do have a
brief info sheet posted by the kits which mentions cat food, litter boxes,
rubbery objects and ferretproofing.)  Any suggestions on how I can approach
them about this?
 
If you've had experience "helping" pet stores, please let me know.  Longer
anecdotes or advice can be maileddirectly to me, and I'll summarize here.
Thanks!
 
- Pam in Rochester, NY  ([log in to unmask])
Rusty "Hey, dates are a lot like raisins!" and Pixxel "So are shoe insoles!"
Ferret FAQ 1.2: rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/news.answers/pet-ferret-faq/general
 
[Posted in FML issue 0876]