They were never just a pet.
Freeze-dry preservation keeps your cat or dog exactly as they were. Their real size, their real fur, the way they always curled up. So they can stay in the places they always were.
If your pet has just passed
- 1
Keep them cool and get them frozen as soon as you can. A chest freezer is best, a home freezer is fine.
- 2
Call us before you pack, wrap or ship anything. It takes a few minutes and it protects them.
- 3
Then take the time you need to decide. Frozen, they will keep until you are ready.
There is no rush and no obligation. Call any time. 844-773-8568844-7PETLOVE
The part that doesn’t end.
It is rarely the big things. It is the dent still in the cushion. The corner of the couch that was theirs and nobody else’s. The sound of them settling down in the next room, the one you stopped noticing until it was gone.
That is the part people are trying to hold on to. An urn is a container for what is already gone, and there is nothing wrong with that. This is a different thing. Your pet stays their own size and shape, with their own fur and their own face, in the room where they always were.
How the process works
Reach out
Call before you do anything else.
We will tell you exactly how to keep your pet safe in the first few hours, then stop talking about the process and let you decide in your own time. Most people call the same day. Some call a week later. Both are fine.
Arrive
Bring them to the lab, or ship them frozen.
Our lab is in Port Chester, New York, open by appointment. If you are further away we walk you through packing and shipping before you touch a single box. Clients send us their pets from across the country.
Remember
Tell us how they slept.
This is the part that matters most. We ask for your photographs and talk through how your pet actually held themselves. The curl they always slept in. The tilt of the head. The paw tucked under. We work from your memory of them, not from a catalog of poses.
Preserve
Months of cold, and no shortcuts.
Extreme cold and sustained vacuum draw every trace of moisture out of the tissue without collapsing it. The smallest cats and dogs may take three to four months. Most take six to nine. It cannot be rushed, and we would not want it to be.
Home
They go back where they always were.
Most people do not put them in a case. They go back on the bed, or the chair by the window, or the corner of the couch. A soft dust now and then is all the care they need. Keep them out of direct sun so the fur does not fade.
The work behind it
0+
Pets preserved for families across the country. Hundreds, one at a time.
Mac’s Taxidermy
The practice traces back to Mike “Mac” McCullough, one of the country’s premier freeze-dry practitioners, covered by 20/20 and The Wall Street Journal.
0+
Years of freeze-dry work, and the patience it takes to do it properly.
Every one of these belonged to someone.
Written about in
Slate
“A quiet answer for people who cannot bear an urn.”
The U.S. Sun
“Hundreds of pets, kept exactly as their families knew them.”
60 Second Docs
“The work is slow on purpose.”
Local television
“A Westchester lab doing something few places will.”
From families
“She is back on the end of the bed where she slept for sixteen years. The first morning I forgot for a second, and that second was a gift.”
Pricing
Priced by weight. Said plainly.
Two prices, set by your pet's weight. Once they are weighed at the lab we send a written quote to your account, and it never goes above these numbers.
More on pricing- Up to 10 lbs
- $5,500.
- Up to 15 lbs
- Up to $7,500, never more.
- Over 15 lbs
- By request. Call and ask.
- Deposit
- 50% when your pet arrives at the lab.
- Balance
- Due once they are prepped and posed.
- Payment
- Check, Venmo or Zelle avoid the card processing fee.
Questions about cost are welcome and cost nothing. 844-773-8568
Questions people ask.
Talk it through with us.
Most people who call are not ready to decide anything. They just want to ask questions first. That is what the phone is for, and there is no obligation at the end of it.
844-773-8568info@secondlifefreezedry.com