LINCOLN PARK — Greta Glimm was hooked on pit bulls after first adopting her dog Zoey six years ago.
She didn't plan on the breed, but after taking an online personality test that matched her with Zoey, she couldn't resist the dog and her funny ears.
"Before I knew it she was mine," Glimm said.
After nearly a decade of working in sales, Glimm opened her own pet boutique in Lincoln Park, which this weekend will be hosting the first of many pit bull adoption events.
Saturday afternoon, Dog and Kitty in the City will host four pit bulls from Chicagoland Bully Breed Rescue in her business, located at 2622 N. Halsted St.
Chicagoland Bully Breed Rescue the oldest pit bull rescue in the Midwest.
Glimm, a 34-year-old South Loop resident, got the itch to start her own business last winter, and opened the doors in late May after quitting her job in high-tech sales.
"At the end of the day, what I did, I didn’t view as important," she said. "It wasn’t fulfilling. I felt like all I did was chase a quota and it didn’t matter to me.”
Her new job matters, and she hopes to use the storefront business as a means to not only sell dog and cat supplies to neighborhood pet owners, but to help find animals homes.
After Zoey died, Glimm fostered a pit named Tate. When Tate's adoption fell through, she gave the dog a permanent home.
She also has two cats, which were both rescued.
Glimm said opening her business was a tough decision, but one she felt she had to make.
"I never thought I’d actually do it," she said. "I thought it would be fun and fulfilling and all the things that my job wasn’t.”
During Saturday's adoption event, any customer — whether they are interested in the dogs or not — will receive 10 percent off their purchase if they mention the rescue. That 10 percent will go directly to Chicago Bully Breed Rescue.
Cherry is one of the dogs available for adoption. She was rescued from animal control last weekend and had to have part of her tail amputated and have eye surgery.
She is only 4 1/2 months old.
There will be two more puppies available and a 5-year-old.
"The older guy is absolutely gorgeous. He is beautiful," said Carolyn Giannopoulos, who runs Chicago Bully Breed Rescue.
Giannopoulos manages about 20 pit bulls, which reside with foster families.
"We can get a better feeling of their personalities," she said. "We teach them the things they need to know to be in a home."
Giannopoulos will be at Dog and Kitty in the City Saturday and hopes that even if people aren't looking to adopt the dogs, they will change their perceptions of them.
A lot of people are afraid of pit bulls, but Giannopoulos finds that most of the time the people she talks to at adoption events have never met one.
"People say I'm scared of pit bulls and I say 'Oh my god, what happened,'" she said. "And they say, 'I've never really met one.' Well that's a pit bull right in front of you."
That ability to change perceptions, her second goal for Saturday, is almost as important as finding dogs a home.
"To be able to say 'Wow they are not like the dogs you heard on the news. Not like that scary dog that's chained up in the yard you drive by every day,'" Giannopoulos said.
