Marla Karraker
Losing a beloved member of your family is never something easy to deal with. Our dog passed away so I contacted Faithful Friends Pet Services to make arrangements to have him cremated. Everyone was wonderful. Amy was so patient with me on the phone as I was dealing with a lot of emotions. She walked me through the process and what to expect. I called a couple times and spoke with Ora as well and she was wonderful. We met Donnie at the crematorium to drop our boy off. Donnie is truly an angel on earth. We had our daughters with us and he showed all of us so much kindness and compassion. I will never forget how well he treated us during this awful time in our life. Everything went as expected. We brought our boy home along with a paw print mold and some of his fur. I cannot say enough great things about Donnie and his customer service. He truly cares about the work he does and you can see that when you talk to him. Thank you Donnie for everything you did for us. We will never forget your kindness.
Karen Shelby
My husband and I had to put one our Yorkies asleep weeks ago and experienced a very comforting experience afterwards. We took Macy to Graceland Fairlawn Funeral Home(Faithful Friends Pet Services) here in Decatur to have her cremated at their pet crematory. After arriving and being greeted by Amy she explained the various services offered by their Faithful Friends division. After paying for the cremation I was introduced to Don who is responsible for the cremation. I learned that he is also a minister and told us that he shares a prayer with your pet just prior to the cremation. We loved that! Amy and Don hugged us both for our loss and wiped away their tears after we gave our final words and kisses to our Macy. We felt like both of the employees knew Macy but realized they were just animal lovers.When I picked up Macy the following day(yes...not a 2 week wait) David Goebel came out with a nice paper sack with dog paw prints on it(see pics). I noticed inside not only Macy's remains from her private cremation but also a leatherette bound case with a pet loss poem on top. Opening it I saw enclosed some of Macy's hair and on the bottom her 2 pawprints in a plaster like base. WOW! I was unaware of this gift to us. I told David that he has no idea how much we appreciated that and how much it means to us both.I highly recommend Graceland Fairlawn (Faithful Friends Pet Services) on Oakland Avenue in Decatur. They helped us in so many ways during the loss of one of beloved pet dogs. Thank you Amy, Don and David from the bottom of our hearts. You made a difficult situation much more bearable.I wanted to share this wonderful experience with all pet owners and even posted it on Facebook to make sure others are aware of Faithful Friends Pet Service. I had 66 comments and 125 reactions from my post on Facebook.Karen and Dick ShelbyDecatur
Samantha Keller
We lost our sweet dog unexpectedly. I called Graceland Pet Services the next morning and they were able to get her in within an hour. Donnie was a lovely person who was kind and comforting from the time I arrived until I left. He carried her inside for me, let me have as long as I needed to say goodbye, and made the paperwork process easy. We had her back by the next day, along with a nose print and paw print. He even framed an ink paw print with her name on it for us. We received her temporary urn and plan to move her to something nicer soon. My heart is broken over the loss of my baby girl, but I am so grateful to Donnie and his team for their kindness in this time of grief. He even made special accommodations for financing for us. I hope you never need these services but if you do, this is the place to go.
Angela Brewer
If you love your pet do not take them to Faithful Friends. My 17 year old dog passed away last month. I called Faithful Friends about an appointment for cremating my beloved dog. The gentleman that I spoke with was very nice and sympathetic. He took down all the information needed and we had an appointment for Monday morning. My dog was brought to Faithful friends frozen because he passed on a Friday and had to stay in the freezer at the vets over the weekend. When we arrived we had to wait quite awhile before someone came in to help us. The gentleman finally came in and he kept calling my dog by the wrong name. He finally realized he had the wrong paperwork and then disappeared for 10 minutes. He obviously lost all of the information I had given him over the phone so he had to ask me all of the questions again. Not something I wanted to do as I was grieving my dog. We finally got through that so then we drove over to the crematorium. The gentleman there took my dog and told me it would probably be Friday by the time he would be cremated because they had several dogs come in recently. I got a phone call Wednesday letting me know he was ready to be picked up. When I arrived his ashes were in a plastic urn in a paper bag. I was told they would have a foot print and some of my dogs hair along with the urn It was not in the bag so I asked where it was. It took awhile to get a answer, but I was told due to the circumstances they were not able to do it. I heard the gentleman from the crematorium say “due to decomposition”. I found out later that my dog was left out of the freezer and that was why he was decomposed and they could not get a foot print or hair. This broke my heart and was just unbearable to think about. I was told they would give me a refund (which does not make up for what they did)and it would take up to 10 days. Two weeks later I still did not have the refund. My husband called them about it and the refund was posted that day.The whole experience was awful and I hope that no one ever has to go through what we went through.
