The work goes on to get Wolverhampton's first Cat cafe, the Qattery, open

Express & Star

We meet the sisters behind what will be Wolverhampton's first Cat Cafe, soon to open.

Transcript

00:00Hello, I'm Joseph Merovich and I'm stood inside the cat area of the Cattery. It's the first cat

00:09cafe to appear within Wolverhampton and it's the brainchild of these two people here, Debbie Morgan

00:14and Marie Morris. I suppose the first question, where did the idea come from? Well, basically,

00:20I lived in Catter for eight years and I've been a rescuer for the last six years. I've rescued

00:27many cats. Some of them stayed with me. They adopted us and I couldn't face leaving them

00:33alone in Catter. They wouldn't have been able to survive. We hand reared some of them. Some

00:39of them were rescued from the street. All 19 have been brought back over to the UK with

00:47us. So you've got 19 cats over here and obviously I'm guessing the house was getting a bit messy.

00:53So why the cat cafe? What was the thoughts beyond that? Well, basically, we built an extension

00:58on the back of the house and we built a 20 foot catty arm. But because we've got to work

01:04and obviously it costs a lot for us to keep the cats fed, watered, it's very expensive.

01:12We decided to look at maybe sanctuary or some way that we could house them and give them what

01:18they need. So basically, we had a look around and saw this business was up for sale and looked

01:28at the options of having a cat cafe. We can spend time with them. We can be at work with

01:33them and they'll have all the love they need. And you're both cat people, I assume?

01:38Absolutely. I have been for years. I've never had a moment where I haven't had an animal

01:44in my life. So naturally we know how cats are, how they feel. We've just got a natural knowledge

01:53for how cats behave and what their needs are. Just emphasising on what Debbie was saying,

01:58I think one of the main reasons for doing this was it was almost like a light bulb moment.

02:02It was an off the cuff remark one day where it was a situation realising that the cats

02:07need the love and attention. They need, they absolutely adore human interaction. And Debbie

02:14made a remark to me the one day and she says, I don't know how we're going to manage with

02:18my husband working and myself working full time. These cats are on their own, many hours

02:23a day and it's going to be stressful for them. So it was sort of, do you know what, could

02:29we're going to be taking the cats to work? And it was like, why don't we? Why don't

02:33we? This is it. Let's do it.

02:35There's a lot of cat cafes around the UK, but this is the first within Wolverhampton.

02:39So what do you think the reception is going to be?

02:42We've already had a huge reception, to be honest. I mean, the amount of people that have been

02:46interested in coming along. The Enjoy Wolverhampton put a post out and literally it went mad.

02:54Viral didn't it? Yeah. Fantastic. Oh my God. What are we going to do? It's, it's, it's quite

03:01surprised us actually. All the cats at the moment are from Qatar. Is there scope for maybe

03:06having cats from around the area as well in the future? No plan. There's no plan. No plan.

03:11These are all, these are my babies. So these are basically our pets. So they, they would never

03:17be up for adoption. And if anything happened where they, we didn't have this building, then they

03:23would still be at home. They would be taken home. There are a couple of them that are actually not

03:27suitable for the cat cafe. Um, so a couple that we rescued, they're actually, um, they don't like

03:33people. They don't interact very well. So I would never dream of bringing those here. We're bringing

03:38the ones that we know needs attention. Um, and basically when, when we actually brought them home,

03:43sort of family came to see them. Obviously they've not seen them because they were in Qatar. So the cats

03:48didn't know them either. Um, the family has been and visited them and it was like, they're

03:53crying out for attention. They fought for a lap. They'd die on your lap. Yeah. And, uh,

03:58let's talk about this room because, um, you've been doing a lot of work to get it ready and,

04:02um, obviously there's all the different cat toys, but there's a lot of artwork around here.

04:06So, um, explain the rationale behind that. So basically, um, yeah,

04:10Musi said came to visit us in Qatar and there's a shopping mall in Qatar. It's quite an older shopping

04:16mall and they, they have the ceiling the same. So they've actually, um, been at our, um,

04:23It's just like a lane in itself too. Yeah. Yeah. Keeping that clean. Yeah.

04:28And, uh, you're obviously still building to get this place, um, ready to go. When is the

04:33expected open day? We were aiming for the 29th of June. So we were working hard to try and get

04:38that up and running. Uh, we want the cats to be in sort of a few days before we open. The problem

04:43we've got at the moment is there's a few delays in getting things up and running. We need the

04:47cat license. So we need the animal welfare license and we're waiting for that to be sorted. So no

04:54sort of start date for now, but, um, once you do get going, um, what's the process for booking?

05:00We've got an online booking system that we're in process of setting up now that should be open very,

05:05very soon. And once these slots are on, on our website, you can go on there, book the slots,

05:11uh, just pay online. Yeah. And, uh, you two can probably both answer this. What are the benefits

05:15of a cat cafe? I think from, uh, the cat perspective, what we've already mentioned,

05:20the fact that the cats crave the attention and it's something they're not getting at the moment

05:24with Debbie putting all the ozzy and her husband being at work full time. So from the cat's perspective,

05:29it's, it's great for them. They'll have so much to do here. It'll be fantastic from a, a, a people point

05:36of view. We want to offer like a community kind of feel. The cafe that we, we took on as a business

05:42as it was, uh, had already implemented some of those things. We do an autism cafe and, um, some

05:48other things. We want to be part of a community. It's a community thing. We want to give something

05:53back with, you know, it's, we are Wolverhampton, so. Absolutely. Enjoy your cappuccino and stroke it

05:59a tabby. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Well, this will, um, eventually become full of cats and people.

06:06So when it does open, get yourself down to the casserie and, um, enjoy your cappuccino.

06:12Meow.

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