Black cat Palmerston the inspiration for our new model
Until late 2018 we made the Petflap in white. In January 2019 we switched to making it in black, and wanted to name this sleek black model after a well-known and highly respected black cat. We considered the name Felix, but the cat food manufacturers might have something to say about that. We wondered about Bilbo or Frodo as we had black rescue cats with those names, but copyright again. Then we thought of Palmerston, otherwise known as Chief Mouser and @DiploMog on Twitter. Palmerston is a rescue cat from Battersea so we couldn’t think of a better namesake for our new model, known as the Palmerston. We haven’t asked him, but we hope he’d be honoured.
Why switch to black?
We’ve had many enquiries about why we switched from white to black, as the white model was popular. The problem lies with laser cutting, how we cut our parts. The white ABS material reflected much of the laser light, so the laser had to be cranked up and that resulted in a form of burn to the edges of the plastic. These rough edges had to removed by hand before the parts could be assembled which took a long time and resulted in fractional variance to the profile of the parts. To produce the Petflap at volume we had to remove that step, and switching to black ABS was a simple solution.
Black cat love
We’ve been sad to hear that black cats and dogs are being given to shelters because they are hard to photograph in a time when online images are so important to people. We find this heartbreaking, but it’s good to see that in Palmerston’s case (and Bilbo’s and Frodo’s) a black cat can have a happy ending. #AdoptDontShop
