George Real Estate Group Radio Broadcast

From School Project To 11 States: A Teen’s Mission To Support Animal Shelters

• George Real Estate Group

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Some stories restore your faith in what a single person can spark. Meet Zoe Hewitt, a high school senior who turned a simple classroom idea into Kennel Kindness, a student-powered network that supports animal shelters with the exact supplies they need—blankets, toys, enrichment mats, and adoption kits—crafted on a shoestring and shipped where they’ll do the most good. One teacher’s Instagram post reached 10,000 people and took the project from Asheville roots to 11 states in days.

We talk about why fostering changes everything, especially after disaster. Following Hurricane Helene, Brother Wolf Animal Rescue lost its facility and leaned on over 200 active fosters to keep animals safe, healthy, and adoptable. Zoe, who interns at Brother Wolf and fosters herself, explains how home environments reveal the behaviors and routines that make adoptions stick. From frozen enrichment treats that calm anxious pups to weekly Adoption Wednesdays and Saturdays in West Asheville, the focus is on practical, repeatable steps that save lives right now.

Zoe shares how the Riley’s Way Foundation helped her scale with the Kinder World for Animals Award, and what comes next: filing for 501(c)(3) status, recruiting student volunteers, and launching a website to coordinate nationwide efforts. The playbook is refreshingly simple—use affordable materials like fleece, organize student clubs, tell a clear story, and let the community run with it. Along the way, we spotlight the Hometown Hero spirit that makes our region special and the everyday leadership that keeps shelters moving forward.

Want to help? Foster, donate fleece, share their Instagram, or start a Kennel Kindness club at your school. Subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with someone who loves animals—then tell us the first small step you’ll take today.

SPEAKER_02:

The George Real Estate Group Radio broadcast is celebrating 10 years on WHKP. The George Real Estate Group is celebrating 10 years on the radio live every Thursday morning at 10.05 on WHKP 107.7 FM and AM 1450, and streaming online at WHKP.com. Each Friday morning at 8.45, the George Real Estate Group presents the Hometown Hero Award to someone in our community who goes above and beyond to make our hometown a better place to live. Here's this week's Hometown Hero Show. It's 845 on Friday mornings, and that's always our chance to gather around the microphones and uh honor our George Real Estate Group Hometown Hero. And uh Noah always joins me for this because he likes it as much as I do.

SPEAKER_01:

It's the highlight of the week for sure, and it's an honor and privilege to sponsor the Hometown Hero series here on WHKP. How are you doing? Well, happy Friday. Happy Friday, yeah. So much to be thankful for and doing well. I mean, the the market continues to move here. You know, that's the conversation was around the Thanksgiving table. People are like, what's happening with the real estate market? But I can assure you the the market's still strong. In fact, we've had a 10% increase in Henderson County with the number of homes selling the current 12 months versus the previous 12 months. So, you know, if there's concern, I mean you might see homes are sitting on the market a little bit longer, uh-huh, prices are softening just a little bit, but but the demand has actually increased uh for our area.

SPEAKER_02:

That uh that just speaks volumes about uh Henderson County, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01:

Absolutely, and and we're grateful. I mean, amazing, uh certainly working with uh so many of our wonderful natives. I we talk all the time, and people have been here two and three and four generations, and of course, yeah, the families that have discovered you know Hendersonville and Henderson County, and they they they they say they try to get here as quick as they can. Um whether it's uh they're retiring here or whether they're uh you know relocating here for a job. I mean, people certainly I remember back to COVID where the the conversation was move your dreams forward, don't wait. Uh don't wait to move to where you want to live. Don't wait, don't wait to live where you want to retire. Go ahead and and get to where you want to go.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, you're on the front line of that, and and uh I think uh that's one of the reasons that you're involved in our hometown hero show is is knowing and recognizing there are heroes amongst us here.

SPEAKER_01:

Every day, and again, the it's amazing. Our community is what it is because of the the men and women that live here and work here and and and go to school here and and people that want to make our place uh better, and that's it's contagious, and we love championing that. We love sharing the stories of uh amazing stories, and you and I get the privilege of having these conversations every Friday morning.

SPEAKER_02:

We sure do. And uh and a heads up, coming up on Christmas Day, we will uh recap our top 10 uh podcasts, uh our top 10 hometown heroes, and then we'll repeat that on Friday morning, the day after Christmas, and we're gonna expand it up to 30 minutes this year. We've we've always tried to scrunch that into 15, and it didn't work. So uh we're gonna be uh letting you know more about the most popular guests that we've had during 2025. I got a sneaking suspicion that I'm gonna have to redo my list after this morning. After this morning. Zoe Hewitt is here, and uh good morning to Zoe Hewitt.

SPEAKER_00:

Good morning, and thank you so much for having me here today. I'm happy to be here.

SPEAKER_02:

It is a real pleasure to meet you and and to have you here with us. Uh Zoe is the creator of Kennel Kindness, and uh one of your teachers at at uh Carolina Day School nominated you, and uh she saw that you s stood out in the in the crowd there at the uh at Carolina Day for uh being so compassionate toward animals. And uh just tell us uh how this uh Kennel Kindness was formed and how you got going with it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, so I'm a senior in high school, and in 2024 I founded this nonprofit, um, and we work with different students and different teachers um across the nation to um give back to animal shelters in need. So, with that, we students make dog treats, toys, blankets, and adoption kits, um, and we donate them to different animal shelters. And I have always had a love for animals, and I just knew I wanted to give this back to my community and started it with just Asheville and then has now a cross, and we are in 11 states now.

SPEAKER_01:

That's incredible, Noah. Remarkable. Uh where did you where did this idea first come from?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so I had brainstormed with another nonprofit. I work for Horizons at Carolina Day School, and I was asked to make a project that would be funded by the Riley's Way Foundation. And I took about a month of brainstorming and coming up with what I wanted to do, and in the end I knew animals have had such an impact on my life, and I have such a love for them that I had to do something for animals.

SPEAKER_01:

So in 2024, you started it locally. Correct. Where did you get the vision to let's go bigger?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it sort of all kind of fell into place. I reached out to a teacher in Delaware who uses um, she has foster puppies in her classroom, and I offered to send her a kit with blankets and toys, and then actually from there she did an Instagram post um and it outreached and reached 10,000 people. Um, and from there, within the matter of days, we were in 11 states.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow. You work with uh Brother Wolf Animal Rescue here locally, right?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, so I'm the program intern at Brother Wolf Animal Rescue as well as a foster parent, um, and then I'm also a foster parent at Blue Ridge Humane Society and Asheville Humane.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, you you've put in a lot of time uh in this since 2024, and that's uh and the the fruits of your labor are evident, as you say, in 11 states. Uh you've you've really worked a hard job here getting this launched and going.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I really enjoy it. It's been the highlight of definitely my high school career, and I'm excited to continue it on as I move into college.

SPEAKER_02:

So uh there at Carolina Today, you your classmates, they all jump in and and are creating toys and treats and things for uh for the local animals.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, correct. So we started a Kennel Kindness Project Club at CDS, um, and we meet just about once a week, and students make blankets, toys. They help me um prep materials for our other little events that we do um throughout the city.

SPEAKER_02:

And you got noticed uh by uh uh WLOS TV recently. Correct.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, so we worked um over the past summer we worked with Horizons at Carolina Day School, and we were lucky to have them come in um in July and feature um the project and the students that work with the project at Horizons.

SPEAKER_02:

And uh LOS came and did a story on you on that, right?

SPEAKER_00:

Correct, yes, and we were lucky to have um we had some cute little puppies come in too that got to play with the students, which was really fun.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay, well, how many uh how many pets do you personally have?

SPEAKER_00:

I too many. I owned ten pets of my own, and then over the past two years we have fostered fifty-five animals.

SPEAKER_02:

My God.

SPEAKER_00:

It is a lot.

SPEAKER_02:

Mom's over there just going, woo!

unknown:

Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

Tell tell us if you're sharing uh since we're speaking to our community here, yes, share with the community the importance of fostering animals.

SPEAKER_00:

It really does make make an impact, and I saw that when after Hurricane Helene, um, when Brother Wolf was so they were so devastated, um, I saw the impact of kind of how quickly our community was able to come together and really help Brother Wolf Animal Rescue rebuild and save all those animals' lives, and we were able to get everybody evacuated. Um and since then, as I've been a part of Brother Wolf's animal um like growth and journey as their intern, I have seen just how important it is to have animals fostering because we get to see and learn so much about them that we wouldn't be able to learn in a shelter setting.

SPEAKER_02:

So Brother Wolf Animal Rescue, for those who don't know, uh was totally devastated. I mean, they were wiped off the map. And where where are they where were they located?

SPEAKER_00:

So they were in um Biltmore Village.

SPEAKER_02:

Um yeah, Biltmore Village got hit hard, yeah. Yes. And so uh are they open in a new facility now?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, so we are in the process right now of actively searching for land to rebuild a new shelter of our own. Okay. Um currently we're kind of going in between some temporary spaces, um, but as of right now, the ASPCA was willing to kind of give us a part of their building to use. Um, and then we are an entirely foster-based organization right now. So we have over 200 active fosters. Um, I think we have about 60 animals in our care right now, the from different shelter poles or anything like that, um, that we are able to continue to save lives.

SPEAKER_02:

But uh over 200 fosters. So back to your question, though, how important fostering animals is such a need.

SPEAKER_00:

It really is, it really is. And we are able to kind of take, once we have these fosters available, we're able to take animals out of more crowded shelters that don't have the space and they have to make the tough choice to euthanize. We are able to take those animals in and help out personally.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. So you you say you uh that you and your classmates and friends uh make treats. What what uh what do you make? What uh kind of and you're I bet you're always looking for dog toys too, all right? I am, yes.

SPEAKER_00:

So we are always actively seeking donations, but we figured out a way to make this um to make the project as low cost as possible. So our biggest material that we use is fleece, and we are able to use that to make tie blankets as well as our toys, um, and actually as well as our little enrichment mats that we make to provide enrichment to the different animals. Um but with the treats, we have some sort of some different ones that we were able to do with adopters. Um, we do more of the ones that are gonna be shelf stable and that are gonna stay for longer. And for our shelters, we do a lot of frozen treats for some frozen enrichment, so it'll take the animals longer to go through.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. What's your uh best story about an adoption or yeah, my favorite one was actually one of our foster animals that we had.

SPEAKER_00:

Um, it was a rabbit, and her name was Tango, and she took just a very, very long time to get adopted. Um she just wasn't it just took a long time for her to get adopted. It just wasn't nobody was really looking for a rabbit at that point. Um, but when she got adopted, I saw Brother Wolf get so excited. They were the it was the only rabbit in their care. She had been in their care for a while, and it was just so amazing to see kind of everybody rebuild and go together. Wow.

SPEAKER_02:

Do you keep in touch with uh new foster parents?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I stay pretty intact um with the different foster parents. We have I've had a few adopters reach out to me since, um, but it's just amazing to see them when I go to our adoption Saturdays to meet the all, um, meet the adopters and kind of see that the animal's going into a loving home.

SPEAKER_02:

Adoption Saturdays.

SPEAKER_00:

Correct. So we do adoption um Wednesdays and Saturdays. Um, so we have all of the animals that are available for adoption at our building at the ASPCA in West Asheville, and they are able to come in, meet the animals just like we would in a shelter setting.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Noah, uh, this is amazing.

SPEAKER_01:

It's remarkable. Uh can you share again the connection with Riley's Way Foundation and and the support for Kennel Kindness Project?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, absolutely. So in 2024, I was um happy to receive the Um Kinder World for Animals Award, which is a part of the Call for Kindness Fellowship. Um so through that, Riley's Way Foundation Foundation invests in the next generation of young leaders. So they give out a certain amount of grant money to um young leaders to impact their social impact projects. Um and over the past few years, they have invested in over 3,500 young leaders.

SPEAKER_01:

Wow.

SPEAKER_02:

So coming up uh next for you, you're a senior in high school. So uh your college is in is right around the corner.

SPEAKER_00:

Correct. I'm looking, I'm hoping to major in elementary education. Um, and with that, I've done a lot of different research projects and ways to figure out how I can continue the Kennel Kindness project into a future classroom.

SPEAKER_01:

Wow. Yeah, what is the vision long term for Kennel Kindness?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. So my vision is we're actively um recruiting more volunteers, and it's been really nice to have the students at CDS really kind of step up and help me with that because I know that when I'm in college, I'm not gonna be able to have as an active role as I am here now. Um, so they've been able to kind of help me and do that part, and we are just sort of planning for the future actively.

SPEAKER_01:

Is it an unofficial or an official 501c3?

SPEAKER_00:

So we just filed actually for the 501c3. We're waiting to hear back from the IRS. But we are an official nonprofit through the state of North Carolina.

SPEAKER_01:

But you're working, you just filed. That's amazing. Thank you. And that's gonna open up so many doors and opportunities for people to give.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, we're very excited.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, speaking of giving, uh Zoe, if you can let us know all of the different ways that we can reach out to you.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Um, so our biggest platform that we are using right now is Instagram. So it's at Kennel Kindness Project. Um, and we post there pretty frequently, and we're actually actively seeking and working on launching a website, hopefully by the end of 2025, which we're very excited about. Um, but then also another way to reach out is through email, which is Kennelkindnessproject at gmail.com. So, yeah, those are our two big ways for now.

SPEAKER_02:

And you can uh get a phone call at 919-452-6929. Yeah. Well, gosh, I I'm just so impressed and uh just so thankful that your teacher uh reached out and let us know about this great project of yours, and we just say a small thank you with a uh a certificate that Noah has for you there.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, thank you so much. I really appreciate that.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, you're so welcome. And there's uh a couple of free meals around town. So amazing. We hope to drag you back over to Hendersonville, son.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. This was incredible. I really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, what would you say to a young person that has a vision like yours to to to do something like this? Maybe I mean whatever it might be.

SPEAKER_00:

My biggest advice is just to go for it. When I was in the beginning, I was so scared of my biggest question was like, what is this gonna look like? What is this gonna how is this gonna have an impact? How can I guarantee that I can make an impact? And the biggest way was just to start with it and kind of roll with it and let it flow and see it happen because everything will naturally fall into place.

SPEAKER_01:

Just take action.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02:

It's it's remarkable. Well, Noah uh is another amazing show here today, and uh you uh are so kind to sponsor this show, remind us of the George Real Estate Group and what you are into in our community.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, and again, congratulations, though. And again, we're thankful for everything you do for our community and and for the animals, and it's it's amazing. So it's an honor and privilege to have you here this morning and to sponsor the Hometown Hero Series. Of course, we love serving our community through real estate. You can give us a call at 828-393-0134. Find us, find us online at realestatebygreg.com uh and follow us on social media, Facebook and Instagram.

SPEAKER_02:

That's right. If you'd learn uh heard some of uh Zoe's talk this morning about Kendall Kindness and and need to go back, uh we'll be podcasting this 10 minutes after uh 9 o'clock this morning on all of the places that you get your podcasts. And we invite you to join us every Friday morning at 8 45 for the George Real Estate Group Hometown Hero Series here on WHKP.

SPEAKER_01:

You've built a lifetime of strength, wisdom, and independence. And here's the best part you still have it. Every decision, every step, every next chapter is yours to choose. Selling your home isn't about letting go, it's about opening the door to more freedom, more time for what you love, more energy for the people and passions that matter most. At the George Real Estate Group, we believe independence isn't behind you. It's right here, right now. Our team goes beyond buying and selling. We're here to help you protect your wealth, preserve your legacy, and make sure Uncle Sam doesn't become your biggest benefactor. We'll guide you every step of the way towards your next chapter, your next opportunity, and your freedom on your terms. Call us at 828-393-0134. Find us online at realestatebygreg.com.

SPEAKER_02:

The George Real Estate Group is located in Flat Rock, North Carolina, near Hendersonville in Henderson County. You can find them online at realestatebygreg.com. The George Real Estate Group can be reached at 828-3930134 or stop by their office at 2720 Greenville Highway, Flat Rock, North Carolina. Tune in live each week on Thursdays at 1005 AM on WHKP 107.7 FM and 1450 A.M. or stream online at WHKP.com or download these podcasts wherever you get your podcasts. The George Real Estate Group brings you the WHKP Hometown Hero Series every Friday morning at 8 45.