Cat cafes are popping up in major cities, including Harrisonburg.
So why shouldn’t the Queen City have its own opportunity for individuals to enjoy a cup of tea and time with felines?
The Catnap Inn is in the planning stages by Staunton’s Pam Boothe. She is raising funding and learning all she can about the world of business.
“This is for everybody who has cats or wants a cat and wants to be around them,” Boothe said.
Boothe currently operates thecatnapinn.square.site selling products for cats and for people who like cats, such as magnets, shirts and cat toys. Her products are also available at Honest Rx Pharmacy, 2225 N. Augusta Street in Staunton, and at select vendor shows in the Valley.
The Catnap Inn will offer English tea and pastries. Boothe lived in England for six years when she was a child.
“I was exposed to a lot of the romance [of England],” she said. “[But] I’m not going to be too strict [about] pinkies up.”
Per health code regulations, the cats will have a separate area in the café and guests will be able to view them through a glass wall while enjoying tea and pastries. A variety of options for spending time with the cats in their area will be available, including one hour or a membership like a gym membership so that guests can visit regularly. “If you just want to come in every day and snuggle a kittie.”
Boothe said she grew up with cats and dogs. While attending Mary Baldwin University, she frequented pet stores to spend time with the cats. She hopes that her business could be that cat escape that she didn’t have during college.
She is locally known as “the cat lady,” and her friends call her “Pam cat.” When a member of the community finds a stray cat or kitten, they often contact Boothe. After this happened a few times, she educated herself on local resources so that she knew what to tell individuals when they called her for help.
Sometimes the strays find her. Several times she has walked down a street, heard a meow and was greeted by a feline. “Are you my next rescue?” she asked them.
One was 8-month-old Zeus, whom her husband spotted in a storm drain near the Staunton Chick-fil-A. After setting a trap with wet cat food, Zeus came home with Boothe. “The hardest part is the waiting,” she said of trapping stray cats to rescue them.
Boothe, a 2004 graduate of MBU with a degree in English, and her husband have seven cats. Gypsy, 13, is the oldest. She has lived in Staunton since 2008.
Boothe assisted a cat mom when she was giving birth, and adopted three of her kittens. “She had a nesting box, but she wanted me,” Boothe said when the cat gave birth to her first three kittens in Boothe’s lap.
She wants to create a relaxed, happy atmosphere in the Catnap Inn, where cats and people can socialize. Local events often feature dogs, but no events focus on getting cats adopted. She wants to help cats find furever homes.
A GoFundMe page is set up under the name The Catnap Inn through which Boothe hopes to raise at least $25,000 to obtain space, preferably in downtown Staunton, for a café to serve locally-sourced food, tea and access to adoptable cats.
Boothe said she would be open to finding space in Waynesboro or Verona.
Boothe hopes to work with the Augusta SPCA to foster cats and kittens, which any business or home can do with the proper paperwork. The SPCA pays for food and care of the animals while fostered. Businesses cannot profit from the adoption of pets fostered by the business.
The Catnap Inn could foster 10 to 15 cats, which would make space open at the SPCA and local shelters for that many cats.
“I’m actually saving a cat twice over,” Boothe said.
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Rebecca Barnabi
