Terms

Who runs this

The Red River Valley Pet Election is run by Fargo Home Company LLC, doing business as Novel Design + Build, of West Fargo, North Dakota. It is our election, for fun and for the shelters. It is not a municipal election and the cities do not administer it.

No purchase, no prizes

Entering is free. Voting is free. There is nothing to buy at any point, and buying something would not help anyone win. There is no cash prize. What a winning pet gets is the title, a set of pictures, and a small ceremony.

Who can enter

Enter a pet you own or care for, in Fargo, West Fargo, Moorhead or Horace. One pet per entry. You must be 13 or older to enter; if you are under 18, ask a parent or guardian first. A pet runs in one city — the one you pick when you enter.

Every entry is reviewed

A person at Novel looks at every entry before it appears publicly. Until then, your pet's page works for you and anyone you send it to, but the pet is not on the ballot and cannot be voted for. We will turn down entries that are not a real pet, that use a photo that is not yours, or that are cruel about a person, a pet or a place. We can remove an entry at any time.

Your photos and your words

Your photos stay yours. By entering, you give us permission to show them on this site, to make campaign pictures from them — posters, cards, an illustrated portrait — and to use those in promoting the election, including on social media. You confirm the photos are yours to give.

Ask us and we will take your entry and its pictures down.

Voting

One vote per person, every day. Free. Not per city and not per pet: one vote a day, for one candidate, whichever city that candidate is running in. Every day is a fresh ballot and you may change your mind about who you back. Polls reopen at midnight, Central time. We use a random identifier stored in your browser to hold you to that; clearing it to vote again, or using scripts, multiple devices or anything similar to vote more than once, is cheating and we will remove those votes. We may also remove votes we believe are automated.

Vote counts shown on the site are our count and our decision is final.

Standings are public for the whole campaign. Every city’s counts are on the site from the first day to the last, so nothing about the result is a surprise. October 17 is a ceremony, not a reveal.

How the election runs

We may adjust these dates if we need to, and will say so on the site.

The adoption offer

Adopt from a partner shelter between September 18 and October 17, 2026 and Novel puts $100 toward the adoption fee. You do not have to vote, enter a pet, or have anything to do with the election.

How to claim it: tell them at the counter that you’re here for the Novel Pet Election. The shelter takes $100 off the adoption fee on the spot and settles it with us — there is nothing for you to fill in, send us, or claim back.

Partner shelters are listed on the adopt page. We may add partners during the campaign; the list on that page is the current one. Adopting from a shelter that is not a partner is a wonderful thing to do and we hope you do it, but the $100 only applies at our partners.

The adoption happens at the shelter, on the shelter’s terms — their process, their approval, their timeline. We do not decide who adopts, and a shelter may decline an adoption for its own reasons.

Changes, and ending it

We may change these terms, change how the election works, or end it early. If we do, we will post it here and change the date at the top.

The usual

This site is provided as it is. We do our best to keep it up and to count correctly, and we do not promise it will be perfect or always available. To the extent the law allows, Novel is not liable for indirect or consequential losses arising from the election or this site. Nothing here limits anything that cannot be limited by law. North Dakota law governs.

Contact

Fargo Home Company LLC d/b/a Novel Design + Build
3262 Oak Ridge Loop E, West Fargo, ND 58078
info@buildwithnovel.com · 701.306.9995

How we handle your information is in the privacy policy.