WORTH IT! Especially if you love cats or have any feline friends at home! We got the 1 day pass for Saturday and although $40+ is a bit steep, it definitely paid for itself with the amount of free goodies that we got during the event ! There is convention center parking that is closer for $15, but the lot was full when we got there so we opted for a small private lot for $4 the entire day. Only a couple blocks of walking and we actually went back and forth to our car to drop off all the freebies that we got! The con itself is in one exhibit hall with some small stage areas for panel talks with experts and influencers in the industry and a meet and greet area to meet some of the cat / human celebrities. There are vendors throughout the hall with loads of cat related goods ranging from food, litter, toys, and neat new tech for cats (those fancy litter box machines, cat health/fitness tracker, etc.) and of course cat themed merchandise for humans too (clothes, prints, pins, jewelry, kitchen goods, and much much more). There is also a small artist alley with artists vending their cat themed goods as well. Lots of cat rescue, fostering, and health related tables too. From this event, we got free wet cat food, dry food samples, cat treats including Churu tubes, cat toys, a cat first aid kit, tote bags, buttons, stickers, a pet tag with our cat's named engraved on it, and even bags of litter too! At the back of the hall there was an adoption area where you can meet the kitties that are up for adoption. We didn't think we'd leave with a new furry friend, but we saw an older kitten with a cone on his head and towards the end of the day he wasn't adopted yet. Turns out he was a "sponsored" cat, so we got to adopt him and take him home COMPLETELY FREE. No adoption fees and the little dude was already neutered, vaccinated, had all his medical check ups, and all the other bells and whistles. Love you, Radagast! Adoption process was easy and streamlined. Everyone working the Best Friends Animal Society adoption village was super nice and helpful. We got our adoption certificate, some adoption freebies, an entire bag of litter from World's Best cat litter, and a carrier. 5/5 Experience! Will definitely go back again, but probably will avoid the adoption area to not add anymore cats to our already 3 cat strong family. read more

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I absolutely loved catconla! Being a crazy cat lady who doesn't own any cats, I got to let out my inner cat crazy. The venue was easy to find and there was a $10 parking lot across the street. Inside, there were rows of vendors that sold cat accessories (for humans and cats), prints, clothing, and plushes. There was also a space where they were doing cat adoptions. I wanted to take them all home but I couldn't ;_;. The atmosphere of this con is relaxed and kid friendly. You better come decked out in your cat clothes or you will be the odd one out! This ameowzing event focuses more on cat culture than cats themselves. There aren't any cats roaming around. The $25 entry fee is a bit steep considering you can finish the con in less than 2h. I'm sure next year it will be bigger though. Overall, they did a purrfect job and it was pretty pawesome. I wish I also made it on caturday, and not just Sunday. Note: catconla, please add a cat cafe next year!!! read more

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Drove from Northern California for my first Cat Con experience. All in all, I loved it. Lots of vendors selling really cool and fun stuff and of course there's an adoption center as well as meet and greets with celebrity cats (some free, some have a fee). The only thing I didn't like about Cat Con, were some of the visitors. I came across a few grumpy, miserable "cat lovers" that seemed like they were trying to ruin the experience for everyone else. It started right from the beginning while standing in line. A grown man whining about how hot it was and didn't understand why there was a line to get in. He was giving everyone, including the staff, an earful for the WHOLE time we were in line and even demanding that someone bring him water. I'm still wondering why they let him in. Newsflash: We're all there for the same reason so just have fun! Besides a few grumps, Cat Con had a great vibe and a wide variety of stuff for you and/or your cat! Would recommend to any cat lover. read more

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Me: I'm going to CatCon on Sunday. The bf: What's that? Me: ....a cat convention.... The bf: WHY?!? I don't have a cat, but I really enjoyed CatCon. It was at The Reef in LA, which I've never been to before. The convention was upstairs and downstairs so we got a "workout". Plus the ac wasn't the best, so everyone was sweaty. They had plenty of vendors there. Pusheen, Petco, Lil Bub, Nala Cat, etc. We got our shop on. They also had cats there for adoption. The line was crazy, so we didn't get a chance to check out the kitties. They had food trucks outside, but I heard they didn't let you back in the convention if you went outside, so we saved the trucks for last. Overall, we all had a good time. We were there for a good 3-4 hours. Plus we found free street parking which is nearly unheard of in LA. read more

Personally, I thought it was fun and the venue was spacious for the event. I can definitely see why people wouldn't enjoy the event since there's tons of vendors and not much to do at the con, BUT people need to learn how to make the most out of their purchases. The event started at 9am on Saturday and we arrived at about 9:30am. There was a line for the main parking lot, but we drove around the corner to the Sheraton's lot, $13 for all day parking and it was a 2 minute walk away. We checked in to grab our event wristbands and received a cute reusable bag, love the design. I noticed online they were having free meet & greet with "cat celebrities" and free seminars. The website also said "wristband required" for these events. So we proceeded to find the wristband stand and grabbed some wristbands to meet Julie Newmar, the original Catwoman. The majority of the other meet and greet had run out of wristbands by the time we checked in at 10am. So first tip, read the website and know before you go. A LOT of people were upset they weren't able to participate in the meet and greets because they weren't aware free wristbands were available. Anyways, after we picked up our wristbands we proceeded to pick up as many freebies as possible since some freebies tend to run out towards the end of the day. The longest line by far with the Petsmart line. We waited about 15 minutes, but they had a good variety of prizes from $5 gift cards to special (small) gift baskets. Frontline was there giving away (one month) tick and flea removal medicine along with a cute reusable bag. There was TONS AND TONS of free cat treats and free small cat toys. I also went home with about 5 reusable bags. Once we covered the freebies, we proceeded to the Julie Newmar meet and greet. I believe it took about 45 minutes to actually get to her, but she took her time meeting all of her fans. The meet and greet was free, but if you wanted an autograph it was $40. The meet and greets were in the building adjacent to the Con, and wow was it chaotic. There was zero organization. At some point they just had one line formed for all meet and greets. Luckily we left the building just in time before all hell broke loose. The last thing we did was just stroll by the vendors and pick up another round of freebies. They had an adoption area and play area for you to play with the local shelter cats. The Pasadena Convention Center was a great venue. The building was well ventilated and was extremely spacious. There was a lot of vendors, but you don't necessarily have to spend money to get the full value out of your ticket. All you have to do to get the full value is; get the freebies, sign up for meet and greets, go to the seminars, and go into the cat play area. I kid you not, the freebies alone make up for the $35 you spend on this event. I wish they offered free parking, BUT it's extremely rare to find free parking for any Con nowadays. Few minor things they could improve on, but nonetheless less such a catastic experience! BTW, DogCon will have its debut in October of 2018! read more

Cat Con LA - Pet Services Near Me - Los Angeles, California

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Got there near opening on a Sunday. Wait time was pretty reasonable to get in I'd say about 10 minutes. Not as many booths as I expected i was hoping they'd use more than one hall but they only really used the main hall. However a lot of the places had cool giveaways and Knick knacks for both you and your cat. I spent about 3ish hours there. I did not do the meet and greets nor the panels, so am unsure of the quality of what you'll get there. read more

Not worth it, most vendors are overpriced and you can find 98 percent of the items on Amazon for a lot less. Also, the information details should be more specific on what and who will be there read more

If you're considering going to Catcon, you better get there early or you could end up like a kitty that gets left outside when it's owners go on vacation. You won't be able to get inside, and you'll be stuck outside wondering where it all went wrong. In theory this should have been a good event, and if you got there right when the doors opened, it probably was for you. But if you were 1 of the 100's of people that came a little later, you may have been assed out completely. Upon arrival, all the parking was full so we ended up parking a few blocks away. Once walking up the entrance, we got in a line that suddenly grew to a point where it wrapped around the building. Why was there such a long line? Well mainly due to the organizers of this event not taking into account the capacity issue for the building, even though they did sell all the people wanting to get in tickets. One woman working for the event came outside and did what any person with a lack of experience in running anything would do, place blame on someone else. She was quick to let everyone know that it wasn't their fault, but the fire marshal would not allow any more people in. Really quite pathetic on her part to do this. She should have accepted responsibility that they were not prepared for the event. After almost an hour wait, we were finally let in. The wait was due to the building being at capacity and they had to let people in as people went out. This is very very poor planning on the part of whoever put this on. Maybe it was their first event, because it's really quite pathetic the way this was organized. After getting in and getting our wristbands, we were ushered down a hall where we were met with yet another line. This was the line to actually get into the area where the event was going on. So first we waited outside to get into the building, then we waited inside to get into the actual event. I'm being serious. What kind of terrible joke was being played here? So once we finally pushed our way to the front and got upstairs, we were met with a lovely swap meet of cat products. There were a few interactive booths, like photo booths, etc, Who's lines were also long. We ventured downstairs to where the Kat Von Dee booth was, which was probably the highlight for some guests, as everything else was pretty lame. We were quite hungry from all the waiting around, but there was no food in sight, until we got outside and saw some food trucks. I wasn't even sure if we would be able to get back in if we had gone out to eat, So we left as we'd had enough of this mess they called Catcon. We felt bad for the 100's maybe 1000's of people they turned away who had all bought presale tickets online. I'd be extremely upset if i was them. Purchasing tickets to an event, and then being turned away after waiting hours in line, simply because the event organizers were so poor in their planning and so unprepared, even though they had an exact idea of how many people were to show up. Also the space this was in is ridiculous, who puts an expo in a space where you have to funnel people through small corridors to get in and out of specific areas. No wonder the fire marshal wasn't having it. I suggest anyone considering going to Catcon next year, don't bother unless they get their act together, because this was a completely disaster of an event and the people putting it on should be ashamed of themselves for taking peoples money. read more

This event was fun. It was a laid back, friendly con in a nice space at the Reef. I don't know if it would have been worth $25 for admission, but I got a sweet deal for it on Goldstar. For $12.50 it was fine. Anyone who loves cats probably would have really enjoyed this event! Pros: Lots of interesting vendors, silly graphics everywhere and some great discussions. Fast check-in at the Will Call desk. Great location at the Reef. Cons: I wish they'd had more to do. It would have been nice to see more participatory workshops and lectures on cat health, having a cat in Los Angeles, etc. Also, it would have been nice to have the booths organized a little better. It would have been a lot easier to find things and compare if they'd had, say, all the food vendors in one section, all the rescues in another, all apparel in a third section, etc. I am guessing that this Con will grow and blossom as the years go on, and I'm looking forward to next year's event! read more

Crazy cat ladies united at this event! My husband told me about CatCon (their slogan = it's like comic con but for cat people -LOvE!) and so I bought tickets online the night before and off we went on Saturday! I was disappointed that they only had one "celebrity" cat -Lil Bub- and that the illustrator for Simon The Cat only made one appearance. I would have loved to have met him. Also... Where was Garfield or Heathcliff or... Grumpy Cat or Hamilton?! The majority of the vendors were up in coming or local, which was cool for them, but some had booths in low traffic areas which sucked- I felt bad. I did find two cat toys that my cats (I own 3, yes, I know I see you shaking your head) love to play with so the shopping part was well worth it! I do agree with the previous Yelpers on it being limited in activities. Animal Planet had a great concept that utilized social media. If you took a picture and posted it on Instagram with a special hashtag, the photo would print to their printer! Also, you could adopt a cat... But the husband veto-d that real quick! I do have to say that everything was much more organized and less crowded than HK Con. The Reef was the perfect spot! I had fun and hope next years will be even more amazing!! read more

Cat Con LA - Cool art work - Pet Services Near Me - Los Angeles, California

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It's $35 dollars to get in then you pay a bunch of vendors. Have to wait in a long line just to see an actual cat. And if you want to see famous kitties you have to pay extra for each one and wait in the hot sun in line FOR EACH ONE instead of having all famous kitties there and paying one extra price and seeing them all at once. This was a greedy ploy. I won't be going again. At the county fair you pay $8 or $9 to get in then you pay the vendors. This is more fair to the consumer. read more

I went last year and it was at the Reef and was so disappointed. The vendors were great (although I would have like more actual cat products not just clothes and art). I was hoping they would change venues but they didn't so I decided not to go this year and from what I have been reading on social media, I'm so glad I didn't. I really really hope they pick a different place next year, I would love to attend again. LA or Pasadena convention centers are fantastic options. Yes, they cost more but they could always get more corporate sponsors or raise prices a little if they provide an event people are happy with. read more

While I appreciated the vendors and convention itself once I actually got INTO the con, this event was a complete mess and the organizers need to take note of the many MANY problems surrounding Cat Con LA. The Reef had little to no signage, the staff were clueless, and the hundreds of attendees trying to get in through one set of doors were utterly confused. Lines overlapped in the lobby because there were too many people trying to get in to such a cramped venue. While waiting to get into the exhibit hall, we and hundreds of others also had to stand in a series of super narrow, hot, and downright claustrophobic hallways while waiting to go up a set of narrow stairs. I don't mind lines for cons (I've stood in many of them) but this was ridiculous and a complete fire hazard if something went wrong. Poor choice of venue and the organizers clearly tried to cut way too many corners (or they have zero experience with convention management). Don't go to this event unless the venue is actually adequate for large crowds. And even then, be prepared for a hot unorganized mess. read more