With a black-and-white dog named Brave strapped to his back, Bryan Reisberg was about to step into a crosswalk off Union Square in Manhattan when a woman reached out to pet the pooch.
Without hesitating, he leaned back so the woman, Trish Clancy, and her daughter, Sinead Clancy-Amer, bundled up against the cold and carrying shopping bags, could scratch the good girl he was toting. Brave quickly bathed one of them in kisses.
“Can I take her home?” Ms. Clancy asked with a grin.
That is indeed the point of Mr. Reisberg’s outings. “We’re taking her out to make a video to help her get adopted,” he replied, directing them to a website where they could submit an adoption application.
Mr. Reisberg, 37, has built a following of 4.1 million TikTok subscribers (and nearly two million more combined on Instagram and Facebook) who have watched his backpack adventures with Maxine, his 10-year-old corgi. Since July, when health problems temporarily took Maxine out of the field, he has teamed up with Best Friends Animal Society, a national animal welfare organization, to give shelter dogs a day in the city.
Best Friends has several no-kill shelters that accept pets from across the country, with the biggest in Utah, where around 1,600 animals stay. In New York, it works with Animal Care Centers of NYC, whose shelters are struggling with overcrowding. In July, Animal Care Centers of NYC stopped taking pets. A month after a new shelter opened in Queens last year, its dog population was at 210 percent capacity.
Enter Mr. Reisberg. Using a backpack that he designed for Maxine, and now sells as the Little Chonk, he takes dogs out, buys them a toy, gives them a treat and records the interactions. The baristas at the Union Square Starbucks and the cashiers at Petco recognize him as he approaches and ask with glee: “Who’s this little guy?”
It was a friend who suggested to Mr. Reisberg that he make videos with shelter dogs to promote adoption while Maxine recovered from arthritis surgery. Mr. Reisberg pitched the idea to Best Friends.
On July 10, Mr. Reisberg posted his first adoption video. The adventures with Axl, a 10-month-old tan-and-white puppy, included a subway ride and a run in Central Park. In the video, Axl often leaned his head to the side, letting his long tongue roll out of his mouth.
“Please consider making Axl part of your family,” Mr. Reisberg wrote in his Instagram post.
More than two million people saw footage of Axl’s day in the city. Nine days later came an update: “Guess who’s going home today!” Mr. Reisberg exclaimed in a video while Axl licked his face. His update featured Axl’s new owner, a woman who saw the video and drove from Virginia to adopt him.
“He could be doing a lot of things that are really self-serving,” said Julie Castle, chief executive of Best Friends Animal Society. “But yet he’s really going for the underdog in more ways than one.”
When shelter officials think they have dog that would do well in a backpack ride, they give Mr. Reisberg a call. Many have been waiting for their forever home for weeks. Nationwide, dogs spent a median of 32 days in a shelter before being adopted in 2024, according to Shelter Animals Count, which collects data from shelters across the country.
Most trips follow a routine: a subway ride, a treat, a toy and some time walking or playing outside. Mr. Reisberg said his favorite part was giving the dog a “pup cup,” a small cup of whipped cream from Starbucks or a local cafe.
“They go crazy for it,” he said as he got in line at Starbucks. “It’s a new routine that I get as messy as possible,” he added.
During walks, people will stop them for petting and photos. Sometimes Mr. Reisberg notices someone smiling at his charge. He turns the dog in their direction and asks, “Want to say hi?”
As Brave and Mr. Reisberg crossed West 59th Street after leaving Central Park near Columbus Circle, a woman pushing a stroller spotted him and exclaimed “a dog!” Mr. Reisberg stopped in the crosswalk and angled Brave to the baby in the stroller.
Even without Maxine, he is sometimes recognized. “I’ve seen you! You give shelter dogs a chance for exposure!” one woman said as Mr. Reisberg stopped to let her pet Brave.
The videos seem to be helping. Since these videos started, Best Friends has had 100 more adoptions, particularly large dogs that “aren’t typically city dogs,” Ms. Castle said.
In September, Pear, a smooch-happy white pit bull mix, got a subway ride and a walk through Times Square. She received lots of pets, a toy pig and a hot dog, and Mr. Reisberg serenaded her with a few lines from “Cell Block Tango” from “Chicago” as they checked out the billboards.
Richard Hage, 53, a graffiti artist who uses the nickname Aones Wto, first saw Pear on an American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Instagram page. He fell in love with Pear, who looked like his previous dog, Leia.
“Then I saw Bryan’s Instagram page pop up and I saw the dog,” Mr. Hage said.
Once his application was approved, he drove an hour and a half from upstate New York and the shelter took a celebratory photo of the new family, with Pear wearing a bandanna that said “rescued and loved.” She brought the pig toy she got with Mr. Reisberg to her new home. His “very lovey-dovey dog” has since settled in, he said. They take regular walks, and she has her own yard to run around in.
“She’s a perfect match for me,” Mr. Hage said.
Some of Mr. Reisberg’s followers who visit the shelter hoping to adopt a featured dog who has already been adopted end up with a different dog, Ms. Castle said. “It’s really driving that awareness and traffic for us, which is so incredible and just what’s needed,” she said.
This month Best Friends Animal Society expanded its Adventure Buddy program to New York, allowing people to borrow a dog for a day of pampering and fun — and even overnight stays.
For Mr. Reisberg, his adventures with shelter dogs have changed him.
He and his wife, Alex Garyn, “were going to get another corgi from a breeder, in December,” he said. “We were going to do that. Since doing the adoptable rides, I called the breeders. I can’t do it,” he said.
Mr. Reisberg and Maxine still go on adventures. For her 10th birthday recently, he climbed the steps to the top of the Empire State Building with her on his back.
There was one dog from his adventures he almost adopted himself: a 65-pound brown-and-white mixed-breed dog named Big Bertha. A family saw Big Bertha’s video and arrived early at an adoption event to bring her home, according to a follow-up post from the Animal Care Centers of NYC. She’s since been renamed Betty White.
Brave was adopted before Mr. Reisberg posted her video. He directed his followers to check out the shelter’s other eligible pups.
In 2026, Mr. Reisberg plans to visit Best Friends Animal Society’s large sanctuary in Utah.
“We’re going to keep doing it as long as I can,” he said.
Rylee Kirk reports on breaking news, trending topics and major developing stories for The Times.
The post Carrying for a Cause: Meet the Man Lugging Shelter Dogs Around New York appeared first on New York Times.
