Blogger Spotlight: Cathrine Garnell, Basil’s Blog

Basil’s Blog is a Top 10 UK Pet Blog tracking Basil the cat and his family of eight cats (the B Team). Written by their ‘purrsonal’ assistant Cathrine Garnell, the blog has been running for five years. Here we caught up with the gang to talk the B Team, story posts and PR campaigns.

How would you describe your blog?
Completely bonkers! But seriously, my blog is really a lot of fun and jam-packed with cat-themed posts almost daily featuring; Colouring with Cats, Brain Training with Professor Basil, Pet Peeves with Parsley, Book Reviews with Amber, plus other posts including blog hops and fictional stories.

Why did you start your blog?
I began writing novels in 2000 and in 2004 my first children’s novel, Basil the Bionic Cat was published so having a blog was just a natural progression to my repertoire, and slowly it grew and grew until now I don’t have time to write novels, as it’s all about Basil and The ‘B’ Team on the blog.

What’s it like having a famous pet?
It’s wonderful, and it really makes me smile when I think that peeps from all over the world know who Bionic Basil is. That is epic!

How does your pet cope with the pressure?
Basil and The ‘B’ Team take the pressure of being famous in their stride, they’re just supurr chill about it all. They take a few more selfies; post on Instagram, tweet, share stuff on Facebook, you know the usual celebrity social media rounds, it’s just the norm for them now.

What’s your favourite pet product?
My cats have lots of favourite products but the best thing is the Yeowww Catnip Banana, they love it! Though my favourite pet product is the Kitty Observatory I made in my last Crafting with Cats post.

What’s your favourite post?
My favourite posts are the fictional story posts; such as last year’s epic saga called Fast, Furry and Dangerous – Revenge of the P.I.T.H. This year’s saga is called; The Last Big Jolly it’s at the halfway point and will conclude at Christmas. They are absolutely great fun to write and have all the makings of a proper summer blockbuster; cats with guns, tanks, helicopters, secret bunkers, time travelling telephone boxes, explosions, aliens, etc… you name it my cats can do it via photoshop.

How do you like to work with PRs?
Working with PRs is great.

What one thing should PRs know about you?
I work to a strict schedule.

What’s a memorable campaign you’ve worked on?
I’ve worked on quite a few campaigns but one of the most memorable was The WHISKAS® Kitten Kollege Dropouts Campaign. Basil had great fun with this one.

What other blogs do you read?
Wow, I read so many blogs each week and the best way for me to answer this is to direct you to my Pawesome Blog Directory and you‘ll see exactly who I visit regularly.

Basil’s Blog features on the leading Vuelio Influencer Database along with thousands of other bloggers, influencers and journalists.