Each week in New York City, Bryan Reisberg and his companion turn a lot of heads – since his companion is a shelter dog in a backpack. Whenever people stare or point, he’ll offer, “Do you want to pet the dog?”
“It’s so fun to do that to people,” he said. “You see them light up with joy and the dogs love it. So we get stopped quite a bit.”
Then he’ll spend a couple hours riding the subway with the dog to Central Park, a pet store for a toy and a coffee shop for a special whipped cream “pup cup” — which sometimes ends up splattered on his neck. Reisberg doesn’t mind — he’s having too much fun.
Then he uploads a video of the outing to his social media sites with a link for how to adopt the dog from Best Friends Animal Society — and within a day or two, the dog gets adopted.
So far he’s helped 34 dogs from the Best Friends Pet Adoption Center in New York and the nonprofit’s shelter partners get adopted — plus two from Pennsylvania shelters, including one who got to ride with him on a Zamboni in a backpack at a hockey game — delighting his fans while driving interest in dog adoption.
Reisberg’s adoption rides for Best Friends recently earned him a 2026 Webby Award and People’s Voice Award in the “Creators: Cause-Driven Partnership” category.
It’s not his first.
His fluffy Pembroke Welsh corgi, Maxine, won a Webby Award in 2022. Reisberg and his wife, Alex Garyn, welcomed Maxine into their home in 2015.
“She was honestly the cutest puppy in the world,” he said.
Maxine Starts Dog Backpack Rides
After Reisberg got a ticket for taking Maxine on the subway without a carrier, he started transporting her in a backpack so she could travel in style with him on his way to work in advertising and film. He shared photos and videos of her calmly enjoying her rides on Instagram — and she was an instant hit.
Within a few years, they’d grown their social media following (@madmax_fluffyroad) to 7 million people across platforms. After hearing from so many people whose aging dogs had mobility issues, Reisberg quit his job and spent two years working with a friend to design a canine backpack and launch a company called Little Chonk.
Last year Maxine was put on crate rest for severe arthritis and could only take very short walks. So a fellow content creator and close friend — Chris Equale of the beloved corgi account @hammyandolivia — suggested Reisberg try taking adoptable dogs on outings in his backpacks, which are designed to carry dogs who weigh 20-100 pounds.
“He said it so casually and I was like, ‘You know what? I think that’s a fantastic idea,’” Reisberg said.
Best Friends Dog Backpack Rides Begin
That simple suggestion proved life-changing — both for Reisberg and his passengers. He spoke with Best Friends and arranged to take a 10-month-old puppy named Axl out on a backpack ride last July.
“We had a fantastic time together. We went on the train, we got him some toys, got him a pup cup and I cut together the video showing me and this dog interacting. It was just really cute and people were meeting and loving on the dog,” he said. “And we posted it online. The video went viral and the response was like nothing I had ever seen before in my 10 years of doing this.”
It was so exciting to learn Axl was quickly adopted that Reisberg decided to keep doing adoption rides each week — and every week, the video would go viral and the dog would soon find a home.
“Retrospectively, I started to realize what was going on in these videos was forming a really close bond with this dog who I’d never met before. They were really comfortable in the backpack. You got to really see their personality in a way that I think is quite difficult to show on social media in such a short period of time,” he said. “It was just proof positive that something is here, something’s working, let’s keep going.”
The experience was eye opening. Reisberg had never adopted a dog before. In fact, when he started doing the adoption rides, he had paid a deposit with a corgi breeder for a future puppy. But he found himself bonding with and even falling in love with the shelter dogs.
Big Bertha’s Special Adoption Ride
On about his fifth ride, a shelter dog named Big Bertha changed everything. When he’d first entered the shelter, the big pit bull mix with clipped ears was barking and seemed a little intimidating. But he puts his faith in the behavior teams at shelters to help identify dogs who would be a good fit for a backpack ride, which paid off. When he met Big Bertha in a grassy part of the shelter, she barreled toward him with the “biggest, goofiest smile” and they were soon hugging and kissing.
“On the ride, she was happy,” he said. “People were stopping us in Bushwick and she would just throw her head back and kiss people and love on people. I didn’t want to leave.”
If Reisberg hadn’t already had Maxine, who he suspected wouldn’t have been thrilled with a second dog at home, he would have adopted Big Bertha on the spot. Instead, he called the corgi breeder who he’d been in touch with for over a year and cancelled his deposit.
“The experience transformed me to my core and just showed me what’s possible with all these incredible dogs, what’s possible when you go into a shelter, what kind of dog you could get,” he said. “I came to the conclusion — and my wife agrees — I don’t think we’ll ever buy a dog again. And listen, I would never vilify anybody for going to a breeder to get a dog, for getting a dog responsibly. Obviously, that’s a choice for you and your family, and it’s a very big decision. But going into a shelter once a week and spending a few hours with these dogs, it just disrupted everything inside of me that I thought I knew about caring for a pet and what kind of pets were available in a shelter.”
The Outsized Impact Of Adoption Rides
His adoption rides are helping open other minds to the joys of pet adoption, too. Julie Castle, CEO and president of Best Friends Animal Society, is grateful that Reisberg is using his platform in such an impactful way.
“We are getting totally bombarded with people wanting dogs Bryan is taking out,” she said. “He’s got a good batting average.”
Since dogs typically benefit from getting exercise and socializing with people outside of a shelter — and can deteriorate the longer they stay in a shelter — Best Friends was eager to take a chance on Reisberg’s offer to take dogs on adoption rides in his backpack, according to Castle.
“What we didn’t realize is just how huge it would be and how New Yorkers loved this,” she said. “We had a fellow New Yorker step up and suggest that for every adoption, they get one of Bryan’s backpacks with the dog and sponsored a hundred backpacks. So it’s just had a snowball effect for us, which is really cool.”
Thanks to Reisberg’s innovative outings, Best Friends launched an “Adventure Buddies” program at the nonprofit’s adoption centers in New York City and Los Angeles so people can essentially borrow a shelter dog for a day of fun outside the shelter — from hikes or walks in a park to a nap on a couch.
Ultimately, Castle finds it inspiring to see Reisberg dedicating his time and talents to raising awareness about the amazing dogs available in shelters.
“It sort of gives you faith in humanity that somebody’s willing to just go out of their way and take time out of their busy day to do this for a homeless animal,” she said. “So we love him. He’s awesome.”
