Where to buy a Chinchilla?

[Angie]

I live in Arkansas so it is hard finding good breeders in my area because their are so few of them

I've heard bad things about Petsmart/Petco when it comes to animals so I am wanting to stay away from them if I can. My husband and I are wanting to get a chinchilla young as we possibly can when it is ok to separate it from it's mother so we know for sure that we can get it use to human interaction. We have tried facebook pages trying to find breeders but nobody will respond, and the only response we did get was for us to adopt one that was already pretty old.

We have been doing a lot of research and have a good idea of what to buy for the chinchilla but was wanting to know what to stay away from when buying bedding, housing, toys, etc since we will have to purchase most of our stuff from a generic petstore. We want our chinchilla to be as happy,healthy, and friendly as possible so any advice you guys could give would be great!