Bangor co. cleaning up in natural pet product market
Courtesy Mutt Nose Best
U. Berry Clean Dog, a natural dog shampoo made with wild Maine blueberries, is the top-selling product for the Bangor-based Mutt Nose Best.
Consumers of specialty pet products are increasingly inquiring about the ingredients within those products.
That’s good news for Jenny Dwyer, who co-founded the natural dog shampoo manufacturer Mutt Nose Best with her husband about two years ago. Dwyer’s business and the retailers she supplies stake much of their futures in being able to provide clear answers to those questions.
In its first year, the company generated over $250,000 in revenue with its line of natural and Maine-branded shampoo (like its wild Maine blueberry variety).
“When you’re talking dog shampoo at six dollars a bottle, that’s a lot of shampoo,” she says.
Weekly, from a warehouse in Bangor’s Bomarc Industrial Park, nearly 150 gallons of the company’s natural dog shampoo makes its way to nearly 700 independent pet stores, covering 43 states and Puerto Rico. Further international sales are pending in Holland, Sweden and Russia, where Dwyer hopes to be selling shampoos by this fall.
Dwyer’s company, which does not have its own retail operation, relies entirely on relationships with a growing number of specialty pet shops.
“We’ve grown from word of mouth and social media within small independent [pet] stores,” Dwyer says. “And there’s also been a real movement toward shopping local. We hit that trend two years ago, at the right time.”
Industry analysts and Maine-based pet retailers have noted the growth, too. In 2012, the consumer trend research firm Packaged Facts estimated sales in that market totaled around $4.1 billion. By 2017, it projects those sales will be $9.4 billion. And nearly three-fourths of that growing market belongs to independent retailers.
The Damariscotta-based retailer The Animal House illustrates that trend in Maine.
In 2004, owner Aubrey Martin launched her natural pet product store in 800 square feet. This year, she’s stocking over 4,000 square feet of all-natural products.
Those figures are what give Dwyer confidence that she can boost her company’s presence to all 50 states by the end of the year and continue to grow her company, all without putting Mutt Nose Best on the shelves of major retailers.
“We find a lot of loyalty in the small stores,” Dwyer says. “They have our Mutt Nose Best right on the top shelf, and maybe a few other lines, but they’re really brand loyal and in return they appreciate that we stay in small businesses.”
Martin, who was one of the first in the state to carry Mutt Nose Best shampoos, says that tight-knit relationship between independent retailers and manufacturers is crucial to fending off challenges from larger stores that are pivoting some attention to the growing market for natural pet products. Independent retailers, she says, have access to more natural products, a better ability to keep abreast of changing trends and are better at moving products from specialty manufacturers off the shelves.
“A brand like [Dwyer’s], I think, would not do well in a large market,” Martin says. “You have to know what you're selling, and it's stores like us that understand what her product is and why it's different from others.”
Martin says that knowledge is so critical to her business that each of her employees must pass a written and oral exam before they’re allowed to discuss topics like nutrition and homeopathy with customers.
And riding on the expertise and networks of savvy customers at independent stores like Martin’s, Dwyer says, has been key to her brand’s success and expansion.
“Once in a while we’ll do something in a magazine, but social media has really been beneficial to our growth,” Dwyer says.
That’s because each new independent retailer has a batch of customers that look to the store as not just a supplier of goods, but a taste-maker and trustworthy source.
“I think with that type of marketing, you’re getting a true response,” Dwyer says. “You’re reading comments on the product and suggestions rather than just paying for an ad, and I think that’s why it works as well as it does.”
Looking ahead, that market is expected to continue growing.
In its 2012 report, research firm Packaged Facts projected the market for natural pet foods and natural pet care products in the United States will grow by nearly one-third this year and around 10% to 15% from 2014-2017.
Laurie LaBauve, who opened The Whole Dog Market in South Portland with her husband Richard about three months ago, attributes part of the natural pet product market’s growth in Maine to a demographic known by the acronym DONK: Dog Obsessed, No Kids.
“You’ve got empty nesters where the dog gets most of the focus and young couples who have a dog but don’t have children,” LaBauve says. “You’ve got people on either end of that spectrum who spend a lot more time thinking about the dog.”
And spending more time thinking about the dog — or cat, turtle, etc. — is where independent retailers and natural product manufacturers like Mutt Nose Best think they can meet a more savvy clientele eye-to-eye.
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