E-commerce
How 1 retailer became a top 'dog' in 'ruff' pandemic times
Zesty Paws, a pet health supplement retailer, has expanded its product line, customer base and distribution, and enjoyed double-digit growth all in the past two years. All, in spite of the pandemic.
June 4, 2021 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
One of the many impacts COVID-19 delivered to the retail segment was a tremendous resurgence in pet purchases, adoption and care-taking.
Stuck inside due to stay-at-home mandates as well as retail and restaurant closings, consumers bonded fast and deep with man's best friends, canine and feline, and pretty much all pets.
Just consider this statistic cited by the Wall Street Journal: Pet food leader, Mars, estimated 85 million U.S. households owned a pet at the start of 2020, and about 11 million new pets were added over the year.
For companies serving pet needs that delivered a huge boon in online orders and sales, from toys to clothes, to snacks and health-focused products.
In the pet supplement segment the impact has been tremendous. Packaged Facts reported growth rates quadrupled in 2020 from 2019, with sales exploding from an annual growth of 3%-5% to a 21% increase.
Simply put, it all created a perfect storm — a positive financial storm — for young Orlando retailer, Zesty Paws, which had been selling pet supplements online at Amazon and Chewy, with no retail store presence as of the start of 2020.
Then the pandemic hit and, boom, the brand launched products at Target in March 2020, developed a key alliance with PetSmart which put the brand in 400 of its stores by September, and it is now completing an all-store expansion this summer. Zesty Paws now offers its products in 2,500 locations.
In short, the pandemic brought a doubling in sales and consumer reach for Zesty Paws in just two years and that growth wave doesn't seem to be ebbing any time soon.
What's truly paramount
CEO Steve Ball, who's been on the job for 18 months, has clearly been successful in scaling the brand's distribution and product innovation.
But growth brings challenges, from boosting production in a short timeframe, to ensuring responsive frontline customer service. Then there's the quest to keep customers satisfied, engaged and, most importantly, coming back. Each mandate is just as important as delivering quality products in a smooth and fast process.
In fact, as Ball views it, seamless customer service experience is paramount to his company's success and that's why the retailer provides customer service 24/7 via every possible channel, from chat to email to phone.
"In many of the five-star reviews we've garnered online, our quick and helpful customer service is mentioned as a key reason why they love the brand. For us, it's about going above and beyond for our customers and treating them like family, a core value of our business that we commit to living out every day," he told Retail Customer Experience in an email interview.
Zesty Paws was launched as a digital-first retailer and that approach, said Ball, gives the luxury of a "fluid environment" in which the brand can constantly adapt and improve the customer journey.
"We have taken the core pillars of that journey and applied them to brick and mortar as well as online experiences. We are a company founded on education. We want to take the time to help our customer understand what they are giving their furry bestie," said Ball, adding that his company takes a conversational approach with customers as it's proven most successful," he said.
"It strikes a good balance as we don't want to alienate anyone by sounding too clinical, and instead we focus on what is most important for the customer to know."
When it comes to Zesty Paws' mission statement, it's a pretty simple one: It's a passion to enable and inspire a 'zest for life' in pets and their human caretakers.
One thing that sets it apart from competitors is that Zesty Paws strives to connect with customers on an emotional level — listening and identifying pain points, said the CEO.
"Our brand is very playful, fun, and unique, and I think that's apparent in everything we do from our customer service to our marketing, website design, and packaging. Furthermore, we've built a powerful brand with strong social validation. We have over 200,000 five star reviews and ratings, which provides the social proof and credibility consumers seek when looking for products today," Ball said.
"Between the five-star ratings, the premium-branded ingredients, and the wide availability in-store and online, we stand out among the competition."
The TV campaign strategy
While dealing with high double-digit growth in a short timeframe, the brand launched a TV campaign in January/February of 2021.
Undertaking a television advertising campaign is no small feat and also a pretty astounding one during a time of intense growth and expansion. But for Zesty Paws it was an opportunity to expand further given huge growth and the opportunity to reach new pet parents — the millions that brought home a pet during COVID-19 in the 25-to-64 age-range.
The eight-week media effort also presented the chance to interact with existing pet parent customers, said Ball, as the campaign, called "Keep Your Bestie Feeling Zesty" was focused on fun.
"The mission was to bring to life the joy that our fur babies bring into our lives. For our Zesty Paws consumers, their cats or dogs are their babies. They are treated like family and they bring so much happiness to their lives. With our creative, we wanted to bring that to life. We wanted to share that whether your dog would benefit from the support of hip and joints, relief from seasonal allergies, or a little bit of help with bloating or gas, there is a Zesty Paws functional supplement that is fun to give and delicious for them to get," said Ball.
Television, he added, is mostly a brand-building strategy for the company.
"We coupled it with a solid digital plan leveraging the same creative campaign which drove most of the conversions. This year is about sharing with all pet parents what it means to Keep Your Besting Feeling Zesty!" he said.
"We are using a drive-to-retail approach supporting our availability at PetSmart, Target, Amazon, Chewy, and on our brand website."
Going forward, it's all about omnichannel
As Ball knows from experience, expansion into retail is never easy. But Zesty Paws proves it can be done and done successfully and he shared some strategic steps.
"Building strong partnerships with our retailer's teams has been the key to placement and expansion, and planning strategies based on analytics and data has ensured that we can maximize their shelf space, drive incremental growth, and delight their shopper with innovative products that fit a pet parent's needs," he said.
And while the threat of COVID-19 is receding Ball doesn't expect pet parents' behavior or interest in pet wellness, to recede. In fact he's predicting another boon ahead.
"Thanks to the better-for-you movement for humans, pet parents have never been more interested in wellness for their pets, pandemic or not," he said.
"The biggest shift we saw is the emergence of omnichannel as the winner of 2020. The consumer wants to be able to go between digital and physical stores without missing a beat, and we are there to meet them at every step. In the coming years, I predict that we'll see an explosion of pet products being sold in health stores and an emergence of pet parents thinking more about supplements for their pets. There is tremendous potential for the pet wellness category and we'll only see more better-for-you products coming to the market in new ways moving forward."
About Judy Mottl
