Petco Leans Into Fresh Food Trend With Freshpet Partnership

Petco is looking to capture more of the growing market for fresh food for pets with a partnership with Freshpet
FRPT
to deliver customized, refrigerated meals for dogs.

Petco is offering a meal subscription plan customers can order online for home delivery. The new e-commerce brand, Freshpet Custom Meals, will be exclusive to petco.com. Meals will be based on veterinary recommendations for a dog’s breed. age, activity level, and other factors.

Petco has launched the subscription offer in 15 states, including California, Texas, Florida, and New York, and plans to make it available nationally later this year. Cost of the subscription plan starts at $3 per day.

Currently, only meals for dogs will be offered. A Petco spokesperson, when asked about meals for cats, replied in an email that Petco is “continually evaluating” its nutrition offerings.

Petco, in announcing the partnership today, cited Nielsen IQ, Packaged Facts and Earnest credit card data showing that the fresh and frozen pet food category is expected to grow three-to-four times its current value, to $6 billion.

Direct-to-consumer sales are expected to drive much of that growth.

The partnership also fits into Freshpet’s plan to accelerate its growth.

Freshpet CEO Billy Cyr at a presentation last month to the Consumer Analyst Group of New York hinted that the company was looking to expand its ecommerce offerings, in addition to continuing to grow its retail presence through its thousands of Freshpet refrigerated displays in pet stores, groceries, and mass merchants.

Cyr said at the presentation that the fresh category has a potential addressable market of up to 42 million households and that Freshpet today is reaching 9.8 million households.

Freshpet’s market share has grown from 2.7% five years ago to 5.8% today, the biggest gain in share of any dog food brand, Cyr said.

Freshpet has had strong topline sales growth every year, but has struggled with costs and inventory issues. Activist investor Jana Partners took a stake in the company last year, and has called on the company to explore a sale.

Freshpet’s early-to-market advantage as a pioneer in the fresh food for pets category, Cyr said in the presentation last month, has given it an edge over newer competitors. But the competition is fierce and likely to get tougher.

Blue Buffalo, the premium brand owned by General Mills
GIS
, recently announced it was testing a line of refrigerated dog food in 200 stores.

The Farmer’s Dog, a fresh pet food company that offers customized subscriptions, gained attention recently with a much-praised Super Bowl ad.

Petco in August announced it was expanding its human-grade dog food offerings with a new line of frozen meals developed in partnership with the JustFoodForDogs brand.