Do you have a pet brand you’d like to get in front of the perfect audience? Get in touch with our team.
By Laura Murphy, Head of Health & Wellbeing
There are few relationships quite like the one we have with our pets.
They occupy our homes, our routines, our camera rolls and, increasingly, our considerations when choosing where to eat, where to stay, what to buy and how to live. We worry about them. We celebrate them. We rearrange our days around them. We spend money on them.
And beneath all of that sits something remarkably simple: we love them.
For brands looking at the rapidly expanding pet economy, that might be the most important consumer insight of all.
Because love changes behaviour. It changes what we value, how much attention we pay, the compromises we’re prepared to make and who we’re prepared to trust. When we’re making decisions on behalf of an animal that depends on us, purchasing becomes an act of care.
The commercial opportunity is significant. But understanding the emotion behind it matters just as much as understanding the size of the market.
UK Pet Food’s latest research, in conjunction with Kantar, estimates that 62% of households own one of the UK’s 36.5 million pets.
The language commonly used to explain the growth of the pet economy is “humanisation”. And there is certainly truth in it. Mintel’s research shows pets are increasingly regarded as members of the family, influencing categories from food and personal care to insurance. But humanisation doesn’t quite capture what it feels like from the other side of the relationship.
People aren’t researching nutrition, supplements, insurance or ingredients because they have confused their pet for a human. They’re doing it because they feel responsible for the wellbeing of something they love.
Pet owners occupy a unique position. We are the gatekeepers to almost every aspect of our animals’ wellbeing. We decide what they eat, how much they exercise, when they see a vet, which treatments they receive, the products they’re exposed to and, increasingly, how we support their physical and emotional health as they age.
That creates a powerful consumer motivation. We don’t simply want to buy things for our pets; we want to feel we’re making good choices for them. It explains why an owner might spend longer researching something for their pet than they would for themselves. Why safety, efficacy and ingredients can suddenly become intensely important. Why the recommendation of a vet, another owner or someone with genuine expertise can carry enormous weight.
For communicators, that’s an important distinction. The opportunity isn’t simply to persuade someone to purchase. It’s to help them feel informed and confident in a decision they’re making on behalf of something they love.
And why trust is such valuable currency in this category.
Perhaps the most extraordinary evidence of what care can achieve is that our pets are living longer.
Health for Animals reports that pet life expectancy has risen substantially over recent decades, driven by factors including greater vaccination, better nutrition, improved veterinary care and owners having a greater understanding of their pets’ health needs. As pets live longer, attention is increasingly turning towards preventative care, early intervention, specialist nutrition, mobility and mental stimulation. In turn, longer lives are creating new needs which is fuelling further innovation in the pet category.
But longevity isn’t really about reaching an impressive number. We want more life in those years. Another walk. Another holiday. Another throw of the ball. Another morning waiting impatiently for breakfast. More of those completely ordinary moments that eventually turn out not to have been ordinary at all.
That desire for better lives is now influencing far more than veterinary care. Food and nutrition, supplements, insurance, technology, grooming, household care, travel, hospitality, retail and lifestyle brands are all finding new ways into the lives of pets and the people who love them.
So, the opportunity around pets is becoming broader than health alone. It is about helping animals live healthier, happier, richer lives and helping the people who love them enjoy more of that life alongside them.
This summer, M&S entered the pet food market with its own Paws & Pals range. The retailer says its research found 60% of its customers are paying closer attention to what goes into their pet’s food and so it has deliberately built the proposition around qualities such as ingredient transparency, quality and trust.
That is interesting not simply because another major retailer is selling pet food. It’s interesting because of what it tells us about the changing relationship between brands, people and their pets.
A trusted relationship established in one part of someone’s life can potentially stretch into another. But that permission isn’t automatic.
As more businesses see the commercial potential of the pet economy, every brand considering entering it should ask itself a harder question than what can we sell pet owners? But rather, what right do we have to play a role in something they love?
This is where PR and communications have a particularly important role to play.
Pet owners are an attractive audience. But treating their emotional connection with their animals simply as another route to purchase risks misunderstanding the very thing driving the market.
Love isn’t a marketing lever to pull. It is a motivation to understand. If people love their pets, what does that make them need from a brand?
Sometimes the answer is expertise: help me make the right decision.
Sometimes it is evidence: show me that this works.
Sometimes transparency: tell me what is actually in this.
Sometimes reassurance: help me know that this is safe.
Sometimes convenience: make looking after them a little easier.
And sometimes it is simply joy: help me give them a brilliant life.
Understanding which role your brand can credibly occupy is far more important than simply attaching itself to the emotion surrounding pets.
This is where PR has a particularly important role to play. The pet economy isn’t one homogenous market, and communication isn’t a simple relationship between brand and consumer.
Owners navigate an ecosystem of vets, retailers, specialists, manufacturers, online communities, creators, friends and other owners. Authority shifts according to the decision being made.
A veterinary voice may be essential when communicating around health. Ingredient transparency might provide reassurance around nutrition. Another owner’s experience may carry weight when choosing a product or service. A retailer’s reputation might give people confidence to try something unfamiliar.
For brands, understanding that ecosystem, and where they credibly sit within it, should come before deciding what they want to say. Because when the stakes are emotional, trust is earned differently.
The animal can’t read the label or tell you when it’s in pain or unwell. It can’t interrogate a claim, assess the evidence or decide whether a brand deserves its trust. The owner has to do that on its behalf. That creates a responsibility for businesses entering this space, but also an opportunity for good communication.
PR can help brands educate rather than simply promote. It can bring credible independent voices into conversations where expertise matters. It can translate complex innovation into something owners can understand and act on. It can build communities around shared experiences. And it can help brands understand when evidence is required, when reassurance is needed and, importantly, when they don’t have the authority to speak at all.
There is undoubtedly a huge commercial story unfolding around pets. But the more interesting story is a human one.
The growth of this economy isn’t simply about people having more disposable income to spend on animals. Nor can it all be explained by premiumisation or humanisation. It is about the place pets occupy in our lives.
We want them healthier. We want them happier. We want to understand them better. We want to protect them from things they cannot protect themselves from. And, perhaps more than anything, we want more time with them.
For brands, that creates an extraordinary opportunity. But it also raises expectations. Don’t simply sell to pet owners. Understand what drives them. Understand the responsibility they feel when they make a decision on their pet’s behalf. Understand the information and people they trust. Understand where your brand can genuinely make their lives and the lives of their animals better.
Because when someone buys something for an animal they love, they’re doing more than making a purchase. They’re entrusting a tiny part of that animal’s life to somebody else.
The brands that understand the significance of that won’t simply sell to pet owners. They’ll earn the right to stand alongside them.
Do you have a pet brand you’d like to get in front of the perfect audience? Get in touch with our team.