Cat owners often get the short end of the stick — at least when it comes to the pet food industry.
For decades, cat owners have been marketed dry kibble to feed their little friends. Some of these foods address certain concerns, like a “hairball formula” cat food or dry food blends for aging cats.
Most of this is bogus marketing, according to Matt Michaelson, the CEO and co-founder of direct-to-consumer cat food company Smalls. What cats actually need is better quality cat food.
Smalls’ goal is to provide high-quality, human-grade cat food, and, on Wednesday, the company announced it raised $9 million in Series A funding to do just that.
Michaelson and his co-founder Calvin Bohn grew up in Portland in the ’90s, when the organic food movement was in full swing. Consumers were starting to pay more attention to the food that went into their bodies — and how that food was processed.
Over time, people started applying the same mentality to animals as well, with farmers re-evaluating what they feed their chickens or cows. But when it comes to organic pet diets, dogs have received most of the love. Companies like The Farmer’s Dog and Ollie promise human-grade food for dogs, but there aren’t as many brands serving cats.
According to Michaelson, 95 percent of VC funding in the pet food industry has gone to companies that make food for dogs, even though there are more pet cats in the United States — about 94 million compared to 89 million.
“The pet food world focuses on catering to dogs, while cats are severely overlooked,” Michaelson told Built In.
Cats naturally have different dietary needs than dogs. In nature, dogs are pack hunters and scavengers, which means they have a wide selection of foods to survive on. Meanwhile, cats are mostly carnivorous predators, which means they need a high-protein diet. As a result, cats are often more picky when it comes to what they eat.
“We asked ourselves, what does your cat eat in nature and how can we get close to that?” co-founder Bohn told Built In.
Smalls produces its own fresh, human-grade food designed for cats, which means it uses meat that’s safe for humans to eat and no carbohydrate fillers. Its food comes in a handful of flavor varieties — using chicken, turkey or beef — and different textures, whether that’s minced or paté.
In addition to its fresh cat food, Smalls also creates its own freeze-dried food. That food is more shelf stable, but not as processed as dry kibble.
Smalls sells its food through its website via a direct-to-consumer subscription model, where customers get shipments of cat food sent to their homes. Customers can also get a trial shipment to figure out what their cats like, and shipments come with a money-back guarantee.
This model has proven successful for the company. Pet adoptions are at an all-time high because of the COVID-19 pandemic, as more people take home pets to keep them company. Also, because of the pandemic, people are relying more on e-commerce and spending less time physically shopping in stores.
These two factors have caused demand for online cat food delivery to surge, growing 162 percent year-over-year from March of 2019 to March of 2020, Smalls reported.
The company is raising funding now to capture this growing demand. It plans to launch new products, like a fish version of its fresh cat food. It also aims to expand into other areas of cat products — like cat litter, toys and medication.
The company is also hiring for several key roles including a director of product management, acquisition manager and product designer. Right now, the company is small, with only 18 employees, but it’s looking to increase its employee headcount this year to 25 people.
“Since COVID-19 changed our lives and economy, there continue to be many unknowns. But, if anything is certain, cats need to eat. Our DTC model allows us to safely deliver exactly what customers need, directly to their doorsteps, and our business is seeing tremendous growth as a result,” Michaelson said in a statement.
