THE PET ECONOMY
A pet’s life is not what it used to be. Today, there’s a venture to indulge every one of their whims
RRam and Shyam begin their day with a lap in their own private pool. Once they emerge from its heated waters, a helper stands by to dry them with Egyptian cotton towels. Their nails are rubbed with a special Ayurvedic herbal blend to prevent germs and infections, after which they go for a leisurely stroll around Delhi’s Sainik Farms. Breakfast is either boiled salmon with jasmine rice or a hearty lamb shank stew, followed by a long snooze on their own balcony. Of course when the Delhi winter gets too cold for comfort, they sleep indoors curled up at the feet of Mommy under a goose-down duvet. Nap over, they have an hour-long play session with the babysitter. The day ends with a dinner of blueberry oatmeal, asparagus soup or nani’s special homemade khichdi. Pampered brats? Not really. Ram and Shyam are two Indian dogs that Dhruv Bhasin, 33, rescued from the streets of Delhi in 2020.
Clearly, a dog’s life is not what it used to be— guard the house, shower love on your human or strut your stuff at a dog show or two. In return, you could probably get a place of your own called a kennel, perhaps a collar with your own name tag, a hand-knit sweater, and a chewy bone for treat if not the family’s worn-out slippers. Outings would be a walk in the park, or a trip to the vet.
That’s how Shallu K., a 66-year-old Bangalorean who has owned close to 20 dogs so far, remembers it. “Baths would mean a simple bar of Dettol soap and the hosepipe in the lawn. We never put coats and t-shirts on our dogs even when we took them to the hills in the winter. They ate bread and milk, not the blueberries and the gluten-free specialty dog foods you see today.”
Today, that could have PETA snapping at your heels. Pets in the modern family have all the privileges that humans do. They are
the children in the family, companions for the ill or the elderly, besides being man, woman and child’s best friend. Naturally, their families want the best for them, and spare no expense in that pursuit. A new pet owner on an average spends anything between Rs 20,000 and Rs 50,000 to get basics such as vaccinations, a bed, meds, leashes, collars and bowls. The rest depends on how deep is your love—and your pockets.
Indians have always kept pets. It’s just that the need for canine/feline company just got more acute in the emotionally and socially isolating days of Covid-19. According to online data agency Statista, if Indians owned 20 million dogs in 2019, that number could well touch 31 million this year. And while dogs remained favourites as pets, cats, fish and birds found enough homes too.
“Dogs and cats have been shown to reduce loneliness and combat stress,” says Samriddh Dasgupta, the Chief Marketing Officer of Heads Up For Tails (HUFT), India’s largest petcare company, and a dog parent himself. “There was an increase in adoptions during the pandemic as people found themselves indoors and often alone.” Noida-based art HR professional Dhriti Gurudanti, 37, found herself emotionally drained during the pandemic, but since she didn’t have the space, she ended up adopting a pet virtually. “I sponsored a dog with a local NGO because I could not keep one in my apartment,” she says. “I would see him on video calls and his antics always made me feel better.”
Sniffing a massive opportunity, a whole industry has sprung up around petcare—from food to grooming to pet fashion to pet products to pet hotels and vacations, pet training schools, pet psychologists, pet birthdays and even pet photo-shoots. A September 2022 report by market research firm Market Decipher estimated the Indian petcare market size to be Rs 7,400 crore in 2021 and predicted it to reach Rs 21,000 crore by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 19.2 per cent. Just the pet food industry is worth a whopping Rs 4,000 crore currently, and is expected to become a Rs 10,000 crore market by 2025, according to market research firm Euromonitor.
A FULL PLATE
Such is the potential of the pet food market in India that packaged food and beverages giant Nestle India acquired the pet foods business from Purina Petcare India for Rs 123.5 crore last year, foraying into the segment for the first time. Beauty and healthcare FMCG Emami also decided to invest in petcare startup Cannis Lupus Services India last year and will now offer Ayurvedic remedies for pets under the brand name Fur Ball Story.
Even the biggest success story in the petcare industry, HUFT, had its beginning here. “Our brand was built on the back of pet food,” says Dasgupta. “The diversification of our portfolio has happened only in the past few years. It was a lonely battle to sell quality pet food 14 years back— we wanted to reinvent how you pick products for your pets,