By Louise Allingham For Daily Mail Australia
15:13 21 May 2023, upgraded 16:18 21 May 2023
- Mike Halligan is the co-founder of Scratch Dog Food
- He began the business after investigating the family pet food market
- Scratch has actually offered $10M worth of dog food given that introducing in 2018
A disappointed business person whose precious dogs got all of a sudden ill and passed away chosen to eliminate back versus the ‘uncontrolled’ pet food market, and his own dog nutrition brand name has actually now generated more than $10million.
Mike Halligan stopped his job in the fashion business to launch Scratch Dog Food in 2018 which is a subscription-based business that provides premium healthy kibble to countless Australian dogs.
The concept was born after Mike found dog food manufacturers do not need to abide by any guidelines in Australia and are under no commitment to notify consumers just what enters into their items.
Before he began Scratch, Mike started to look into the family pet food market to enhance the health of his 2 ill dogs and was shocked by what he discovered.
‘I actually began taking a look at what they were consuming… it ended up the majority of the food was crap. I was taking a look around and it was simply a mess,’ the Melbourne business person informed FEMAIL.
‘Both of them died in a brief quantity of time and because last duration I found out that the dog food market was uncontrolled and I got actually p***ed off.’
The loss of his dogs and his new-found understanding ‘planted the seed’ to start his own ‘truthful’ and healthier pet food brand name.
‘I was so hellbent on making a dog food – your dog consumes the exact same food day in and day out, so if your food isn’t good that’s going to do a great deal of damage to their health that may not be apparent initially,’ he said.
Through a shared connection, Mike fulfilled Doug Spiegelhauer who had actually been operating in the family pet food market for 8 years at the time.
‘He was among the leading dog foodstuff designers in the nation and was in fact almost to stop his job,’ the cofounder said.
‘He was so fed up with having good objectives of making the food however eventually the brand names he was working for would picked cost over health.’
The pair set out to produce a healthy dog food while notifying dog owners precisely what is entering into their family pet’s supper.
Mike said dog owner’s are typically misguided regarding what grocery store and even superior foods consist of with lots of utilizing meat ‘leftovers’.
‘Most foods switch out meats and active ingredients based upon what’s inexpensive at the time. They make it so the package looks precisely the exact same however one month it may be lamb then one may be beef and the next month it may be chicken
‘It’s the exact same dog food however it’s simply getting switched out all the time based upon cost.’
Dog food product packaging can likewise utilized tricky marketing techniques to make consumers think their dog is getting more protein than they actually are.
‘Brands may state there’s over 80 percent protein from meat sources however the meat sources part will be actually actually little,’ Mike explained.
‘Many individuals will believe their dog food has 80 percent protein in it or 80 percent meat however that’s simply not the case. Just take a look at what the huge claim on the package is actually stating.’
He likewise said to look out for foods which contain high quantities of starches like potato and tapioca which provide little dietary worth.
‘There’s a great deal of confusion due to the fact that there’s many choices. They’re all stating they’re the healthiest thing and they have actually got a veterinarian’s approval however individuals simply wish to have the ability to see what remains in the food,’ Mike said.
‘The labelling is so unclear and there no laws around it so it actually is the wild west when you’re attempting to search a package for what’s healthy or not due to the fact that it can be camouflaged a lot.’
Together Mike and Doug developed Scratch which provides healthy kibble to family pet owners doors on an online-only membership basis and is completely transparent about the active ingredients they utilize.
‘We’re the only brand name in the nation that reveals just how much we utilize of every component and we’ll never ever alter that,’ Mike said.
‘People have the ability to see ‘ok my dog has a concern with chicken, I wish to have the ability to see the dog food does not have chicken in it’.’
With no brick-and-mortar shops, instead of spending on lease, the business can invest more money back into sourcing premium active ingredients.
Doug with the help of 2 licensed family pet nutritional experts establish healthy dishes and source Australian-sourced active ingredients.
‘A great deal of dog food you purchase in the store is bulk-made a couple of times a year, we make food regular monthly sometimes when our dogs require it,’ Mike included.
‘They wind up getting food we may have made in the recently directly to their front door.’
Dog moms and dads can even customize their furry friend’s diet plan, whether they’re an adult, senior or puppy, to their particular requirements and get foods that assist with joint, skin and stomach concerns.
In the starts of Scratch 5 years back, Mike said the business chased word of the brand name navigated an online neighborhood of French Bulldog owners.
‘Some of those early individuals who were searching for openness in the dog food market had actually Frenchies who had been battling with these skin concerns all their life,’ he said.
At the time, Scratch was offering simply one dish with kangaroo meat that lots of bulldog owners state cleaned up their dog’s skin concerns.
‘We got shared around all these Facebook groups for Frenchies and all of a sudden half the consumers we had were for French Bulldogs and it actually removed from there,’ Mike said.
‘Once you start assisting the health of dogs individuals simply discuss it.’
Since then, Scratch has actually offered more than $10million worth of dog food to countless pooches around the nation.
Mike said this year as the brand name turns 5 he wants to turn over $15million and struck their 40,000 dog fed by Scratch.
He likewise hopes Scratch will pave a brand-new course for the dog food market and program owners the value of what they are feeding their furry pals.
