Following up on The Pet Business Professor’s recent post on 2018 U.S. Pet Spending by Generation, we figured we would help share this excellent data and share some of our thoughts, takeaways, and action items.

You can find the original article and data HERE. Highly recommended reading for pet store owners as this kind of data can help you dictate your future marketing pet store marketing plans, what the trends are looking like, and where the majority of your profits come from! Important stuff.

If you don’t know any of those things, give us a shot at dialing in on that - start with a free call with a Pet Engine Marketing representative to revolutionize your pet store marketing strategy.

Reach out

3 TAKEAWAYS: PET SPENDING BY GENERATION

Good to know the defined generations first:

Millennials: Born 1981 to 1999. In 2018, Age 19 to 37
Gen X: Born 1965 to 1980. In 2018, Age 38 to 53
Baby Boomers: Born 1946 to 1964. In 2018, Age 54 to 72
Silent Generation: Born 1928 to 1945. In 2018, Age 73 to 90
Greatest Generation: Born before 1928. In 2018, Age 91+

ok boomer?

Boomer spending went down $6.4B, while Gen X and Millennials improved 17.9% and 25.4% respectively. So, the Boomers’ spending, in general, is decreasing. Following the trends previously stated by the Pet Business Professor regarding pet spending in the U.S. (our thoughts and takeaways HERE), more millennials are finding financial independence and disposable income that they gladly spend on pets.

Millennials are the faster-growing generation and are thought to have surpassed boomers in 2019. They are also the ones that are and continue to be digitally connected, influenced, and reached. By the way, did you know that we help you reach that generation really well?

FDA Warning impact

The FDA pronouncements about grain free foods and DCM had a profound and noticeable impact on pet spending across generations, but specifically on boomers. As they reverted to more “normal” foods, millennials and Gen X members picked up the slack by being more informed (or not caring about the FDA announcement, whichever you prefer) or even upgrading their pet foods to more expensive varieties.

Depending on your customer base, your pet store marketing strategy can go in either direction with this. At Pet Engine, we recommend staying educated on the matter and being able to educate your customers across all channels and media. You can do this through email, video, social media, websites, in person, and more. The issue probably isn’t divisive enough to prevent any disagreement in customers from shopping at your store, so you can also play to both parties and continue to sell the whole range of dog foods.

continued expansion in services

Both veterinary and non-veterinary services saw majority growth across the generations and saw the biggest increase in history. As a pet store going into 2020, a major goal should be incorporating services and/or building on cross-referring partnerships to bring customers into the store beyond just retail offerings.

Bringing in a groomer or two can increase revenue by close to $100,000 and will make up the cost of decreased retail space. Being the preferred partner for local veterinarians can be a strong way to bring in new customers. Part of our philosophy at Pet Engine is to bring in customers for reasons other than retail, and these are prime examples of how to do so.

PET SPENDING BY GENERATIOn
Conclusion

Thanks to The Pet Professor for aggregating this data. For us, the data backs up our business model, marketing strategies and tactics, and growth models for independent pet stores: focus on millennials and diversify your income streams. It’s not complicated, it just has to be done right!

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