 | |
| Company type | Public |
|---|---|
| |
| Industry | Pet food |
| Founded | 2006 |
| Headquarters | Bedminster, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Products | Refrigerated pet food |
| Revenue |  US$318.79 million (2020) [1] |
| US$-3.19 million [2] (2020) | |
Number of employees | 591 [3] |
| Website | freshpet |
Freshpet, Inc. is an American pet food company. Its cat food and dog food products are marketed as fresh, and need to be kept refrigerated. [4] It is listed on the Nasdaq exchange with the ticker symbol FRPT. [5]
Freshpet was founded in Secaucus, New Jersey, in 2006 by Scott Morris, Cathal Walsh, and John Phelps, former pet food executives. [6] [7] It opened a factory in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, in 2006; [8] [9] and another in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in 2013. [4]
Freshpet went public on the NASDAQ in November 2014, raising $164 million in its IPO. [10] [11] with a market capitalization of $447 million. [11]
In February 2020, the company was offered a grant of $2.1 million from the Texas Enterprise Fund to build a plant in Ennis, Texas. [12]
In 2020, the company reported revenue of almost $319 million, an increase of some 30%, and a net income loss of $3.19 million, up 130% on the previous year. It also reported losses in the four preceding years. [1] [2]
In 2024, the company moved its headquarters to Bedminster, New Jersey.
Freshpet's cat food and dog food products are marketed as fresh, requiring refrigeration [4] since the company's products have no preservatives. [13] Freshpet was the first to distribute pet food in the fresh and refrigerated category across North America. After a 2007 crisis of wet and dried dog food tainted by melamine, Freshpet's uncontaminated fresh food products experienced rapid growth in the number of stores carrying them. [14] [15]
As of 2021, the company's pet-food brands include Freshpet, Dog Joy, DogNation, Spring & Sprout, [16] Vital, Homestyle Creations, and Nature's Fresh. [17]
Mars Inc. is an American multinational manufacturer of confectionery, pet food, and other food products and a provider of animal care services, with US$45 billion in annual sales in 2022; that year Forbes ranked the company as the fourth-largest privately held company in the United States. Headquartered in McLean, Virginia, the company is entirely owned by the Mars family. Mars operates in four business segments around the world: Mars Wrigley Confectionery, Petcare, Food, and MARS Edge, the company's life sciences division.
Pets.com was a dot-com enterprise headquartered in San Francisco, U.S, that sold pet supplies to retail customers. The website was launched in November 1998 and was shut down in November 2000. A high-profile marketing campaign gave it a widely recognized public presence, including an appearance in the 1999 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and an advertisement in the 2000 Super Bowl. Its popular sock puppet advertising mascot was interviewed by People magazine and appeared on Good Morning America.
Dole plc is an Irish-American agricultural multinational corporation headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. The company is among the world's largest producers of fruit and vegetables, operating with 38,500 full-time and seasonal employees who supply some 300 products in 75 countries. Dole reported 2021 revenues of $6.5 billion.
Odwalla Inc. is an American health food company based in Dinuba, California. Founded in Santa Cruz, California in 1980 and formerly headquartered in Half Moon Bay, California from 1995 to 2020, the company's product lines include fruit juices, smoothies, soy milk, bottled water, organic beverages, and several types of energy bars known as "food bars".
Bob Evans Restaurants is an American chain of restaurants owned by Golden Gate Capital based in New Albany, Ohio. After its founding in 1948 by Bob Evans (1918–2007), the restaurant chain evolved into a company with the corporate brand name "Bob Evans Farms, Inc." (BEF), and eventually established a separate food division to handle the sale of its products in other markets.
PetSmart Inc. is a privately held American chain of pet superstores, which sell pet products, services, and small pets. It is the leading North American pet company, and its direct competitor is Petco. Its indirect competitors are Amazon, Walmart, and Target. As of 2020, PetSmart has more than 1,650 stores in the United States and Canada. PetSmart stores sell pet food, pet supplies, pet accessories, and small pets. Stores also provide services including grooming, dog daycare, dog and cat boarding, veterinary care via in-store third-party clinics, and dog training. They also offer dog and cat adoption via in-store adoption centers facilitated by the non-profit PetSmart Charities.
Petco Health and Wellness Company, Inc. is an American pet retailer with corporate offices in San Diego and San Antonio. Petco sells pet food, products, and services, as well as certain types of live small animals.
Hill's Pet Nutrition, Inc., trading as as Hill's, is an American pet food company that produces dog and cat foods. It is a subsidiary of Colgate-Palmolive.
Wellness Pet Company is a pet food company that consists of Wellness Natural Pet Food, Old Mother Hubbard by Wellness, Whimzees by Wellness, Sojos, Eagle Pack and Holistic Select purchased by Clearlake Capital. Wellness Pet Company is headquartered outside of Boston, in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, as well as in Boston proper.
Ollie's Bargain Outlet Holdings, Inc., commonly referred to as Ollie's Bargain Outlet is an American chain of discount closeout retailers. It was founded in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, in 1982 by Morton Bernstein and Mark L. Butler with backing from Harry Coverman and Oliver E. "Ollie" Rosenberg; the latter of whom is the namesake of the company. As of May 2024, the chain has 525 locations in 31 states. Its selection of merchandise comprises a variety of discounted household goods, apparel, pet supplies, kitchen pantry staples, and seasonal products ; a majority of these items are unsold or overstocked merchandise that is purchased in bulk from other retailers and sold at discounted prices.
Beneful is a brand of dog food products by Nestlé Purina PetCare global that includes wet dog food, dry dog food and dog treats. As of 2012, it was the fourth most popular dog food brand, generating more than $1.5 billion in annual revenues. According to a SWOT analysis by Marketline, Beneful is one of Nestle Purina's more significant brands by revenue.
Sprouts Farmers Market, Inc., is a supermarket chain headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. The grocer offers a wide selection of natural and organic foods, including fresh produce, bulk foods, vitamins and supplements, packaged groceries, meat, poultry, seafood, deli, baked goods, dairy products, frozen foods, natural body care, and household items. Sprouts employs 35,000 workers and operates more than 400 stores in 23 states.
This timeline of the 2007 pet food recalls documents how events related to the 2007 pet food recalls unfolded. Several contaminated Chinese vegetable proteins were used by pet food makers in North America, Europe and South Africa, leading to kidney failure in animals fed the contaminated food. Both the centralization of the pet food industry and the speed and manner of the industry and government response became the subjects of critical discussion.
Pet, Inc. was an American company that was the first to commercially produce evaporated milk as a shelf-stable consumer product with its "PET Milk" brand. While evaporated milk was popular before refrigerators were common in homes, sales peaked in the 1950s and it is now a niche product used in baking and as a cooking ingredient.
Verisk Analytics, Inc. is an American multinational data analytics and risk assessment firm based in Jersey City, New Jersey, with customers in insurance, natural resources, financial services, government, and risk management sectors. The company uses proprietary data sets and industry expertise to provide predictive analytics and decision support consultations in areas including fraud prevention, actuarial science, insurance coverage, fire protection, catastrophe and weather risk, and data management.
Chewy, Inc. is an American online retailer of pet food and other pet-related products based in Plantation, Florida. Chewy went public in 2019 with the ticker symbol CHWY on the New York Stock Exchange.
Two River Group Holdings is a New York-based venture capital firm and merchant bank focused on the life science sector. It specializes in investments in life science, biotechnology, and in firms focused on developing preventive and therapeutic technologies for a broad spectrum of disease areas including oncology, cardiovascular disease, neurological disorders, and companion animal health care.
Simmons Foods and its affiliates process and supply poultry, feed ingredients, and pet food. Simmons poultry primarily provides chicken for restaurants such as Chic-fil-a, Panda Express, Jubilee, Cheesecake Factory, Taco Bell, KFC, and a dozen other chains. Their poultry division also co-packs for brands such as Great Value. Simmons Animal Nutrition division provides feed ingredients for brands such as Blue Buffalo, Hills, Nestle, Mars, Champion, and Freshpet. Their pet food division specializes in fresh and canned pet food for brands such as Great Value, Blue Buffalo, Fresh Pet, Hills, Nestlé, and 2 dozen other brands out of their Kansas, Iowa, and Arkansas plants. They are one of the largest providers of canned pet food in the United states. Their 3 business units are based in Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Kansas.
Whistle Labs Inc. is a subsidiary of Mars Petcare headquartered in San Francisco, California. It produces and markets the Whistle GPS Pet Tracker, a device worn on a pet's collar that monitors its activity and location. In addition to pet owners, the devices have been used by veterinary researchers.