U.S. Pet Product Retail and Internet Shopping Trends, 4th Edition

The industry term “omnichannel,” from the retailing and marketing communications point of view, focuses on brick & mortar + internet sales. The Packaged Facts term “omnimarket,” from a broader competitive landscape vantage, further emphasizes that pet owner spending is broadening across a transformed set of products, services, and high-tech product/service hybrids, with competitors aggressively crossing former business boundaries to vie for consumer mindshare and customer loyalty.

All pet and vet industry opportunities intertwine with channel shopping trends, as well as with the digital platforms both as sales juggernauts and as consumer behavior influencers.

In the wake of COVID-19, a reset of the U.S. pet industry is evident in several trends—which, being synergistic and intertwined, are best wielded in strategic combinations.

• A permanent remix of physical and digital shopping behaviors, with buy online, pick up at store (BOPUS) and curbside bridging the two.
• In an omnimarket era, on top of mergers and acquisitions, a fluid role for partnerships.
• An entrenched role for autoship/subscription purchasing in key pet product categories.
• Beyond autoship, a competitive focus on efficient home delivery of products as larger consumer market trends play out in pet products.
• In a digitalized era of abundant retail and ubiquitous product options, an essential role for private label and customer rewards programs.
• Beyond rewards programs, a growing role for pet care spending and financing options.
• The continued retail-ization of vet and pet services.

At a general level, the humanization of pets and the premiumization of pet products and services means that human market trends have overtopped the traditional pet industry levees.

At the industry-specific level, however, innovation in pet health and wellness is the omnimarket driver. Wellness-seeking consumerism is hardly new nor specific to the pet market, but it exerts a unifying principle in a way not feasible in the much larger and messier human consumer market, of which the pet industry is a microcosm.

Scope of Report

This report provides a data-rich analysis of pet product retail sales and shopping patterns in the U.S., with a primary focus on dog and cat products. Report coverage spans e-commerce, discount stores/supercenters and supermarkets, pet specialty stores, and the veterinary sector. Along with detailed retail sales and share quantification, the discussion examines competitive dynamics, pet product shopper psychographics, and customer demographics by channel and key retailers (such as Amazon, Chewy, Walmart, PetSmart, and Petco). Focus chapters on pet food and pet medication/flea control further assess retail dynamics in these core pet market categories.

Report Methodology

The information contained in this report was obtained from primary and secondary research. Primary research includes proprietary online consumer polls of U.S. adult pet owners (age 18+), conducted on an ongoing basis by Packaged Facts, to measure purchasing patterns and attitudes regarding pet products and services. The Packaged Facts surveys cited in this report were primarily conducted between January and November 2022.

The pet ownership and pet owner demographic data draw on trended MRI-Simmons National Consumer Study data through the Summer 2022 survey release, including trending and comparison with pre-COVID-19 patterns. Secondary research includes information and data-gathering from consumer business and pet/vet trade publications.

Market size and segmentation calculations draw on various sources: syndicated sales-tracking data; reported revenues of pet product manufacturers, retailers, and pet services providers; background sales data from syndicated sales-tracking sources; surveys of independent and chain pet store retailers; government data, including U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Expenditure Surveys; and figures from other market research sources.