UAE’s pet industry thrives as residents splurge on ‘fur babies’

Gulf News

A surge in pet ownership, especially after the pandemic, has showcased the immense untapped potential the UAE’s market holds.  Some estimates suggest that pet ownership in the UAE has increased by over 30 per cent since the pandemic, with young singles and seniors particularly embracing pets, predominantly cats and dogs. This has propelled the pet care industry in the country into a market exceeding $360 million, with expectations of reaching $2 billion by 2025.  Read the full story here: https://gulfnews.com/business/markets/uaes-pet-industry-thrives-as-millennials-splurge-on-fur-babies-market-expected-to-surge-to-2-billion-by-2025-1.98461785  Subscribe to Gulf News on YouTube and watch more of our videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/GulfNewsTV  See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km  #UAEnews #pets #animals

Transcript

00:00I saw an opportunity in the pet universe six years ago when I started a daycare and a hotel for dogs.

00:12I've been in the corporate world for a long time, FMCG's mainly. I used to play tennis

00:17for a living and then I joined Unilever back in 1998 and then over the years it's been

00:24corporate, traveling, doing reports and growing the business and then I decided to... I saw an

00:30opportunity in the pet universe six years ago when I started a daycare and a hotel for dogs.

00:39Things went really well, of course, except for the couple of years where the COVID was visiting.

00:45And then the pet shop, I mean, bought a stake at Petsville. We became partners and we decided to

00:51grow the business together. Last year the new investors asked me to come and

00:58manage the pet shop, which for me is more than just a job, it's a passion. I'm one of

01:04the lucky ones who enjoy what they do. It's a lucrative segment of the market, I would say.

01:11It's one of the very few segments that are still under-invested. If you look at the

01:17segment globally, it's growing at 14.5-15 percent, which is the highest growing segment

01:24across all FMCGs. The pet segment is growing only at 25 percent, which is still very high

01:30and the highest growing compared to Europe, to the US, to Latin America, to Asia even.

01:38So the segment is under-invested, under-represented and we expect

01:43huge, huge growth in the upcoming years. One more point, if you look into the penetration

01:50of pets in the households, only eight percent of the households in the UAE have cats. Only five

01:57percent of the households in the UAE have dogs. In the US, it's 70 percent. So the opportunity is

02:05huge and looking into different industries, looking into the history, the Middle East

02:11follows and specifically in the last couple of years and the outlook for the next 10-15 years,

02:18there is a lot of investments across industries and everyone is expecting this region to boom.

02:24So what's better than having a growth segment in a growing region? We've seen a lot of

02:32humanization, I would call it, of pets. So people now take pets as part of the family, as kids,

02:38which means the spending patterns are developing. They're looking for more premium products,

02:44they're still, of course, looking for value, for money, but also they're looking for innovation.

02:49And when I say innovation, I mean daycare, I mean boarding centers. Even in some of the daycares,

02:55we run Halloween parties, we run end-of-year parties, we run back-to-school parties.

03:00So I think it's a lot of growth levers leading this industry forward, not just

03:08one. Innovation is part of it, of course, and I think there is a lot of more innovations coming to

03:15the market. Convenience is another thing. Everyone now is buying online, everyone is

03:20looking for better products. It's not only about how they treat the pet, it's how they share their

03:26lives with pets. So now you look for many, you see many requests of people looking for

03:33a beach to go with their pet. Experiences. In the store here, we allow, of course, people to come

03:38with their pets and it becomes a fun kind of trip. So it's not only about how they look

03:45and how they classify their pet, as much as it's about sharing good moments with pets.

03:52And I think part of it also was due to the change of demographics during COVID. A lot of families

03:58have left, a lot of single people have actually came to the UAE and they need companions. Dogs

04:05in looking for a home has always been an issue, not only in the UAE actually, I think the country

04:10here has done a lot on that front. During COVID, the shelters were empty. Everyone was

04:18looking for a dog, everyone was looking for companionships, and it's amazing how once they get

04:25there, I've seen so many cases of people adopting a dog during COVID, and six months later we're

04:30looking for another dog. We need a companion for our companion. And that explains how

04:38it works psychologically, and it's amazing because it's contagious also.

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