5 Questions for PetSmart CEO Philip Francis
The company is enjoying double-digit growth as pets become more "humanized."
— -- PetSmart's boss says his company is enjoying steady, double-digit growth as pets become more "humanized." And after the pet-food scare, he hopes people will go back to putting that dollop of wet food on top of the dry.
Q. How's business, considering the slowdown in the housing market and high gas prices?
A: We're 40% a grocery store plus haircuts and affordable luxuries. The times that would give a luxury yacht maker heartburn hurt us just a little. And boom times only help us a little bit, too. We're relatively non-volatile. We've had double-digit percentage growth for many years in a row.
When we do what we do well, things are pretty good for us. We have a lot of growth ahead. We're trying to lead on standards of pet care and animal husbandry, which could make new government standards unnecessary.
Q: What's behind your growth?
A: The trend in humanization of pets is one of our biggest business drivers. The industry is growing at 5% or 6% a year, but there's only a 2% increase in pet head count. As pets become more humanized and childlike, they move up in expenditures. Our newest offerings are pet hotels and "doggie day camps." There's short- and long-term boarding with snacks, daily walks, "poochy cots" and a special relief room. There's also day camp for hotel guests or working people who don't want to leave their pets home all day. We've got stores that have 90 dogs in day camp during the day from 7 to 7. Only-children usually find a play group; many single-dog households do, too.
Q: Is it hard to find good people to hire, as it is in much of retail?
A: We're very, very lucky. People want to work around pets. They can't believe they're being paid to play with a dog. When we have a store opening and 35 jobs, we have 400 applications.
Q: How did the recent pet-food recalls affect business?
A: What happened is many people who used to feed dry food with a little wet food on top aren't doing that now. Some people have also moved to higher-end and organic foods. It's taken our average transaction size down a little bit. Our goal is to get people to return to putting a little wet food on top of the dry.
