paper: introduction of business

Objectives

· To be a market leader by the third year of business through, customization of pet feeders, expansion into delivery of complementary products and focus on socially responsible designs/ products that are environmental friendly.

· To maintain a minimum of 15% annual sales turnover increase for the first five years in business.

Mission

Provide customized pet feeders that will serve busy pet owners with varied away-from-home schedules.

Success Strategy

· Product customization at extra costs borne by the customer.

· Exemplary customer care with extended product guarantee from customization efforts.

· Invest in pet safety and pet health workshops for clients. This will help in selling complementary products.

Opportunity

The common pet food dispensers have timers set by owners depending on the frequency of the pets feeding habit. However, our unique design has a pressure plate placed at the bottom of the feeding bowl. The pressure plate is designed to feel the repeated warm touch of the pets tongue/ mouth. Once this happens, the timer is automatically triggered. The advantage lies in reducing wastage especially where the pet is unable to feed and the dispenser adds the bowl contents causing a spill-over (Wellock, 2013). There is also a temperature maintenance device that regulates the warmth of the food stored in the dispenser.

Target Market

· Middle or upper class clients with extra money to engage in product customization and complementary products/ services.

· The old generation that is characterized by tendencies to forget or certain disabilities, yet love keeping pets.

Marketing Strategy

Place: Highly concentrated areas like the cities provide ideal selling points. The people have busy schedules during working days and would need to take care of their pets for an average of 9 hours away. The proximity of households provides room for multiple sales and affordable marketing expenses in terms of reduced transport costs in covering multiples of households. The long term target is establishing the consumers eventually shifting from cities to suburban areas. This category of consumers has a larger capacity to possess multiple pets and spend more hours away from home than average city dwellers (Wellock, 2013).

Product: The product relies on a timer that is set by the pet owner yet controlled by the pet. The owner can set the re-fill time to 1 hour, but the pet triggers the countdown through pressure applied on the base of the bowl as an indication of clearing the current food content. This dispenser is ideal for busy individuals, ones with disabilities or experiencing bouts of forgetfulness. Adjusted dispensers may serve multiple animals differentiated through bowl color or height (Tisch, 2005).

Price: The estimated price ranges from $200 to as high as $300 or more. This is because of extra customization including feeding bowl with pressure plate. Other devices include the thermostat to check and regulate temperature of stored or served content. There are both cooling and warming functions involved depending on the desires of the pet-owner. The timer and pressure plate connection piping are essential features. The dispensers may be customized to contain large volumes of food as well as serve multiple pets.

Promotion: Social media is our method of choice when it comes to creating awareness. We will engage in provision of free pet health clinic sessions as well as free food coupons with a certain number of first groups of customers. We will also offer part exchange for old dispensers with newer inventions, for loyal customers. Bill boards and posters are our preferred communication tools in the sub-urban areas.

Market Research

Our product is priced slightly higher than existing automatic feeders but carries more benefit as compared to the extra cost. At a least price of $200, the dispenser can serve more than five times a day depending on the unique needs of the pet. Most competitors have a price range of $133 to $160 within the city (Wellock, 2013). The average competitors have a five day limit and only hold an average of five cups of food. Our product serves dry food but with customized demand, the design can serve liquids such as milk or water among others. Furthermore, removable food storage extensions can be added to cover longer periods of pet-owners’ absence. Most dispensers in the market are standardized to a daily re-fill capacity. The market is filled with single species feeders that would suit one kind of pet, especially dogs (Tisch, 2005). Our design provides for single and multiple pets through various heights/ sizes of feeding bowls. The design provides us with a market for pet training in terms of bowl color and bowl height association.

Financials & Budget

Projected Sales & Profit Graph

The units are in $ 100,000s with the gross profit standing at 70% of sales and net profit 20% of the gross profit. The actual market implementation should yield modalities to minimize the cost of sales and expenses thus increase the margin. Specific area of interest lies in decreasing the taxes incurred in business.

Year 1 Income Statement

Sales Revenue 120,000

Cost of goods sold (C.O.G.S) (36,000)

Gross Profit (Sales less C.O.G.S) 84,000

Expenses: Advertising 5,000

Utilities (Internet, electricity & water) 3,900

Administration Costs & salaries 58,000

Insurance 300

Net Profit 16,800

Start-Up Summary

The $50,000 start up capital is distributed as follows;

· 60%: Product prototyping, patent and design fees as part of research and development.

· 15%: Corporate branding and marketing

· 15%: Administrative costs

· 10%: Office set up and equipment purchase.

Challenges

As a start-up, we are faced with competition from established companies with unlimited resources including goodwill established over the years. Such companies include; Our Pets’, A Charmed Life (elevated feeders) and Doskocil Manufacturing company (Wellock, 2013). Indirect competitors include members of the supply chain and distribution channels such as Wal-Mart, K-Mart and PETCO.

Customization of products needs more time with clients and their pets. The pet training aspects and client education call for working during odd hours including evenings and weekends. Extra costs of production attract are incurred because there is no standard design in our intended market penetration technique. However, the main parts can be standardized while exterior appearances formed to suit individual client needs.

Observation

Despite the steadily growing pet feeding industry, two aspects stand out from a research perspective. There is less robust advertising in the industry as compared to others, a fact attributed to low sales across companies. Consumers are shifting to customized designed and as opposed to standardized products in the market. Our company intends to take advantage of the customization aspect sweeping through the industry.

References

Tisch, D. (2005). Animal feeds, feeding, and nutrition and ration evaluation. Clifton Park, NY: Thomson Delmar Learning.

Wellock, D. (2013). Health and nutrition for dogs and cats: a guide for pet parents. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

Sales Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 1.2 1.3800000000000001 1.5869999999999986 1.8250499999999996 2.0988074999999977 Gross profit Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Yea r 4 Year 5 0.84000000000000052 0.96600000000000041 1.1108999999999998 1.2775349999999985 1.4691652499999985 Net Profit Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 0.16800000000000004 0.19320000000000001 0.22217999999999988 0.25550700000000004 0.29383304999999998