K9 of Christchurch – the fastest growing pet food company in NZ in the Deloitte's top 10

 A Christchurch pet food company that is increasing sales by more than 320 percent a year has been named one of the fastest growing companies in New Zealand.

   K9 Natural Food was tonight listed among Deloitte’s top 50 fastest growing companies in the country and they are predicting even bigger growth next year.

      Their growth for the two years year to July was 640 percent for the period and sales since July have been even stronger.  K9 Natural Food export 85 percent of their product and they are forecasting sales to go beyond $15 million in the next financial year.

   Chief executive Calvin Smith said tonight their Deloitte achievement of being listed eighth fastest growing company in NZ will cement current relationships with existing markets.

   ``We don’t really need any more doors opened.  Our sales team seem to do a fantastic job of that already. We will certainly use it to strengthen and grow our brand in all our export markets, as well as in New Zealand.

   ``We will also be using the social media which we are very active on to notify the wider K9 family of the success.  The people that buy K9 Natural form a strong bond with the company and many will get just as much satisfaction out of this result as we do.

   ``Growing at this rate, we must allocate resources wisely and where they have the biggest effect and at the moment that is in the USA and Europe.’’

   Smith said K9 Natural is growing at such a rapid rate simply because they believe they sell the best food for a dog.  We just need to make more people aware of our food.

   About 15 percent of the meat produced in New Zealand is exported as pet food, often to be processed overseas, he said.  K9 tries to buy as much natural meat, fruit and vegetable as close as possible to their Christchurch manufacturing plant to reduce the carbon footprint.

   ``Word of mouth from our current customers has resulted in a growth rate domestically over 50 percent and that seems to be continuing this year.

   ``We currently have 15 staff but have budgeted for 40 staff by this time next year. The growth will typically be in the sales, marketing and support roles.  We are in the process of building a new factory which will be very efficient so we won’t need a huge increase in production staff.

   ``We are well aware that making the fast 50 doesn’t mean we have made it; we have just made it to the start line.  There is a lot of hard work required to ensure we capitalise on this great opportunity,’’ Smith said.

   The Deloitte Fast 50 has become synonymous with some of New Zealand’s most successful businesses from the past decade such as 42 Below, HRV and Trade Me.

   K9 Natural Food was founded five years ago by Geoff Bowers, a former English police dog handler and dog trainer who has eaten both the raw and freeze dried K9 Natural dog food which is the only fresh raw 100 percent complete diet sourced from animals deemed fit for human consumption on the market in most countries worldwide.

    To learn what dogs should eat, Bowers spent three months in frozen Alaska up in the Arctic studying feeding habits of the grey wolf.  He said DNA showed dogs were 99.8 percent wolf and their digestive system was exactly the same, so it made sense to base their diet on that of the wolf.