When the cat is chasing the dog

Although dog food still has a bigger market share, cat food products are getting closer to them in the pet food market. Pet food sales in general are on the rise, with dog food having a 60-percent share from sales, while cat food is at 40 percent – but this segment is developing faster. Réka Szabó, grocery brand manager of Nestlé Purina told Trade magazin that single-portion wet cat food sales are growing at the fastest pace (in a large part due to the performance of the Felix brand), but sales of cat and dog treats are also above the category average. Fruzsina Négyesi, portfolio manager of Mars Magyarország Értékesítő Bt. informed us that the market is turning in the direction of single-portion products – formerly multi-portion wet food was popular. The former now already realises 40 percent of sales. There is great potential in treats too. Hyper- and supermarkets dominate in sales, but discount stores have managed to increase their market weight recently. Zoltán Molnár, commercial director of Partner in Pet Food (PPF) revealed that shoppers are becoming increasingly conscious. They prefer cheap but good quality pet food, and they keep waiting for promotional offers. Nestlé Purina’s premium dog food brand is DOG CHOW®. Szilvia Albert, Nestlé Purina’s specialist channel brand manager told us that this year they are putting a new product line on the market. They have already been offering Large Breed products and now they have created the PURINA® DOG CHOW® Small Breed product range. Why? Because according to Euromonitor data, almost one third of Hungarian dogs are small-bodied and their number keeps growing. The company’s super premium dog food brand is Purina® PRO PLAN®. This year’s new product in this domain is Purina® PRO PLAN ® made using the OPTINUTRITION recipe. There are size-specific (Small&Mini, Medium, Large Robust, Large Athletic) and age-specific (OPTISTART, OPTIHEALTH, OPTIAGE) products, plus those that serve special needs such as OPTIDERMA, OPTIDIGEST and OPTIWEIGHT. As for the cat food category, Nestlé Purina launched the Friskies Crunchy&Soft dry cat food in two sizes and in two flavours. This is the first Friskies product that contains both soft and crunchy bits, therefore it is considered a major innovation in the brand’s history. Mars makes great efforts to offer products to all cat and dog owners in ever price category. They keep updating their product selection in the single-portion, dry food and treat categories. This year one of their main projects is the relaunching of Whiskas – the market leader brand – in aluminium foil bag. In the dog food category it is also the single-portion, dry food and treat categories where they came out with new products. In the first half of 2015 the Pedigree mini dry food line went through an overhaul (it targets dogs smaller than 10kg). The company’s latest product is the treat called Pedigree Tasty Bites. Partner in Pet Food targets cat owners with its PreVital brand. This year the company is focusing on expanding the single-portion segment. They doubled the size of the portfolio developed especially for neutered cats, introducing new flavours. Long-term goals include improving the distribution, which goes hand in hand with growing sales. St. Pierre Kft.’s pet food brand Ozzi is being developed with an eye on market trends all the time. Mr. Ozzi, who impersonates the brand, told our magazine that the portfolio has been created with the growing popularity of single-portion products in mind. Both cat and dog owners can find 2 aluminium-cup Ozzi products in stores. Last year they put the Ozzi 4×100 pouch product for cats on the market. The majority of products are wet pet food, but this year 10kg Ozzi dry dog food also appeared in shops (following the 1kg version).