Tuffy's Pet Foods Severing Relations with Chewy.com

April 26, 2017

A Minnesota-based specialty pet food maker is severing its relationship with Chewy.com in the wake of the e-commerce company’s acquisition by big-box retailer PetSmart.

Tuffy’s Pet Foods, Inc., maker of specialty pet food brands NutriSource, PureVita, and Natural Planet, said in an April 20 statement that Chewy no longer falls “within the channels we choose to support with our product and marketing plans.”

The statement was signed by Charlie Nelson, company president, and Dan Schmitz, national sales manager.

“While e-commerce sales have grown significantly over the past few years and will continue to grow — and no company can ignore this channel — it is our strong intent to continue with our current marketing plan focused on the independent specialty retailers and family owned businesses.”

The company said its products would continue to be offered through Chewy.com for a short period of time so the relationship can be closed “in a professional, ethical manner.”

A search for Tuffy’s on Chewy.com Wednesday turned up 69 choices for NutriSource, 76 for Tuffy’s Pet Food, 23 for PureVita, and 10 for Natural Planet.

Founded in 1947 by Tuffy and Kenny Nelson, the Perham, Minn.-based Tuffy’s is a subsidiary of KLN Enterprises, which also makes candy and confections.

A Chewy representative did not immediately respond to an email Wednesday seeking comment about the statement by Tuffy’s.

Headquartered in Dania Beach, Chewy.com was founded in 2011 by Ryan Cohen and Michael “Blake” Day, millennials who met in a computer chat room. Early this year, analysts estimated the company had captured more than 50 percent of the online pet food market.

After the PetSmart acquisition was announced on April 18, customers took their skepticism to Chewy’s Facebook page. Some said they didn’t like various aspects of PetSmart’s operations, while others questioned whether Chewy could retain the qualities that fueled the company’s growth — such as fast, personalized service and surprising customers with paintings of their pets.

In an interview by telephone on Wednesday, Schmitz said Tuffy’s has no objections to any aspect of PetSmart’s operations.

Declining to distribute through large retail chains “is just the direction our company decided to go in,” Schmitz said. “Our support of independents is what’s gotten us where we are today and that’s the road we will continue to go down.”

Steven Kirn, a lecturer for the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business, said it might be a smart move for Tuffy’s to protect its “exclusive” image among pet food consumers “rather than play in what often ends up as a race to the bottom in pricing — with presumably a lowered consumer image of the brand.”

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