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Is It Time To Consider A Pet-Related Business? By D. Marie Ratliff If you read up on trends in business or home business, thenyou've probably seen quite a few articles recently on the petindustry. To put it briefly, more and more people are owningmore and more pets. The figures are amazing, both in terms ofnumbers of pets owned and amounts spent on pets.
According to the APPMA (the American Pet Products Manufacturer'sAssociation), pet spending has more than doubled from $17billion in 1994 to about $38.4 billion in 2006. And spending isnot just on basics like food or routine veterinary care. APPMAs National Pet Owners Survey shows 27% of dog owners and13% of cat owners buy their pets birthday presents, and 55% ofdog owners and 37% of cat owners buy their pet holiday presents.High-end retail goods and services such as pet spas and hotels,pet therapy and expanding veterinary services such as jointreplacement surgeries and delicate eye procedures are becomingmore common. Baby boomers (whose children have grown up) and youngprofessional couples (who delay having children in favor ofcareers), are fuelling much of the growth in spending. They turnto pets to fill the void and often consider their furrycompanion a best friend or member of the family. So what does this mean for you? Maybe not much, unless you also consider the continuing growthof and interest in self-employment and home based business. Formany people, corporate downsizing, reduced pension plans orhealth care coverage, outsourcing and the sheer desire forfinancial independence are good reasons to consider starting afull or part-time business venture. It's this combination - the booming pet industry and the needfor supplemental or replacement income - that makes it worthyour while to examine the pet industry. After all, if you'regoing to start a business, it makes sense to start one with agrowing customer base and high demand. Not that a pet-related business means you have to work directlywith pets. Or get a degree in veterinary science. Or paythousands of dollars in fees to open up a pet store franchise.When you consider that many pet owners have higher-than-averagedisposable incomes and full time careers too, products orservices that go beyond the traditional can be surprisinglyprofitable. For example, if you do like to work directly with cats, dogs orsmall animals, dog grooming and pet sitting continue to beviable businesses. But they're just the beginning. If you preferless competition, consider pet photography, or becoming a petmassage therapist, or raising one of the popular new crossbreedssuch as Puggles or Labradoodles. A doggie day care might be fun.There are even people who conduct parties for pets, to celebratebirthdays and other events like graduation from obedience school! But you can start a pet-related business even if you can't standdogs or are allergic to cats. Remember, pet owners today spend alot of money both to pamper their pets and to make owning a petmore convenient. So you could sew designer clothes for dogs or designer dogcarriers. You can fulfill an ongoing need of pet owners bystarting a pet food delivery service, or take care of animalwaste through a pooper-scooper enterprise. You could write anewsletter focused on the care of tropical fish, or design andsell dog houses. It's a purr-fectly great time to start a pet business! About the author:D. Marie Ratliff is an authority on small business marketing andthinks it's prudent to start a business in an industry that'sgrowing rapidly. Learn more about pet business at http://www.PetBusinessCentral.com Pet BusinessCentral. Limited time offer - free Pet Poisons Hotsheet |
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