Innovation of the Day: Wild Earth

This startup wants to make pet food sustainable

Sustainable pet food company Wild Earth has launched dog treats made of fermented koji, a type of fungus. The Berkeley-based startup says it is on a mission to revolutionize the pet food industry by making sustainable, cruelty-free, and healthy products. Currently much pet food is meat-based. Wild Earth say their koji dog treats contain all the amino acids that dogs need, while using 90% fewer resources than similar meat-based treats. The company plans to launch a koji and plant-based dog food next.

Paws up for sustainable dog treats! But what can you learn from all this?

Expectations never stand still. Vegan diets — we’re talking about diets for people here — used to be a fringe concern. But we all know that’s changing fast: as we called out in this recent Innovation of the Day on Good Catch plant-based tuna, sales for plant-based alternatives to animal products are expected to exceed USD 5 billion by 2020. But if rising numbers are turning away from meat for reasons of health and environmental sustainability, then what about the meat they feed their pets? The arrival of Wild Earth is just another reminder that once they are generated, new consumer expectations never stand still.

You can’t hide from the truth. In an increasingly transparent world, the negative impacts of consumption patterns — on individual health, society and the planet — become increasingly hard to hide from. That truth is driving adoption of vegan diets; now it’s likely to drive adoption of plant-based pet food, too. One study by UCLA found that the meat fed to pet cats and dogs in the US alone creates 64 million tons of carbon dioxide a year, causing the same damaging impact on the climate as a year’s worth of driving by 13.6 million cars. How long until rising numbers of pet owners hear about facts such as this? So two questions to take back to your team: how is rising transparency going to change opinions of your industry in the years ahead? What should you be doing about that now?

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