Aug 9, 2019

BabelBark catapults digital platform for pet industry

The Pet Industry has seen an explosion in growth in recent years. The industry currently boasts a whopping 14% CAGR (compound annual growth rate), and sales are expected to hit $281 billion in North America alone by 2023.

The reason why is clear: consumer needs are changing. Now the largest consumer group in the world, millennials are the driving force behind this rapid market growth, responsible for more than half of it.

It seems that millennials simply love their furry friends, making them the perfect consumer group for the pet industry.

Several recent studies have shown that this new generation of consumers is getting married much later than previous generations and waiting longer to have children. Instead of starting a family of their own, many of them choose to adopt a pet instead.

But while this spells out good news for companies in the pet business, it also signifies a major shift in consumer demand.

Millennials want different things from their pet products than previous generations and are much more technologically inclined. This tech-enabled consumer group increasingly looks for digital pet services.

A recent survey by Michelson Found Animals Foundation, for example, found that 56% of pet parents have special tech just for their pets. Of those interested in pet tech, pet health and nutrition apps were particularly popular.

This has set the stage for the digitization of the pet industry, driving a new wave of pet-tech companies to open up shop and try to fill this gap in the market.

BabelBark is one of the companies leading this change. Co-founders Roy Stein and Bill Rebozo created the world’s only, globally enabled, horizontal digital platform for the pet industry in 2015.

Their line of products includes BabelBark, an app that connects pet owners with their pets digitally, allowing them to monitor things like their pet’s health, nutrition, and location via the app.

Their other products – BabelVet and BizBark – provide tools for veterinary hospitals and businesses that can help improve healthcare, business operations, and profitability.

“As a proud owner of a beautiful Goldendoodle, I initially conceived of BabelBark for my own personal use. Since then, it has grown into something much greater,” said Roy Stein, CEO of BabelBark.  The company has already raised $8.6 million in funding with an additional 6.5 still open.

Founder Roy Stein – who has previously held executive leadership roles for companies including EnergyPoints, GridPoint Inc. and Comverse Technologies Inc. – founded BabelBark in order to solve a need he himself had identified.