Drools eyes business growth in Asia and Europe

Established in 2010, Drools is believed to be India’s second-largest pet food company. The company is part of the Indian Broiler Group and retails pet food and veterinary services in over 23 countries from its 38 depots and warehouses. Its product portfolio is available in 30,000 stories in India.

CEO Dr. Shashank Sinha shares the growth challenges in the Indian pet industry, global market expansion plans and strategies to become the country’s number one pet brand.

In 2022 you posted a turnover of ₹365 Cr (€40.8M/$44.1M), and you aim to double your revenue by 2025. How are you going to do this? 

We have grown at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 40% over the last 2–3 years. We are looking to be available to the customer by expanding retail stores and our footprint in supermarkets, department stores, grocery stores, medical shops and pharmacies, where we were not very strong a couple of years ago. Exports aren’t a huge contribution to the business’s overall value, but we are slowly expanding our footprint.

You have a clear strategy to grow your presence in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. How is that going?

We hold 50% of the Indian market share, but going forward, exports are going to be a priority for us. Australia was our first major crack last year. We will soon be available on Amazon Australia as well, where we are looking to expand our product range.

Apart from our national market, both the Gulf countries and Southeast Asia are a priority for 2023 and 2024. We want to make our presence felt as a regional Asian brand. Prescription and therapeutic diets for pets seem to work very well for us under Drools Vet Pro, and our upcoming strategy will be expanding our product range in countries like Thailand, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Dubai and Saudi Arabia.

From September, we will be exporting to Thailand, Asia’s largest exporter of pet food and a global leader. This will prove our grit as a brand with our customer-first approach. 

Do you have any other target markets?

Europe and the US are much more mature markets where we would like to expand later. Russia will be the first European country we will enter this year.

Who are your current biggest competitors?

Pedigree and Whiskas are in terms of packaged food. However, our biggest competitor in the Indian market is home-cooked and table food. In India, only 7 in 100 pets eat commercial pet food.  

What are the challenges to the Indian pet food market? How will Drools overcome that?

The biggest challenge is the knowledge gap among pet parents on why to pick packaged food over home-cooked diets and the difference in nutritional requirements between humans and their pets. 

We have a huge number of celebrity endorsements talking about ‘feed real, feed clean.’ This supports reading the pack’s label, checking ingredients and learning how the products are made. We are working with retail channels like the Indian e-commerce company Flipkart to spread awareness among pet owners.

How is the company innovating? 

Pet parents across different states (small and metropolitan cities) call themselves pet owners and pet parents, so their demand varies. At every level, the product lines change—some focus on the product (chicken sausages, ready to serve), while others look at the quality and ingredients. For example, we have recently launched a new product line made from grain-free ingredients.

You have recently expanded your production capacity…

We have just opened up our third dry food plant following the surge in demand, and we are happy to share that we are the only one with three manufacturing facilities in the country right now. We have also become Sri Lanka and Nepal’s number one pet food brand.

Where would you see Drools in the next five years?

We hope to become the number one player nationwide in terms of volume. Currently, we hold 45% of the market share in dry cat food. We are the biggest pet biscuit player in the country and have 50% of the prescription diet market. We are working on expanding our dog category shares. We’ll try to be a major contributor and player in the Indian subcontinent and Asian markets.