Interview with Rashi Narang, founder of Heads Up For Tails

Rashi Narang founded Heads up for Tails (HUFT) in 2008 after being disappointed with the selection she found on the market when looking for a gift for her own dog, Sara.

Seizing the opportunity, she started the pet business, which now has 105 stores in 20 Indian cities. India’s pet retail market is very fragmented and HUFT has approximately 8-9% of the market with its stores and grooming spas, as well as an online shop.

Now, HUFT is in talks to close a funding round of $25-28 million (€24-27M) and is aiming to become a ₹500 crore ($58M/€55M) brand by 2027.

How did it all start?

We started as a small, homegrown company – for a long time just me, researching and learning, since there was no existing business model to follow in India.

We introduced India-first products, but selling them was a challenge. I visited over 200 pet stores and all but one turned me away. The one store that said yes after a few months eventually merged with us years later.

You operate in the world’s most populous country. How challenging is that?

It’s very challenging on multiple levels. When we started, we had to do more than just solve logistics, infrastructure and supply chain issues – and that continues today.

Back then, we had to create a customer base from scratch, because awareness was so low.

While India has a long history of coexisting with dogs and cats, they were primarily used for guarding or security purposes.

When we started, the mindset was more about pet ownership rather than pet parenting. Over time, we’ve witnessed a shift, with pets moving into homes, onto beds, and becoming true family members.

Being part of this transition has been incredible. We’ve worked hard to promote that change through education, content and community building.

Our goal is to help people truly connect with their pets, because pets make us better, more compassionate human beings.

How does the Indian market compare to Western countries?

In Europe and the US, many people are on their third, fourth or even tenth pet, whereas a large percentage in India are first-time pet parents who need to learn everything from scratch. India is also an extremely price-sensitive market.

Unlike in the West, where disposable income allows for higher spending on pets, Indian consumers need to see great value in what they’re buying.

Awareness is growing, but the core segment of engaged pet parents is still small.

There are plenty of pet lovers, but truly dedicated pet parents are a niche.

That’s why we advocate for pet parenting, helping people to understand the joy and responsibility that comes with truly caring for their pets.

Have Indian pet parents changed their attitudes to commercial food?

Around 90% of the Indian households still feed their pets fresh home-cooked food rather than packaged pet food. Cooking at home is deeply embedded in our culture.

However, we are seeing a slow shift toward packaged food.

We started as a lifestyle brand, but in the past 4 to 5 years we’ve expanded into pet food, and now it accounts for over 50% of our business. A few years ago, we also introduced treats, and we’ve recently expanded into full meals.

Rather than competing solely on price with third-party brands, we wanted to create pet-first nutrition – clean, preservative-free and made with pets as family in mind.

This category is seeing the most growth. Besides food, grooming services are a strong area, along with toys and walking essentials like collars, leashes and harnesses.

And what about services?

As much as 60% of our revenue comes from our physical stores. Of that, grooming services account for about 15%, which is a significant portion.

We’ve been offering grooming for 6 to 7 years now, and demand is growing quickly.

Traditionally, in India, most people bathed their dogs at home. But as pet parenting evolves, more owners are opting for professional services.

This shift in demand is encouraging, and we see great potential for further growth in the service sector.

How do you see your services offer evolving in the near future?

Instead of focusing on retail-first stores with small spa areas, we are experimenting with spa-led stores that have smaller retail sections.

Our current spa spaces are quite limited, and we’re constantly at full capacity, which means we have to turn customers away.

We’re exploring how deep this can go and trying to find the perfect balance between services and retail.

Retailers worldwide are pushing more toward an online footprint. Is that the case for you too?

From a profitability standpoint, offline makes more sense for us compared to online, where loyalty is much lower due to price comparisons.

Actually, our average basket size offline is 18% higher than online.

Online customers tend to shop wherever they find the lowest price. In-store, our team builds relationships with customers. They know them and their pets by name.

We are developing a strong omnichannel strategy where customers can buy online, return in-store or have products delivered from our stores.

Now that we have a solid retail network across the country, our focus is on optimizing both channels.

Quick commerce is consolidating as a retail channel in India…

Quick commerce platforms operate through dark stores that service neighborhoods, meaning they can only stock fast-selling SKUs.

These platforms focus on convenience rather than discovery, so we use them to list our bestsellers and fastest-moving products. Customers can get these products delivered in 10 minutes.

So far, we have seen this gaining traction, sometimes even struggling to keep up with demand. It is still early in our journey – we have only been listed on these platforms for a few months – but we see significant growth potential.

We are on Blinkit, Zepto and Swiggy Instamart, with plans to expand to a few more new platforms soon.

While there’s some concern about cannibalization of retail sales, quick commerce simply cannot match the range available in our stores.

A typical quick commerce platform may stock 20 of our SKUs, whereas our stores carry over 1,000. For more in-depth shopping, customers still prefer visiting a store or shopping online.

How is your store network divided? Do you work with different price points depending on the location?

Over the past 2 years, we’ve also worked on making our products accessible at different price points. Initially, we were more niche, catering to high-end consumers, but now we’re expanding to serve a broader audience.

We have stores in malls, high streets and neighborhoods, each with a slightly different product mix based on local needs.

Essentials like pet food remain constant across locations, but we’re tailoring other offerings to fit different markets.

What is your target for store expansion over the next few years?

We want to reach at least 250 stores in the next 3 to 4 years. We see plenty of room for expansion and are also keeping an eye on how online channels evolve.

It is definitely the age of convenience, so we are working on balancing both physical and digital retail.

You are proud of featuring ‘Made in India’ products as a big part of your assortment…

At one point, we were importing about 10 international brands and serving as their exclusive distributors.

However, supply chain disruptions – especially during and after COVID-19 – made it increasingly difficult to manage supply and demand. Import costs, including logistics, duty and freight, have also risen significantly.

As a result, we have shifted our focus toward manufacturing in India, allowing us to control our supply chain better and be more agile in responding to market needs.

This approach has been a key focus for us over the past year.

You recently opened a store at a New Delhi airport…

As a team, and as pet parents, we realized that people often want to bring back something for their pets after a trip – just as they do for their kids.

This led us to open our first airport store at New Delhi’s domestic terminal, which aligns well with our target market.

The airport store has been great for visibility and discoverability, with strong sales and many new customers trying our products for the first time.

It also allows us to reach pet parents from different parts of the country who might not otherwise have access to our brand.

While it is still early days – we’ve only been open for a few months – the response has been very positive, and customers are often delighted to find a pet store in an airport, as it is quite unexpected.

This location is entirely dedicated to our brand, making it even more special.

In which local market do you see more potential?

We are present in all Tier-1* cities and are expanding into Tier-2 cities, with some Tier-3 experiments underway.

Awareness is highest in Tier-1 cities, where pet ownership is growing, as people move away from joint families to nuclear family set-ups.

That said, our Tier-2 and Tier-3 experiments have shown depth, and there’s exciting potential in these markets. We are taking a slow approach, but I believe there are great opportunities.

How does consumer behavior differ across the tiers?

The main difference is awareness. In Tier-1 cities, pet owners are more informed and exposed to more content. In Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, some people may still wonder why their dog needs a toy, because they’ve never considered it before.

Lifestyle differences also play a role. In smaller cities, homes tend to be larger, with more space for pets, whereas in Tier-1 cities, increasing urbanization means more apartment living.

However, demand for pet products exists across all regions.

What about expansion beyond India? You already have a presence in Singapore. Can you share your strategy for growing internationally?

We wanted to test our product market fit in a global setting, so Singapore made sense – it’s close by and has higher purchasing power.

We now have 2 stores there and are about to open a third. The response has been great, and we see strong demand. Next, we’re looking at the Middle East and some neighboring countries where we see opportunities.

We want to ensure we expand strategically without diluting our focus. Finding the right partners will be key.

Our ambition is to take our products worldwide. We put immense effort into R&D, and we believe our edibles and lifestyle products are world-class. We want pets everywhere to benefit from them.

*Indian cities are classified based on population and economic factors. Larger cities, such as Mumbai and Delhi, are Tier-1 (100,000 people or more). Less populated cities and towns are classified as Tier-2 (50,000-100,000) and Tier-3 (20,000- 50,000).