Recent Articles from Erik Martin
A Healthy Snack Knack
They say you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar. The same can be true of honey sticks, fruit and nut yummies, baked birdy biscuits, and millet morsels: offer a healthy selection of savory snacks for birds and chances are their owners will flock to your store for more of these avian indulgences. Because […]
Ferrets: Furry and Fun
The craze that made them household name critters may have died down from a few years ago, and they might not sell as solidly today as other small mammals in your store. But make no mistake: when it comes to cute and cuddly, few animals compete for a patron’s attention quite like the fur-tastically fetching […]
The Play’s the Thing for Birds
Few things warm bird lovers’ hearts more than seeing their winged companions busy at play. But avian amusements only go so far in a cage lacking bird-friendly baubles, trinkets and toys. And therein lies an opportunity for pet store retailers, who can position themselves as the go-to source for fun products designed to stimulate birds […]
Crunch Time for Small Animals
Here’s some food for thought: Consumers are no longer content with the fast-snatch grab-and-go approach to small animal food shopping. Today, they care about the contents, and they’ll spend more time in your store reading the label on a package of edibles, according to the experts. That makes it all the more important to carefully […]
High-Energy Retailing
Back in 2009, Disney had the foresight to tap into the snowballing small animal ownership craze when it released the live action 3-D film “G-Force.” The movie’s heroes—we are talking guinea pigs, hamsters, moles and other CGI-animated mammals—escape from their cage to save the world from a dastardly evil with the help of high-tech exercise balls. The flick may not have broken [...]
Backyard Feathers
Old McDonald’s farm isn’t the only place where contented egg layers, colorful quack-makers and other pleasant pheasant-like feathered friends can be found. Today, all manner of urban poultry pals have found a home in the backyards of animal lovers living in the boondocks as well as the big city. And pet retailers who want in on […]
Exotic, Not Quixotic
Variety is the spice of life, they say. It’s a big reason that saffron, sumac, serrano chilies and epazote, despite being rare and lesser known, are highly coveted seasonings among fine cuisine aficionados. And it also helps explain the irresistible allure of exotic small animals, like sugar gliders, prairie dogs, degus, hedgehogs, chinchillas and kinkajous—out-of-the-ordinary […]
Seeds for Success
They say the quickest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. That can also be said of pet birds, whose owners know that providing nutritious yet tasty edible offerings can keep their winged companions healthy and happy. More importantly for pet retailers who cater to this need, it can sow the seeds for […]
All About That Base
Today’s pet retailers can’t afford to roll out of bed late—or roll only partway into the small animal bedding subcategory, for that matter. That’s because pet owners are increasingly aware of the plethora of substrates crowding the market and are clamoring for greater variety in the products with which they choose to line their cage […]
Time to Branch Out
You can’t exactly put yourself “in a bird’s shoes.” But imagine how their feet must feel gripping the same cylindrical surface day after day. Now imagine how you can capitalize on educating customers about how to avoid this fatigued foot fate. By stocking a wider array of perches and related accessories in your store and […]
Small Animal Abodes
The days of the all-purpose aquarium serving as a surrogate for a proper pet rodent residence are long gone. So is the era of the flimsy plastic domicile that functioned more as a disposable chew toy that could be gnawed through faster than you can say “chinchilla.” Indeed, the good news in 2017 is that […]
Beyond the Norm
They say the cure for feeling cooped up is to spread your wings and fly. But many bird product retailers are content to confine sales of cages—the most crucial avian commodity that bird owners purchase—to a limited supply and a small selection. That’s an opportunity missed, say the experts, who recommend expanding your offerings to […]