Jon Martinek Joins Chew Distributor Natural Dog Company as COO

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Press release: The Natural Dog Company

The Natural Dog Company (NDC), a wholesale distributor of single ingredient dog treats and chews that are sourced from free range, grass fed cattle, is pleased to announce that Jon Martinek has joined the company’s executive team as chief operating officer.

“Jon is our first COO,” said Dan Goodnow, NDC founder and CEO. “He has previous experience in the independent pet channel and therefore understands the needs of our customers. With Jon’s leadership, we will become more strategic about our product development, order fulfillment and sustainability initiatives.”

Martinek brings more than 25 years of retail experience operating at vice president/chief merchandising officer levels covering global fast-moving consumer goods retail with Walmart International and US (10+ years), Johannesburg, South Africa-based Massmart/Walmart (four years), Leeds, United Kingdom-based Asda/Walmart Stores Ltd (nearly five years) and Nottingham, United Kingdom-based Mars (four years). Most recently, Martinek served as chief merchandising officer for Minnesota-based Independent Pet Partners LLC, an independent pet retail startup that Martinek helped grow to 160 stores through acquisition and greenfield openings across three years. Martinek led teams across buying, supply chain and services.

Martinek says he was drawn to NDC because of its solid foundation of quality customer service, value pricing, and sense of social responsibility. He looks forward to helping build the structure and the processes that will allow NDC to grow its manufacturing and functional capabilities so that it can successfully evolve into a sophisticated and more impactful business.

“My goal is to shape the growth of the business in a way that is scalable, sustainable and continues to deliver on the excellence that built the business to date,” Martinek said.

In 2020, The Natural Dog Company landed in the top half of Inc.’s list of the 5,000 Fastest Growing Companies.