Breeder’s Own Pet Foods, Inc.

Case
Analysis

By John Fitzpatrick, Skylar Jeong, Sam

MKTG 485
March 3, 2020

Executive Summary

The following proposal is for Breeder’s Own Pet Foods, Inc, producer of dog food for

show-dog-kennel. They prospered through focusing on a niche market of unique dog food for

show dogs however, their new goal is to advance into the wider, general dog food market with

three options. The first option is to include specific instructions related to thawing and

refrigeration time, breakeven pricing, adapting price-off coupon to stimulate trials, specifying the

target market, implementing two advertising strategies of print ads and tv ads and focusing and

have a budget of $500,000. The second option is modifying the first option by implementing a
different price point to successfully break-even with a total budget of $700,000. The third option

is completely rejecting the previous marketing plan and implementing a totally different plan.

To successfully enter the frozen dog food market in Boston and gain brand awareness,

Breeder’s Own should target single and married people ages 21-54 with higher than average

incomes who own a dog. In order to do this, they should utilize a $700,000 marketing budget that

consists of TV and newspaper/magazine advertisements. The TV ads should depict Breeder’s

Own as a high-quality luxury dog food because they are a member of the family. The

newspaper/magazine advertisements should aim to drive new consumers straight to the product

trial phase by offering certain discounts on the new-to-market product.

Problem Definition

How to successfully promote Breeder’s Mix dog food during its initial launch and gain

market share given a budget of ($500,000-$700,000).

Analysis of Alternatives

For the first alternative, Breeder’s Own Pet Foods Inc will implement the given

marketing plan from Marketing Momentum Unlimited with a budget of $500,000. In order to

overcome the potential objection to frozen dog food, cases and pouches will include a statement

of the thawing time, a suggestion for quick thawing, and recommended refrigeration time. The

pricing of the individual cases will be $10.96 to breakeven. Additionally, there will be a price-off

coupon to stimulate trials due to the product being new to the market. This coupon will

encourage trials to curious consumers. The target market of Breeder’s Own Pet Foods Inc. is

single and married people between the ages of 21-54 with the household income greater than
$25,000. Due to the fact that only 48% of consumers with annual income less than $25,000

spend money to keep a pet whereas, 63% of consumers with incomes greater than $50,000 invest

in pet foods and supplies.

As for advertisements, there will be print ads in newspapers to inform a smaller and more

retentive audience and discount coupons will be distributed with the print ads. In addition to the

print ads, there will be television ads to reach a mass audience with the objective of registering

brand name and the package in the viewer’s memory. General media strategy will include

creating awareness of a new brand, obtaining distribution through supermarket outlets,

motivating trial through coupon redemption, and emotional impact of television. Additionally,

the focus will be on collateral advertising due to it being the most effective method to obtain

distributions in supermarkets. This will be a critical stage of the campaign because it will aid in

the accomplishment of the objective. In order to break even with a $500,000 marketing budget,

they will have to sell 662,166 cases at $10.96 per unit (Appendix A).

The next alternative is similar to the first, with the exception of the total budget being

$700,000 instead of $500,000. With this plan, most of the aspects of the first plan will stay the

same. The first to get modified would be the pricing on how much the dog food will cost. The

new pricing would be $11.30 instead of $10.96. The next modification would be to increase the

spending on television, newspaper, and magazine advertising. The budget for

magazine/newspaper would be increased by $30,000 and television by $170,000. The collateral,

miscellaneous, and agency fees would stay the same. In order to break even with a $700,000

advertising budget, they would have to sell 642,481 cases at $11.30 per unit (Appendix B).
 By rejecting the plan that is given and creating a different plan, there is more flexibility

with it. Using the 2% of profits go towards marketing that other dog food brands use, the budget

at the beginning would be $145,152 (Appendix C). The budget would be used for TV

advertisements, magazines, miscellaneous, and agency fees (Appendix D). Breakeven would be

at the price of $10.37 with 700,045 units.

Plan Development

To determine how profitable the plan would be, first, there was the determination of how

much the dog food market in Boston was worth. Annually, $14 billion is spent on dog food in the

US. 1.2% of the American population resides in Boston. 36% of all dog food sales occur in

supermarkets. 80% of those food sales are not on treats. This means that the total industry value

of supermarket sold non-treat dog food in Boston is worth about $48,384,000 annually. The book

also states that 1 out of 10 dog owners feed their dog frozen food already, and 15% of non-frozen

feeders said they would be willing to try frozen dog food. The target market contains those

people who would consider trying frozen food. Considering these additional statistics, the target

market value is estimated to be worth a total of $7,257,600 (Appendix E).

Breeder’s Own Pet Foods should implement a marketing budget of $700,000 to gain the

most brand awareness and subsequent market share. With this large marketing budget, they

should expect to capture the full market potential of those Bostonian consumers that would

consider buying frozen dog food. This would generate a first-year revenue of $7,257,600. In

order to achieve a 15% return on investment, Breeder’s Own would have to sell 472,808 cases at

a selling price of $15.35 per unit. This would generate $556,747 in profit in the first year which

represents a 15% share in the non-treat dog food industry in Boston.

awareness in the Boston market. According to Statista, the average cost per impression with a

TV advertisement is 2.5 cents. Also, the average cost per impression with a newspaper is 3.2

cents. With a $700,000 budget, Breeder’s Own will be able to spend 75.5% on TV advertising,

and 18.7% on newspaper/magazines. These expenditures will result in 21,160,000 TV ad

impressions and 4,078,125 newspaper/magazine ad impressions which come out to a total of

25,238,125 impressions. This is a massive amount of exposure compared to the population of

Boston, which was only 630,000 in 2011. This means the Breeder’s Own can leverage this

$700,000 marketing budget to reach the entire population of Boston with an average frequency

of 40 times in the first year. By using collateral advertising they can incite purchases with

coupons that drive first time sales. This constant exposure to a wide range of people will drive

brand awareness in the initial market, and educate the population about this new product.

The product will be packaged in 15-ounce bags and sold in a case of 12. The design of

the packaging is important to inform the consumer not only about the organic and all-natural

health benefits but also includes instructions of how to properly prepare the product. These

instructions will be simple and illustrated on the side of the packaging clearly visualizing the

three ways; thawing, refrigerating, or microwaving.

They should follow the TV and magazine advertisement recommendations in the case.

The best TV message when marketing high-quality dog food is to appeal to emotions and

position the consumer’s dog as a member of the family. As a member of the family, the target

market’s dog should eat like one. Highlighting the superior quality ingredients of Breeder’s Own

dog food will help to position the brand as one for owners who really want the very best for their

beloved furry friends. In the magazine and newspaper ads will be coupons to help consumers
skip directly to the product trial phase. This way they are not fully committing until after being

able to try it for less than what it cost. The plan chosen hits all of the best aspects of the

alternatives, focusing on awareness and getting the brand out there is the priority that drives

sales.

Appendices

Appendix A

Appendix B
Appendix C

Appendix D

Appendix E