A very humble 2012 beginning ….

With only $3,000 worth of products and a retail space of 20sqm, Paw4Friends was established. The store was a modest layout filled with some quirky pet products and a small variety of pet food.

We quickly realised that trying to maintain the business through sale of products alone was not going to be enough to keep the doors open. We needed to evolve our initial business model and so 3 months in, we purchased our very first Hydrobath (Dog wash tub) and extended our store offering to now include dog wash service.

The months that followed were incredible and the support from the community was overwhelming.

12 months later we more than doubled our store size to a 45 sqm space (just 3 doors down). We expanded our services to include dog walking and daycare. By then our store had a much more extensive range of pet products which also included products for small animals such as rabbits and hamsters. It was an amazing feeling of gratitude and excitement.

Over the next 2 years, our pet store steadily increased a following of customers with our name reaching as far as Avalon, and our team grew from 3 to 5 staff.

With a growing number of regulars, we knew it was time to expand and find a space that would potentially be the pet destination we were hoping to be.

And it was! A pet lovers destination with approximately 120sqm of dedicated grooming, daycare and pet retail display space. We knew it would be the place for all pet lovers to visit and we continuously expand our product range. We now carry over a thousand different products.

In that 8 years we served as a small business to our local community plus some others, we knew, we have been blessed and really could not have asked for more.

In that same time, we learnt so much as a small business. We understood the heartache and pain that comes with operating a small business. The importance of being competitive and up to date with the market. Therefore as part of our business evolution and growth we decided to take all our learnings and develop a platform application that is specific to the pet industry for retailers and consumers alike.

Our brainchild and market disruptor – PawsEco.