NEW YORK (AP) – Danielle Schwartz did not ask for an oil painting of her cat. But she loves the portrait of Stinky hanging at her home in upstate New York, a surprise gift from an unlikely place: an online pet store.
It is one of more than 1,000 free paintings that Chewy sends to selected customers every week – even during the pandemic – exploring people’s obsession with their fur children and, hopefully, winning customers for life.
In the relentless world of online shopping, that personal, slightly kitschy touch is how Chewy is trying to stand out from the competition, which only gets tougher as more people shop online and add pandemic pets for their families. Pet ownership is expected to grow by 4% in 2020, the first increase in several years, according to the Petco Foundation.
Chewy’s strategy seems to be working on Schwartz, whose blue-eyed cat likes to rub himself in the painting of his cat tree.
“I just want to buy everything from them,” she says. “They are a great company. I was shocked that they did something so personal. “
The portraits have become a hit on social media, where people share images of them or beg for their pets to be turned into works of art.
Eric Sheridan, a sales specialist from Lee, Florida, asked for a portrait through the Twitter account of Gozer, his Boston terrier with more than 3,000 followers. A Chewy representative replied, “My paws are crossed so that we can send one to you.” It arrived a month and a half later. “Christmas came early,” Sheridan tweeted from Gozer’s account.
Not everyone is happy to get a mysterious portrait – the company recognizes that some confused customers send them back. But many of those who get a portrait of a pet document it on social media, offering Chewy free advertising – a trend the company noticed when it started sending them out.
“Customers were going crazy,” says co-founder Ryan Cohen, who helped get the idea in 2013 before leaving the company.
Chewy was founded in 2011, marrying Amazon’s fast delivery with the friendliness of a local pet store. The goal was also to take a portion of the fortune that Americans spend on their pets, which is expected to total $ 99 billion by 2020, according to the American Pet Products Association. PetSmart, the pet store chain, bought Chewy in 2017 for more than $ 3 billion to expand its online business, but two years later it transformed Chewy into a public company it is now worth about $ 40 billion, although it never made a profit.
Amazon and Chewy dominate the online pet supply industry, with Amazon’s market share more than 50% and Chewy 34%, according to retail consultancy 1010data. But the pandemic was especially good for Chewy, as people avoid physical deposits. The stock price more than tripled in 2020. Sales increased 45% in the quarter from August to October. And it added 5 million new customers last year, bringing its total customer base to almost 18 million.
Phillip M. Cooper, a consultant in the pet industry, gives credit to customer service. “It set the standard,” he says.
The company’s 2,500 agents are trained to answer questions from pet parents, such as what foods are best for older dogs or where to find shelter. Chewy sends handwritten notes to new customers and all buyers receive Christmas cards by snail mail. He even sends flowers to people whose pets have died.
“It helped relieve the pain,” says Jordan Redman of Norman, Oklahoma, who received a bouquet of flowers after Bud, his golden retriever, died.
But it is the paintings that leave customers gasping for breath. There is no way to buy one from Chewy, and the company does not say exactly how someone will be selected. But you usually send them to those who have pictures of pets in their Chewy account or shared one with a customer service agent.
For clues, see the experience of Danielle Moore, who said that Chewy asked her to send a photo of her Australian dog, Kana, during a call about returning an order. Kana’s likeness appeared three months later. Moore loved it so much that he tried to buy another one through Chewy, but the customer service agent didn’t budge. Instead, the Dallas chemist ordered one for $ 36 at Etsy, and the paintings hang together on the wall.
Chewy does not disclose the cost of making and sending the portraits. He has worked with hundreds of artists across the country who receive photos of their themes via email by the company.
Josh Lawson, who paints 20 to 50 portraits a week, has already done snakes, goats and even what he thinks were bison. It may take two hours or more to make a portrait. Cute kittens, for example, need extra attention and a long-tipped brush to get the right amount of fluff. “I want to make them look real,” he says.
There is pressure to do this. Chewy says he rejects works of art that don’t look enough like the pet or sends them back for rework. The goal is for people to talk about Chewy with others and get a privileged place on the consumer’s walls, serving as a billboard for the company.
Annesley Clark, a law student in St. Louis, was surprised at how much the free painting looked like her pit bull mix, Willow. “I was out of my mind,” she says. “It is she exactly.”
She couldn’t wait to show it off. The next day, she took him to a socially distant picnic with four other people and held up the artwork. “I said, ‘Look at this. It’s perfect. ‘”His friends agreed.
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Follow Joseph Pisani on Twitter: @ Josephpisani