Correction: Top 5 pet food brands on Amazon in 2018

EDITOR'S NOTE: Pete Andrews, director of insights at Edge by Ascential, said, “There was incorrect data published in our recent press release. We quoted that Taste of the Wild has decreased in market by 20 percent. Upon further review, our data in fact shows that their 1st Party market share on Amazon has stayed constant throughout the year."

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Pete Andrews, director of insights at Edge by Ascential, said, “There was incorrect data published in our recent press release. We quoted that Taste of the Wild has decreased in market by 20 percent. Upon further review, our data in fact shows that their 1st Party market share on Amazon has stayed constant throughout the year. TOTW continues to be top selling brand on Amazon – I am sorry (to both TOTW and to your publication and readers) that Edge by Ascential has provided incorrect data.”

REVISED ARTICLE:

Pet food market analysts identified the top five brands by their share of total pet food sales on Amazon in 2018. Industry researchers with Edge by Ascential (formerly One Click Retail) concluded that overall pet food sales on Amazon reached an estimated US$1 billion in sales in 2018. That represents an increase of 20 percent compared to 2017.

Top pet food brands on Amazon

  1. Taste of the Wild
  2. Blue Buffalo
  3. Purina
  4. Hill’s
  5. Wellness

Blue Buffalo may have had 11 percent of pet food sales on Amazon in 2018. In third and fourth place were Purina PetCare and Hill’s Pet Nutrition possibly with nine and eight percent respectively. Wellness came in fifth possibly with six percent. Greenies had the sixth highest sales possibly with five percent.

"Blue Buffalo's continued top-selling status illustrates how important it is for brands to incorporate in their packaging what consumers are looking for: healthier pet foods," said Pete Andrews, director of insights at Edge by Ascential, in a press release. "Blue Buffalo's top seller contains the keywords 'Protection Formula' and 'Natural' in the title. The brand includes in-depth content on their product detail pages along with complete ingredient lists, nutritional information, numerous customer reviews and peer-answered questions. The Blue Buffalo brand understands how important community is to the pet owner, whether they are shopping online or in-store. By encouraging consumer interaction on Amazon, brands can recreate some of the interactivity that pet owners value from brick-and-mortar stores."

Change in year over year pet food sales on Amazon

Some pet food companies’ sales increased dramatically in 2018 compared to 2017. Purina’s pet food sales increased 13 percent year over year in 2018, according to market analysts. Rachel Ray’s Nutrish increased 27 percent from 2017 to reach tenth in sales. Fancy Feast also grew significantly with 17 percent sales growth and sixth highest sales by brand.

Although some in the pet food industry worry that Amazon’s private label pet foods could undercut sales of other brands and piggyback on marketing, Edge analysts saw little evidence of this.

"Amazon's own label Wag, launched halfway through 2018, brought in almost US$2 million in sales in 2018, a negligible share in the current pet food category," said Andrews. "Not long after its Wag launch, Amazon began offering its dry dog food under the Solimo private brand as well. Much of the on-page content is nearly identical but Solimo actually offers more A+ content and a cheaper equivalent to Wag," explains Andrews. "Whether this is an A/B test on Amazon's part to identify the effects of small product differences on sales or a transition away from Wag is yet to be determined – but it does suggest that Amazon is not yet ready to challenge major pet food brands head-on while they still gather experimental data."

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