U.S. users accounted for 65% of requests about vegan dog diets on pet care platform Dosty during a recent three-month period, according to Ayaz Ahmadov, the company’s co-founder and chief executive officer. He interprets those conversations as evidence that owners’ personal values and dietary preferences influence their interest in pet food.
Approximately 700 users sought advice about vegan diets for dogs during the period, Ahmadov reported in written responses to Petfood Industry. The United Kingdom accounted for 8% of requests and Canada for 4%.
Those figures describe the geographic distribution of inquiries, rather than the proportion of owners feeding vegan diets in each country. Dosty did not provide the total number of users or dog owners in each market, or establish whether those asking questions subsequently fed their dogs vegan food. The figures therefore cannot establish national differences in use rates.
Differences among US and UK inquiries about pet food
The conversations nevertheless offer a platform-specific view of how owners approach feeding decisions and how pet humanization may take different forms across markets.
“What is interesting in our data is that pet humanization does not appear to develop uniformly, even across culturally similar English-speaking markets,” Ahmadov said.
He described American users as particularly exploratory in their questions about nutrition, treats, ingredients, supplements and human foods. British users, he said, more often sought reassurance about whether they were feeding, training or caring for their animals correctly.
“So we would be careful about saying that American owners humanize their pets more because they care more,” he said. “What appears to differ is the form that humanization takes.”
Ahmadov interprets the U.S. conversations as an expression of owners incorporating pets into their household’s lifestyle and consumption choices. In British users’ conversations, he said, emotional attachment more often appeared through caregiving responsibility and concern about making appropriate decisions.
Interest in vegan feeding also extended across dog sizes. Among approximately 700 users asking about vegan diets, Dosty classified 40% as owners of small or designer breeds and 60% as owners of medium or large dogs. The company did not provide the corresponding breed distribution of its overall user base.
“From the conversations we see at Dosty, interest in vegan feeding often appears to begin with the owner’s lifestyle or belief system, rather than with a specific biological requirement of the dog,” Ahmadov said.
For pet food companies, the distinction raises a question about consumer communication: Are owners seeking information about a product’s suitability for their animal, its compatibility with their own values, or both? Ahmadov’s interpretation suggests both motivations can appear in feeding conversations, although the data supplied do not quantify their influence on purchases.
Responses differ by AI or human questioner
Ahmadov also reported differences between questions directed to Dosty’s artificial intelligence assistant and those posted in its human-led, breed-specific communities. Assistant users tended to seek immediate answers to specific concerns, while community participants sought other owners’ experiences, including accounts of feeding changes.
“For us, the most interesting insight is that pet care is not only an information problem. It is also a confidence problem,” Ahmadov said. “Owners often need both a reliable answer and the feeling that they are not the only person dealing with the situation.”
These figures describe inquiries on Dosty, not confirmed feeding practices or national vegan food adoption rates. The supplied commentary did not specify exact collection dates, total users in each country or whether the country percentages represented unique users or multiple requests. It also did not report whether users subsequently fed their dogs vegan food.
