Why Digital-First Pet Brands in India Are Moving Offline
Digital-first pet brands in India are moving offline as physical retail becomes key for trust, discovery, and sustainable omnichannel growth.
For years, India’s new-age pet brands followed a familiar playbook: launch online, build a loyal D2C audience, control the narrative, and grow through digital marketing. That approach worked-until it didn’t.
As customer acquisition costs rise and online growth begins to plateau, many digitally native pet brands are discovering a simple truth: physical retail is no longer optional if scale is the goal.
Across India, pet care startups born online are now opening brick-and-mortar stores-not as a retreat from digital, but as a natural next step in their evolution.
From Screen to Shelf: A Strategic Shift
Digitally native brands are those that started online, selling directly to consumers through their own websites and marketplaces. In the early stages, this model offered speed, data, and margin control. But it also came with limits-especially in a category like petcare, where trust, trial, and education matter deeply.
Physical retail solves many of these challenges.
A presence in stores allows brands to:
- Reach pet parents who don’t actively search online
- Enable first-time trials, especially for food and supplements
- Build credibility through visibility and physical reassurance
In India, where many pet parents are still first-generation owners, seeing a product on a shelf-recommended by a store associate-often carries more weight than a digital ad.
Omnichannel Is Becoming the Default, Not the Exception
Rather than choosing between online and offline, successful brands are now designing hybrid distribution strategies.
Typically, this looks like:
- Shelf-stable products (supplements, dry food, treats) in retail
- Subscription or specialised formats continuing online
- Retail stores acting as discovery and trust-building points
- Digital channels are driving repeat purchase and loyalty
This approach allows brands to expand their reach without sacrificing the customer relationships they have built online.
In India, pet-focused retail chains and curated marketplaces-such as Heads Up For Tails and Supertails-have become important partners in this expansion, offering brands both scale and category credibility.
The Margin Reality Check
Moving into retail does come with trade-offs.
Compared to direct-to-consumer sales, offline distribution usually means:
- Lower per-unit margins
- Trade discounts and promotional costs
- Inventory planning and operational complexity
For digital-first brands, this requires a mindset shift. Retail is not always about maximising margins-it is about customer acquisition, visibility, and long-term brand building.
Smart brands account for this by:
- Designing retail-specific SKUs and pricing
- Treating stores as marketing investments, not just sales channels
- Protecting premium positioning through selective distribution
When done right, retail doesn’t dilute the brand-it strengthens it.
Why This Matters More in India
India’s petcare market is still maturing. Unlike Western markets, where vets drive many purchase decisions, Indian pet parents often rely on:
- Pet shop owners
- Groomers
- Community recommendations
Offline retail plays a crucial role in influencing these decisions. For digitally native brands, remaining online-only can limit exposure to a large and still-growing segment of pet owners.
Physical presence also signals seriousness. For many consumers, a brand that exists only online still feels experimental. A brand on a shelf conveys a sense of established presence.
The Bigger Picture
The move into retail is not a rejection of digital-first thinking-it’s an extension of it.
Brands that succeed will be those that:
- Use retail for discovery and trust
- Use digital for education, retention, and lifetime value
- Design products and pricing with both channels in mind
In today’s environment, growth doesn’t come from choosing one channel over another. It comes from making channels work together.
For India’s digitally native pet brands, the path forward is clear:
from clicks to counters, from followers to footfall, from D2C to truly omnichannel.
That’s not a step backwards.
That’s what scale looks like.
Reference
- India Pet Care Economy 2025: Market Trends, Key Players, and Growth Opportunities — Overview of India’s petcare market growth, premiumisation, and consumer behaviour trends relevant to retail expansion. (India Briefing)
https://www.india-briefing.com/news/indias-pet-care-economy-2025-an-overview-37234.html - India Pet Market Size, Share, Growth & Forecast 2032 — Data on market valuation and growth drivers for pet products and services in India, including the rise of retail channels. (Markets and Data)
https://www.marketsandata.com/industry-reports/india-pet-market - India Pet Food Market Size & Share Outlook to 2030 — Analysis of the pet food segment, distribution channel trends, and the role of retail and specialty stores in market expansion. (Mordor Intelligence)
https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/india-pet-food-market - Supertails: Online Pet Store, Shop Pet Supplies and Products — Example of a digital-first Indian petcare platform that combines online presence with expanding retail services. (Supertails)
https://supertails.com - Top 10 Pet Care Brands in India — Highlights major petcare brands in India that influence both online and retail distribution strategies. (Indian Retailer)
https://www.indianretailer.com/article/retail-business/retail-trends/top-ten-pet-care-brands-in-india - Pet Fed India — Example of a major Indian pet event where brands, both online and offline, engage directly with consumers, illustrating the real-world importance of physical presence. (Wikipedia)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pet_Fed_India
