Benton County Inventors Produce Pet Products

Charles Hatfield’s relationship with Wal-Mart goes back a long way.r

“I had the dubious honor of putting Ol’ Roy to sleep,” he said of Sam Walton’s beloved English setter. “That was not a good day. He had cancer internally.”r

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. now sells its own brand of dog food named for Ol’ Roy, who would sit at Walton’s feet during the Saturday morning meetings at company headquarters. Walton, the founder of Wal-Mart, died in 1992.r

Hatfield bought Rainbow Animal Hospital in Bentonville in 1972.r

In 1989, Hatfield came up with an idea for leash/collar combo that he calls Hatfield’s “2 in 1.” He pitched the product to Wal-Mart thinking the company might stock it in one-third of its stores.r

“They had a meeting, and my buyer called me. He said, ‘Well, if they’re going to go ahead and take it, they’re going to go in all the stores.'”r

That required an additional 51 miles of webbed nylon material.r

“It scared me,” Hatfield said.r

But Hatfield got his 1,620-SF “factory” rolling, and Hatfield Pet Specialties’ “2 in 1” leash/collar is now for sale in all domestic Wal-Mart stores except for the smaller Neighborhood Markets. That amounts to about 2,900 stores.r

After seeing dogs pull their heads out of traditional collars and run away at the door of his office, Hatfield also began making choke collars that he’s marketing to Wal-Mart.r

The “2 in 1” sells for $4.87. The choke collars sell for $2.97 for small, $3.17 for medium and $3.47 for large.r

Hatfield wouldn’t divulge how many leashes or collars he has sold through Wal-Mart or how much revenue he has earned from them.r

Hatfield said the webbed nylon he uses has a weave that is 1/100 of an inch thinner than most nylon collars. That allows the buckle to better grip for closure in the “2 in 1.”r

Hatfield, who currently has five employees in his factory, said he plans to build a second building (1,890 SF) next to the existing factory on his farm in Bentonville to increase production.r

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Cluckers and Grrrnolar

In 1996, the owner of the Hillbilly Smokehouse in Rogers heard a strange tale. Apparently, some people from Japan were looking for a dried chicken treat for dogs.r

Thinking there might be a market for such a product in the United States, Tom Baumgartner came up with Cluckers, a dried chicken breast product for dogs.r

“It’s a piece of chicken breast that has had the fat trimmed off of it and dehydrated,” said Drew Baumgartner, vice president of operations for his father’s company. “It was just a freaky thing that we started seven years ago.”r

That freaky thing led to another dried meat for dogs, Turkey Jerkee, and an additional $500,000 in annual revenue for Hillbilly Smokehouse Products. Drew Baumgartner said revenue has been increasing by about 20 percent per year for the company’s pet foods. Hillbilly Smokehouse’s revenue from critter foods has almost equaled that from its smoked meats sold for human consumption, he said.r

The dried meat doggie treats sell for about $5 per 4-ounce bag. They’re also available in one-pound bags or by bulk. Dog Days, a daycare for dogs in Bentonville, is the only local store that carries the products, but they’re also available online at www.hillbillysmokehouse.com.r

“Our stuff is pretty high-end,” Baumgartner said, noting that it sells well on the East and West Coasts. “It’s a premium treat. It’s expensive to make.”r

Baumgartner said Hillbilly Smokehouse pitched the Cluckers to Sam’s Club, but the production price may have been too high for the wholesale division of Wal-Mart. He’s also worried about meeting the demands of the world’s largest retailer.r

“You don’t want to do business with Wal-Mart if you can’t keep up with the demand,” he said.r

Hillbilly Smokehouse recently came up with a new pet-food product, Cluckerooz, which contains chicken, spelt, rice and barley. A fourth product, tentatively to be named Grrrnola, is in the works. Grrrnola will also contain chicken and spelt, but it comes in rectangular biscuits with a harder texture, Baumgartner said. The two new products contain baked chicken, not dried meat.r

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Floating Fidor

Dog Days daycare has become a testing ground of sorts for new pet products.r

Laurel Matula, the owner of Dog Days, has come up with ideas for a pet flotation device and an elevated dog bed. She and a partner, Ryan Murphy, have been developing the products. Wildwood Industries Inc. of Rogers is making the prototypes.r

Kent Jenkins, the owner of Wildwood, said the pet flotation device would be useful for someone who wants to take a dog out in a boat or for hunters whose dogs get tangled up in swamp brush and are in danger of drowning.r

“It’s like a life jacket but it’s shaped to fit different sized dogs,” said Jenkins, whose company makes primarily horticultural products and macramé plant hangers. “It’s got a little handle on the back of it. If you’re dog gets in the water, how are you going to get him out of there?”r

The suspended dog bed is sort of like a trampoline and is preferred by pooches at Dog Days.r

“It keeps air under your dog,” Jenkins said. “It’s cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter.”r

Jenkins said he has yet to find a buyer for the new products, but he’s working on it.r

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Feeding Frenzyr

Meanwhile, Scott Letts, the pet-supplies buyer for Sam’s Club, spent Sept. 15 working for Matula at Dog Days. It was small-business appreciation week, and Sam’s Club buyers spent one day of the week at a business associated with their department.r

Letts said he got a couple of good ideas from Matula. One was for paper food bowls, which Sam’s already sells in the restaurant area (the kind many eateries use to serve french fries). Matula said, at about 3 cents each, the bowls are great for feeding several dogs. If one dog is sick, it doesn’t contaminate another by eating out of the same bowl. Also, since the paper bowls are disposable and cheap, Matula saves time by not having to wash them.r

“I had no idea she used these little bowls to feed the dogs with,” Letts said.r

Letts said the product could be marketed in the pet care department as well as restaurant supplies. It would be valuable for kennels and anyone who owns more than one dog, he said.r

Matula also pitched smaller doggie biscuits. If a dog chomps into a biscuit and drops half of it on the floor at her day care, a fight could erupt. Smaller biscuits could be eaten in one bite, she said. r