We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Mat & Audrey Brady a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Mat & Audrey, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Crazy stuff happening is almost as certain as death and taxes – it’s technically “unexpected” but something unexpected happening is to be expected and so can you share a crazy story with our readers

Mat and I wouldn’t have started a cat food business if our cat hadn’t survived a coyote attack. Our cat was attacked by a pack of coyotes and our neighbors saved him and took him to the veterinarian. Our neighbors had a similar looking cat and thought he was their own (until they came home and saw their healthy cat awaiting them)! We had no idea what had happened, and weren’t called until a day later when they scanned the microchip. Around that time, Mat and I were looking into farming opportunities for a small business of our own. Once we started researching cat longevity and nutrition, we discovered the benefits of a raw food diet for cats. We started making raw cat food for our own cat and were convinced that it would be beneficial for many other cats.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

After our cat survived the coyote attack we started making raw cat food in our own facility and selling it at the farmer’s market. It wasn’t long until a pet store spotted it and asked us to sell it in their store. From there, the brand grew slowly into other stores and was picked up by distributors. Now the food is available in independent pet stores all across the U.S. It’s still a family owned and operated small business.
We specifically target cat customers because we feel that cats do not get as much attention as dogs, especially when it comes to nutrition. We believe that cats will live longer, healthier lives if they eat as nature intended.

Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.

We built out our first processing facility inside of a refrigerated shipping container. Since our cat food is fed raw, the meat needs to be kept at a cold temperature during processing to keep it safe. We started off with a small grinder, and even chopped some of the meat by hand. That shipping container served us well until we needed to upgrade to a larger facility. Now we process all of our foods in a refrigerated cold room with floor drains. We have upgraded all our equipment to larger machines to be able to process higher quantities at faster speeds. Every time we get a new piece of equipment there is a learning curve with adjusting speed, heat for sealing, cutting blades, etc. At the end of the day, we are proud to be manufacturing our products in house, and it increases quality control as well.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

We have a lot of customers who tell us they heard about our brand from their local pet store, an internet search or social media site. There are some large Facebook groups where cat owners help each other find quality brands that can potentially help their pets’ ailments. There is also a list by Susan Thixton of TruthAboutPetFood.com called “List of Pet Foods I Would Trust to Feed My Own Pets” that a lot of people read and use to find superior pet foods.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://savagecatfood.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/savagecatfood/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/savagecatfood