300 Petco Stores To Open in Rural Lowe's Stores

[storewanderer]

I will say that PetSmart must have very strong deals with some of the conventional brands. A couple of years ago when there were cat food shortages the conventional canned foods that were out of stock at Walmart, Target and the supermarkets were fully available in bulk at PetSmart.

Those shortages were running well into 2023 at Wal Mart, Target, and Kroger for some reason. Then at some point not many months ago it was like a switch flipped and Wal Mart and Kroger became fully stocked, but Target to this day has most flavors out of stock (probably an issue with the local store). Safeway usually stayed stocked better (probably due to the awful pricing- for a while they had Friskies posted at 1.29 per can but lately moved it back down to .99 and on sale .90). I think part of why Petsmart stayed stocked was due to much higher level of inventory on hand both in the store and also at the warehouses.

It is strange Petsmart got better vendor support than Wal Mart, Target, and Kroger on staying in stock, but they are lucky they did.

[ClownLoach]

I will say that PetSmart must have very strong deals with some of the conventional brands. A couple of years ago when there were cat food shortages the conventional canned foods that were out of stock at Walmart, Target and the supermarkets were fully available in bulk at PetSmart.

It is strange Petsmart got better vendor support than Wal Mart, Target, and Kroger on staying in stock, but they are lucky they did.

If I had to guess, PetSmart delivers excellent volume on these products for the manufacturers. They probably threatened to remove the supermarket brands if they failed to perform. Since there's little threat of a supermarket removing, well, supermarket brands - PetSmart gained leverage and was able to keep the shelves full. PetSmart used to have pallet racking through 2/3rds of the store but changed to regular gondolas and only a little bit of racking that is typically empty years ago; now they get more frequent replenishment and keep less on hand. Most stores seem to be encouraged to keep their wall pallet racking empty as well and I'm not even sure if they still have the forklifts necessary to access it. Newer stores have no pallet racks at all.

[storewanderer]

If I had to guess, PetSmart delivers excellent volume on these products for the manufacturers. They probably threatened to remove the supermarket brands if they failed to perform. Since there's little threat of a supermarket removing, well, supermarket brands - PetSmart gained leverage and was able to keep the shelves full. PetSmart used to have pallet racking through 2/3rds of the store but changed to regular gondolas and only a little bit of racking that is typically empty years ago; now they get more frequent replenishment and keep less on hand. Most stores seem to be encouraged to keep their wall pallet racking empty as well and I'm not even sure if they still have the forklifts necessary to access it. Newer stores have no pallet racks at all.

You know, that would be a pretty good bargaining tactic to force those supermarket brands to keep them supplied. Look- you keep us supplied or we pull your product. We will replace it with private label product priced 10% lower and we will convert our customers over to that new product.

A couple stores in my area still have some racking around the perimeter of the stores outside fish but it is just used to merchandise items for sale and they stock by hand. They have not stored pallets on the top for many many years. The racking tends to have cat litter, cat trees, some dog food, some other dog accessories (carry crates, etc.).

Newer Petsmart units are very small. A couple around Sacramento I've been to, I am shocked how small they are. The mix still seems to be there, but they cut drastically things like fish, grooming, adoption center, checkout, etc. Also things like going from large multi-occupancy restrooms and a good sized backroom/breakroom to single unisex bathrooms, virtually no break room, and virtually no back room.

There is a smaller chain in NorCal called Pet Club who deals in pallets and historically has had a heavy mix and low pricing. They've been hit badly by the supply shortages and though they keep opening new stores I am not sure what is happening with them. They have one former large Petsmart in Roseville. Never much activity at that store. I can see why Petsmart closed it. However I cannot see why the much newer/smaller and seemingly busy Petsmart down in Granite Bay at Sierra College/Douglas (Safeway center) closed...

[cjd]

I don’t know that mine qualifies as a rural area but I did notice this weekend that Lowes does have a Petco branded section up front.

There is also a Fintech fishing clothing section adjacent to it that used to be more in the middle with the outdoor furniture.

[ClownLoach]

If I had to guess, PetSmart delivers excellent volume on these products for the manufacturers. They probably threatened to remove the supermarket brands if they failed to perform. Since there's little threat of a supermarket removing, well, supermarket brands - PetSmart gained leverage and was able to keep the shelves full. PetSmart used to have pallet racking through 2/3rds of the store but changed to regular gondolas and only a little bit of racking that is typically empty years ago; now they get more frequent replenishment and keep less on hand. Most stores seem to be encouraged to keep their wall pallet racking empty as well and I'm not even sure if they still have the forklifts necessary to access it. Newer stores have no pallet racks at all.

You know, that would be a pretty good bargaining tactic to force those supermarket brands to keep them supplied. Look- you keep us supplied or we pull your product. We will replace it with private label product priced 10% lower and we will convert our customers over to that new product.

A couple stores in my area still have some racking around the perimeter of the stores outside fish but it is just used to merchandise items for sale and they stock by hand. They have not stored pallets on the top for many many years. The racking tends to have cat litter, cat trees, some dog food, some other dog accessories (carry crates, etc.).

Newer Petsmart units are very small. A couple around Sacramento I've been to, I am shocked how small they are. The mix still seems to be there, but they cut drastically things like fish, grooming, adoption center, checkout, etc. Also things like going from large multi-occupancy restrooms and a good sized backroom/breakroom to single unisex bathrooms, virtually no break room, and virtually no back room.

There is a smaller chain in NorCal called Pet Club who deals in pallets and historically has had a heavy mix and low pricing. They've been hit badly by the supply shortages and though they keep opening new stores I am not sure what is happening with them. They have one former large Petsmart in Roseville. Never much activity at that store. I can see why Petsmart closed it. However I cannot see why the much newer/smaller and seemingly busy Petsmart down in Granite Bay at Sierra College/Douglas (Safeway center) closed...

Ironically many of the new PetSmart stores are smaller than new Petco stores. If Petco was smart they'd start pursuing some of these closed PetSmart locations. I suspect that PetSmart has decided there is a limit as to how much rent they will pay regardless of store performance, and if the store exceeds that amount they close even if they don't have an immediate relocation option and have to open new at a later date. I think they also are getting out of all large buildings when leases are up except for the higher volume boxes which get the weird remodel that removes half of the gondola length and leaves funky empty spaces (they really should just rearrange and create a racetrack instead to make the store easier to shop).

Historically Petco has run for their lives when they see a PetSmart opening except in their hometown of San Diego County. When PetSmart first landed in SoCal 30 years ago I remember two Petcos preemptively shut down the day before PetSmart opened. It seemed so coordinated I thought PetSmart was just their new large format store but then learned they weren't related.

[ClownLoach]

I don’t know that mine qualifies as a rural area but I did notice this weekend that Lowes does have a Petco branded section up front.

There is also a Fintech fishing clothing section adjacent to it that used to be more in the middle with the outdoor furniture.

So my area is rural enough that I've got two ranches full of horses within two blocks of my house, and nearby goat farms and cattle farms. But Petco is across the street from the Lowe's here (although their location is in a badly designed center that is more than half vacant now that BB&B is gone). So I'm guessing this Lowe's won't add the Petco area.

[cjd]

So my area is rural enough that I've got two ranches full of horses within two blocks of my house, and nearby goat farms and cattle farms. But Petco is across the street from the Lowe's here (although their location is in a badly designed center that is more than half vacant now that BB&B is gone). So I'm guessing this Lowe's won't add the Petco area.

They very well may. My Lowes is neighbored by a power center with a Petco in it, and just another two miles or so north is another shopping center with a Pet Supermarket.

This area is considered “rural” but I don’t know that’s necessarily true considering none of the surrounding towns have as much big box as we do. We’re definitely a bigger town than any in the closest 60 miles or so.

[ClownLoach]

I think we are probably way off track in this discussion, but in my semi-expert opinion the PetSmart assortment in fish accessories is bizarre. Yes, they have a lot of entry level stuff for the mom and dad who have a little kid that wants a fishtank, but they have a massive amount of very expensive high end goods. Some of their filters and such are hundreds of dollars and wouldn't work with a single tank sold in the store. There are many very high end items sold there. That is what makes the assortment so frustrating and bizarre to me. They carry novice level, store brand crap for essentials needed at all levels of fishkeeping, and then some expert level filters, pumps etc. If they were purging the slowest selling items they've failed dismally because few experts are buying a $350 pressurized canister filter for their 500 gallon tank at PetSmart. All they have successfully done is removed any of the items that would bring a everyday customer (novice to expert) from their store, like quality food and chemicals, and force them to either buy them from Amazon or drive to a specialist. The entire assortment is the polar opposite of what it should be. The easiest comparison would be if they kept all the same accessories for dogs (carriers, leashes, grooming etc.) but decided to discontinue all the dog food except for a small aisle of PetSmart brand food. Suddenly there would be zero "everyday routine visits" to their store. What they've done with fish is the same thing. You could buy a kiddie tank as discussed, or maybe a pump or filter if you were repairing a major tank in the hundreds of gallons, but those are "one and done" purchases. They do not have the appropriate products for everyday business because they've deliberately chosen to remove nearly all reputable products and replace with high margin store brands that nobody in their right mind would trust.

Petco surprisingly carries a wide range at the stores with a large fish department of brand name products, but they are a inconsistent mess as discussed with tiny sites with large fish areas, large stores with small fish areas, and so on. They do store brands on the stuff that doesn't matter like decorations, but carry the appropriate brand names in foods and chemicals. I've been able on multiple occasions to visit the Petco five minutes away and get a medication, part, or other urgent item without either ordering from Amazon or driving to a specialty store. Petco spends all their money on the constant prototype revamps and remodels in their home market of San Diego and the money never goes out to the rest of the chain. In San Diego county Petco stores are even carrying world class product like Waterbox aquariums that cost thousands of dollars and people are buying them because it ordinarily would take weeks/months for the manufacturer to fulfill a direct order.

Do you think the Petsmart fish department is possibly just selling down these items and not replenishing, and that is why you see many items gone but a lot of very slow moving items still there? When I look at their shelves they only have 1-2 units of a lot of these items and you can tell from the packaging the the items have been sitting around a while. They also seem to have some items spread out on the shelves so the items do not touch one another (not enough items in planogram to fill all the the shelves, and they've already shortened aisles).

I also wonder if Petco got some of these vendors to sign exclusive deals with them. Petco does hit some rural markets Petsmart is not in.

They do seem to replenish the slow moving big ticket items. Again my objection to PetSmart right now in that category is the private equity driven push to convert to store brand products. It isn't as easy to come up with safe and effective chemicals as it might be for a store brand dog food. The reputable vendors they kicked out had proprietary and patented products that are tested to the equivalent of pharmaceuticals (independent lab testing and such). The same for foods for pretty much anything besides dogs, cats and birds. The rest of their assortment is just odd as the higher end products aren't compatible with anything else they sell. It's just a category that is adrift and not being well taken care of but in a company the size of PetSmart that could be a billion dollar segment of the business that they're throwing away (and it's a category that is known to have heavy markups not to mention that if you sell majority fish that can be captive bred you literally can make your own near free product at your facilities). I am looking to adopt a very hard to find breed of cat that I have had before; I am curious as to what my experience will be in purchasing food and accessories for the cat once I get one. It seems the space dedicated to cats was also dramatically reduced at PetSmart. Really, all of their stores have reduced space but it's most obvious in the older prototypes that are nearing 30 years old - they removed nearly half of the gondolas on the back end and there's a 25-30 foot gap of empty floor between the back endcap and the wall.

I am getting ads regarding another new line of high end heaters, lighting and filtration products being added to PetSmart right now. These filters top out just under $300. Baffling that they add these high end one-time products yet they choose to carry low end house brand water conditioning products no sane person would buy. No chance at getting "regular business" from the aquarium owner who needs basic supplies. Like I said their aquarium merchandising applied throughout the store would be like running the same dog or cat departments but removing all the food except for a single line of the lowest end possible dry kibble.