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PETSMART
Overview
PetSmart, Inc. (NASDAQ: PETM) is a leading chain of retail stores doing business in the United States and Canada engaged in the sale of pet supplies and services such as grooming and dog training. PetSmart also offers veterinary services, provided by Banfield, the Pet Hospital, which leases out space in each store. Technically, in full, the company's name is the PetSmart Store Support Group, Inc. They are based in Phoenix, Arizona.
PetSmart was founded in 1986 under the trade name Pacific Coast Distributing, Inc., a Delaware corporation, and opened its first Pet Food Warehouse stores in the Phoenix area the following year. In 1988, the stores' names were changed to PetSmart. Through several mergers and acquisitions, PetSmart expanded in the early- and mid-1990s across the U.S. and into Canada, and entered online retailing through a partnership with Idealab in 1999 (which later became a wholly-owned subsidiary of PetSmart).
Top Paw is a line of products, including collars and leashes, that is manufactured for Pacific Coast Distributing, Inc. (now PetSmart) by Coastal Pet Products Inc. PetSmart also owns several brands of dog food, including Authority and Award. Top Fin is a line of fish products, including fish tanks, food, nets, filters, aquarium lights, and other aquarium products.
In early 2000, PetSmart changed many of its stores from a front-half storefront, back-half warehouse feel to an all-over standard retail market, in hopes of not intimidating customers.
In August 2005, the company announced that it would alter its name from PETsMART to PetSmart over a period of time. This move is designed to emphasize its evolution from a pet supply store to a service-oriented company [1]. (It would also allow PetSmart to further distinguish itself from its main competitor, PETCO, which uses all capital letters in its name.)
As of the end of the 2004 fiscal year, PetSmart operated approximately 726 stores.
Allegations by PETA
PetSmart is being persued by animal rights organization PETA for the company's sale of live birds. PETA alleges that it is cruel to sell birds bred in warehouses and feels that the breeding of the birds is similar to the use of puppy mills. PETA also claims that the use of pest control glue traps within PetSmart stores is cruel. Also, PETA feels that because the stores sell various species of rodentia, that it is hypocritical for them to engage in rodent pest control. This is despite the fact that within stores that use these glue traps, associates are asked to use oils to disengage the glue and let the rodents free.
PetSmart no longer sells most large sized birds, in fact, in most stores they no longer carry large birds at all. Also, the store chain does not sell dogs or cats, opting to donate space within their stores to local humane societies and pet adoption agencies.
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