French company Diet'Dog is finding that more pet owners are turning to its natural dietary supplements and holistic skin and paw care products to ensure the well-being of their dogs and cats. And in a bid to get its products into the hands of more UK customers through better distribution, the firm will exhibiting at PATS Sandown on March 17-18.

"Our natural supplements are packed with superfoods, enzymes, essential nutrients, minerals and vitamins and are based on the principles of phytotherapy and aromatherapy to help with dogs and cats everyday conditions," says Alexandra Banry, who manages the UK side of the business.

As she prepared for PATS Sandown, Alexandra gave Pet Trade Xtra an insight into her company's innovativeproducts.

How long has the company been in existence?

Diet'Dog is a family owned company based in the east of France. The idea for Diet' Dog came to my dad, an animal nutritionist with a vet education, about 20 years ago. Diet'Dog has been in existence for 15 years in France.

A mad dog lover, my dad has always had dogs and always worked with animals, putting their wellbeing as his top priority. While spending lots of time with his doggy friends, he noticed that some of them were not as happy as they should be due to nutritional deficiencies, having health issues such as itchy and sore skin, dull, dry and flaky coat, degeneration of skeletal muscle, joints issues, digestive issues including bad breath and winds and lack of energy/vitality, so he started to think about how he could help these issues through nutrition.

It became clear that even the best of diets (raws, species-diet) could come from soils that are depleted or from lower quality food sources and lack sufficient protein, amino acids, vitamins and minerals. Sometimes the food also loses many of its key nutrients through processing and storage. Having worked for the animal nutrition division of Roche, a global healthcare/pharmaceutical company, he had a thorough understanding of the importance of vitamins, carotenoids, enzymes, antioxydants and human quality nutrients in dogs' diet. So he came up with the idea of creating natural nutritional supplements  (by using phytotherapy principles) that every pet owner could use, adding all the nutrients, vitamins, minerals and enzymes lost in heavily packaged food and helping health issues of dogs. 

Do you now own the company?

The UK business is mine but Diet'Dog belongs to my dad.

Can you tell us more about your products?

Diet'Dog is a phyto-nutrition and phyto-care specialist. With Diet’Dog pet owners can keep their best friend naturally healthy. Our natural products respect pets while our supplements work naturally from the inside out.  Our products are vet approved and are recommended in the UK by holistic vet Richard Allport. Our mission is to ensure the wellbeing of all dogs whatever their age, size, breed or activity. We use the best possible ingredients we can source. Our ingredients are of the highest human grade quality. Using premium and ethically sourced ingredients, every product combines 100% natural ingredients to promote optimum health. The nutrients, vitamins, enzymes, minerals contained in our supplements are all naturally occurring, coming from plants, algae or vegetables.

We use minimal processing methods. We use the gentlest processing method of freeze-drying at (minus) - 40° to prepare our tasty granules to preserve all the abundant vitamins, minerals and nutrients, enzymes of our ingredients. Most pet products on the market are manufactured through a hot processing method (much cheaper), removing all the activity of their ingredients. Our supplements can replace the natural enzymes, phytonutrients and trace vitamins and minerals that are removed during the processing of most packaged food. Because of our granulation process, our granules are tasty and naturally effective: a guarantee for dogs! 

We believe in meeting high ethical standards. Diet’Dog complies with European Union established standards and guidelines to ensure traceability of the ingredients and optimal conditions for manufacture of its products. All our products are made in France. We do our best to make sure our products have no harmful effects, on human and animal health or the environment. None of our products have been inhumanely tested on animals.


How do your products work?

We believe in natural effective formulae which have been thoroughly prepared. We make sure that our ingredients work synergistically. For example, we combine herbs together to enhance certain properties and reduce others to create a tailored product with multi actions. A herb can improve the actions of another herb due to a completely different action of its own. As we only use natural ingredients in our natural supplements, their benefits are thought to build over time. A regular course of at least 21 days several times a year is therefore recommended. All our supplements are in the form of tasty granules that can be given daily whole by hand as a treat or sprinkled and mixed with normal food. 

How many products in the range?

Our range includes tasty natural dietary supplements and skin and paw care products for dogs and cats: 13 supplements and 6 care products. In total 19 products, including two supplements for all round health (D-Dog Superfoods and D-Dog Superfoods Beta) and 17 products targeting specific needs of pets (for example, itchy skin, joints, energy etc.)

Can owners of dogs with dietary problems use your products without seeing a vet first?

Yes they can unless their dog has a serious condition and is monitored by his vet.

What are you hoping to achieve by exhibiting at PATS Sandown?

We are hoping to get our brand further established in the UK and reinforce our distribution network.