Lily’s Kitchen unveils cat range, its biggest launch to date
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Lily’s Kitchen is unveiling a brand new identity, new recipes, new flavours, new pack designs and new formats for its entire cat range – which will create excitement and add value to the cat food category.
Consisting of dry, wet, lifestage, organic and treat products to meet the needs of all cat customers, the completely new Lily’s Kitchen cat range - which will replace the existing range in its entirety - is a result of the pioneering company’s dedication to providing proper food for pets.
This resource-intensive project culminates in September with the biggest launch and marketing campaign in the company’s eight-year history. Over the past 18 months, Lily’s Kitchen has undertaken more than 126 hours of ground-breaking research with pet owners, led by a desire to truly understand not just how to reinvigorate the category but how to exceed all expectations of Britain’s 4.5 million cat owning households and their 7.5 million cats, who consume £950 million of cat food each year (Source: PFMA Population data 2016).
The launch comes at a time when cat obesity and associated health issues such as diabetes, heart and kidney disease and arthritis are prevalent amongst the UK cat population, largely driven by the ignorance of their owners about the importance of a healthy balanced diet suitable for cats. According to the PFMA, 77 per cent of vets believe pet obesity is on the rise, with 40 per cent of cats now overweight.
“Our primary concern is for the health and happiness of the UK’s pet population, which has been the backbone of our business since it launched eight years ago,” says Henrietta Morrison, founder and CEO of award-winning Lily’s Kitchen.
“Lily’s Kitchen has led the move towards natural, premium dog food and now we want to replicate this success in cat and be the market leader in natural, premium cat food. We embrace big challenges and when we recognised that the offerings for cat owners are a far cry from the offerings for dog owners, we had to do something about it. Our fantastic new cat range is evidence of our big aspirations and audacious ideas.
“We have spent a significant amount of time and considerable investment understanding the right product range for consumers, creating a range based on cat preferences and consumer preferences which will add value to our stockists’ stores.
“Lily’s Kitchen offers independent pet shop owners a premium natural brand, which meets the needs of pet owners interested in proper food using high quality ingredients from an ethical and transparent brand. The new range of cat recipes will not only deliver this, but within the extensive new range (moving from 15 to 30 SKUs at launch) pet owners will have the choice of pack formats, sub-ranges and accessible RRPs providing entry point and trial options as well as multipacks and bigger packs demonstrating improved value for money.”
Ground-breaking research
Further evidence of the huge significance of the new cat range comes with the appointment of Lily’s Kitchen’s first ever senior brand marketing manager dedicated to the cat portfolio. Imogen Harper joined the company 12 months ago and has been leading the project, which has included bespoke research to develop a better range for cats and cat owners, as well as helping to create its look and feel – including a new strapline Love at first Bite. Imogen explains:
“Through our research we observed culture, listened to cat owners and really understood the drivers influencing what they are looking for in food for their pets, the top priorities being: a high percentage meat content; natural ingredients; and packaging that is practical and makes you smile every time you see it.
“We always start with what is right for cats, then take into account what is right for the environment and with our new findings we’ve been able to understand how we can help owners make more educated decisions. There is still a lot of education needed about cats being obligate carnivores and thriving on natural high meat diets for example.
“Compared to dog owners, due to the very nature of cats, their owners tend to know less about what cats need and therefore, as a cat food producer, we have a responsibility to highlight essential information to owners making it easy to understand the key benefits. This is also an area where retailers can really add value to their customers by demonstrating their nutrition expertise, which should encourage more cat owners to shop in the independent, premium natural pet trade.
“We will be providing retailers with all the essential tools to highlight the benefits and help their customers choose the best recipes for their cats, including new bespoke POS to drive engagement at the shelf and ongoing support to ensure the changeover is seamless and to ultimately drive incremental sales.”
The new range
Lily’s Kitchen’s new wet, dry, organic and treats range for cats, which comes in the iconic look and feel of Lily’s Kitchen packaging with emotive, premium colour palettes and paper cut illustrations, is born out of Henrietta’s passion for leading positive change in the pet food industry. This all stemmed from the day she decided to take her dog Lily’s health and happiness into her own hands by creating naturally nutritious meals from scratch in her own kitchen. The range primarily aims to ensure that all cats have access to the best, most natural food and owners can truly ‘trust’ they are feeding their pets the right food for long-term happiness and health.
On the larger packs, customers can read about how Henrietta decided to make proper food for cats. They share the true story of Sophie, a pretty tabby belonging to one of Henrietta’s neighbours who was keen to feed her cat a healthier, tasty diet after seeing the success of Lily’s Kitchen’s ‘proper food’ for dogs. Many customers who have cats as well as dogs were also asking Lily’s Kitchen to expand its range, so it was important to get it right for them.
As with all Lily’s Kitchen products, the new cat range is made with a huge amount of care and love combined with extensive expertise from vets and nutritionists. The recipes are packed full of meaty greatness, which refers not only to the quantity of meat used but the high quality that is dictated by the brand’s exacting standards. And all recipes are grain free and made with absolutely no meat meal or fillers, only natural ingredients.
Lily’s Kitchen is also aiming to clear up confusion amongst cat owners about the term ‘complete’ which is often referred to on pet food. Many brands and products that look like main meals are in fact not nutritionally complete as they lack the essential nutrients required to keep cats healthy. On the contrary, all of Lily’s Kitchen’s main meals in the new cat range are nutritionally complete and balanced, including the correct proportion of Taurine as well as other essential nutrients required for optimal heart and eye health. Lily’s Kitchen has ensured the range clearly sign-posts this for cat owners.
In line with the company’s ethical and sustainable principles, all of the dry food packaging is 100% compostable and includes a feature to make the bags re-sealable to maintain freshness. The wet food is in recyclable aluminium trays rather than in non-recyclable foil pouches, which challenges category norms that single serve meals have to be in packaging that goes straight to landfill.
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