Zach Ao and Jennifer Wu haven’t had the easiest relationship thanks to distance.
But what they have had is the perfect dog – a couch potato-adventurer named Karoo, who would inspire their pet food startup in 2021.
The entrepreneurs behind Viva Raw Pets met before college – he went to Duke University and she went to the University of Pennsylvania – and had a long-distance relationship for most of their collegiate career. But for one shining semester, they studied abroad together in South Africa.
For a few months, they led an exhilarating lifestyle – rock climbing and diving. They fell in love with the “Great Karoo,” a moniker they heard a lot to describe the area they were adventuring in, and kept the word in the back of their minds. When they later moved in together and got a dog, their Rhodesian ridgeback was named “Karoo.”
After college, they worked in tech, he at Capital One and she at Appian. But much of their lives centered around Karoo, now 5 years old.
As they worked full time, they weren’t able to devote the time to creating whole meals for their “baby,” so they looked for easy options.
The fresh pet food options they were finding were “super gray and mushy.”
So they decided to come up with their own solution for Karoo – and that became a pet food startup that they went all in on during the pandemic.
Viva Raw isn’t the only game in town.
Vegan dogfood maker Wild Earth, for example, moved to the Triangle during the pandemic from California.
But the strategies are completely different.
While Wild Earth is in retail – including at Petco through a new distribution deal – Viva Raw is all-in on direct-to-consumer. And while Wild Earth is looking to expand as it scales its manufacturing, Viva Raw stays lean by employing third-party processors.
Viva Raw is completely bootstrapped, something Ao said is the long-term strategy.
“We want to control our destiny,” he said.
Viva Raw had opportunities in California, but picked the Triangle because of its proximity to East Coast customers in places such as New York and Florida. Closer proximity is important for the company, which ships frozen dog food.
Right now it’s at seven employees.
The firm inked $3 million in revenue in 2022.
While Ao wouldn’t say how much it’s on track to make in 2023, he did say the firm has “grown significantly” since last year.