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The House of Two Bows 雙寶之屋

~ a basenji, a shiba, and their human companions

The House of Two Bows 雙寶之屋

Tag Archives: grizzly pet products

REVIEW: Prime Pet Supply online retailer

26 Friday Jul 2013

Posted by M.C. in Food, drugs & other ingestibles, Reviews

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

dog food, fromm family dog food, grizzly pet products, hurtta, jaraden, joint supplements, prime pet supply

Prime Pet Supply shipping

Service: Prime Pet Supply mail order services
Web address: PrimePetSupply.com
Physical address: 2824 Steinway St. Ste 228; Astoria, NY 11103
Phone: 1-800-801-4386
E-mail: support@primepetsupply.com (customer support); contact@primepetsupply.com (business and media inquiries)
Social media: on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.

All right, I confess. This summer, I gave in to the lure of convenience offered by online pet supply mail order companies. We haven’t visited some of our favorite local pet boutiques in months, not for lack of desire, but time. This is what happens when the sole driver and primary dog supplies purchaser at the House of Two Bows ends up with a 9 to 5 office gig, a condition which I understand afflicts large populations of North America.

Trapped in my downtown office tower cubicle, I came to appreciate the type of service offered by companies like Prime Pet Supply. Indeed, finding a reliable online supplier of pet goods will be important in upcoming months, for reasons I shall reveal later…

Prime Pet Supply is a brand new company, based in Astoria, New York. We were invited to try out their services by Serkan Kutlubay, who is listed as the company founder along with co-founder Vanessa Quick (according to the American Pet Products Association; this information is not readily available on their site, though I always prefer to know who’s behind a brand). Their company promises the following:

    We believe that our pets’ food and treats should be prepared with the same care and attention to healthy ingredients as the food we feed ourselves. We do the research for you and hand-pick each and every item to ensure that there have been no complaints regarding the quality of the product or its formula. Prime Pet Supply stands firm in our mission to offer only the highest quality. [from PrimePetSupply.com’s About Us page]

Wow! That’s a very high bar they’ve set for themselves. Let’s see how they measure up.

So the number one pet expense category that I care about is food. It’s not something that I usually purchase online, preferring to examine the package and check my own labels in person. But when I know what I want, it’s easy to pick it out from a list.

What I first noticed when entering the dry foods product category was that Natura products seemed to dominate the inventory: Innova, EVO, California Natural, HealthWise, Karma were all represented. Alas, we don’t feed any of these brands, and especially not after the last round of recalls, which unfortunately had occurred right as I began shopping from Prime Pet Supply. Concerned about how their company handles their stated commitment to quality in light of such a widespread recall, I shot an e-mail to Serkan with my concerns.

His response:

    “The moment we received the recall notification that morning, we immediately marked out of stock all products related to the recall. After 15 minutes, all the recalled Natura products are marked as out of stock. I believe we acted fastest to that matter. […] So I am proud of my company we didn’t make any single sale after the recall. In next 2 hours we sent an email to all our Natura product customers and notified them about the recall, not only notified them about it, but also, we recommended them replacement brands such as Fromm and Great Life and also send instructions about receiving refund from Natura.
    “I believe we handled this incident pretty well. We received many thank you email from our customers that day.
    “From what we heard so far is very promising, the company [Natura] is doing their best to prevent future recalls and I believe this incident won’t be repeated. One reason we sell their pet foods, because of the ingredient and formula quality. However if they issue another recall then probably we will stop selling at least they dry food line.”

I was impressed with the thoroughness of his response. This is a point in favor of Prime Pet Supply, even if I don’t have the same faith in Natura. Currently, Natura products continue to be sold on their website. They offer several other options that I was happy to choose from.

The order I placed was as follows:

  • Fromm Grain-free Pork and Peas recipe (12 lb. bag), $35.90
  • Grizzly Pet Products Joint Aid – sensitive tummy formula (10 oz.), $14.90
  • TOTAL: $50.80 $15.80 (after discount)

Under normal circumstances, orders under $69 tack on a $5.95 flat rate shipping charge, but we received a promotional discount and free shipping in exchange for this review.

So I did notice that their prices are not the lowest compared to other online retailers, and the free shipping threshold seems a bit high. However, they had the box at our doorstep fast — in just two days time, even though the company is stationed out on the East Coast like most of the other major online pet supplies retailers. You can also save 15% on items scheduled for auto-shipment. And of course, you save on gas and taxes, as compared to shopping locally.

Prime Pet Supply

The box was a little beat up in transit, but that’s not really their fault. What they may need to do, however, is to add more packaging in the box, as things do get jostled around within, especially when the package includes a large, heavy bag of kibble!

I deliberately ordered one large and one small item to see how they would handle the packaging. Grizzly Joint Aid comes in a pouch, not a bottle, so the beat up box didn’t affect the product itself. I also chose this item because it comes from a company I generally like, and I had not seen it offered by other online retailers. Always nice to learn about a joint supplement that I can offer in custom, measured doses.

Prime Pet Supply shippingPrime Pet Supply shipping

Both Bows were most interested in the kibble. Good thing it arrived as quickly as it did, as we were getting down to the crumbs on their last batch of Fromm’s Salmon Tunalini. They haven’t tried Pork and Peas before, so it was a risk to splurge on a 12 pound bag; Prime Pet Supply doesn’t offer this new recipe in 4 pound bags. Since we’ve done well with this brand and with pork in general, I decided to go for the plunge. It’s working out well so far.

Checking out the bag

When buying food from an online retailer, I suspect most people go in knowing beforehand what they want to purchase, since returns can be such a bother. Unfortunately, Prime Pet Supply seems to be missing the majority of our regular food brands, though they do have a handful of others that look promising and unfamiliar to us.

On the upshot, they impress us with available brands in other categories, such as dog clothing. They offer Hurtta brand jackets and Jaraden pet carriers, which have caught my eye as well tailored, high end products that we do not see from other “all-purpose” pet suppliers. They also draw my attention to items of interest that I don’t normally scout out at local stores, like “natural” flea and tick deterrents from Alzoo.

PrimePetSupply-livechat

The company is also in the midst of actively expanding its selection, as well as soliciting feedback from its customers. They are very interested in us, to the point where I had a live chat representative pop up one afternoon when I was sitting on the website… Woah. That was a little unexpected. I must admit that I brushed “Benny” off by quietly closing the window without bothering to say hi. Nevertheless, I like that this option is available during regular business hours, and that Serkan himself is so active and prompt to respond to e-mails.

Will this be my first go-to site for all my pet needs? Well, probably not… considering that my pets don’t need much by way of material goods other than edibles, and I’ve noted some of Prime Pet Supply’s inadequacies on that score. Will we check back and keep an eye on this site? Yes — especially if they can continue to differentiate themselves in other categories. They’re good for some surprises and a friendly, easy shopping experience. Time will tell what else they have in store.

Final Scorecard (in order of my priorities):
Cost effectiveness: B+
Customer service: A
Convenience: A
Selection: B
Quality of received products: A
Packing: B

OVERALL SCORE: B+

[Disclaimer: The House of Two Bows received a discount in exchange for our honest review. The opinions expressed in this post are from M.C. and the HoTB.]

REVIEW: Pawalla Mini Box

08 Friday Mar 2013

Posted by M.C. in Food, drugs & other ingestibles, Reviews

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

aromatherapy, dog toys, dog treats, gerrard larriet, grizzly pet products, pawalla, salmon, sponsored reviews, subscription boxes, training treats, wigzi

23 February 2013 Pawalla Mini box

EDIT: On 22 August 2013, Pawalla announced that it is “no longer operating as a subscription service.”

Product: Pawalla Mini box subscription service for pets
Quantity: [at least] one treat, one toy, and one other “surprise” item
Price: $12 / month for a full year subscription; $14 / month for 6 month subscription; $17 a month for a single month [BONUS: new subscribers can save $5 with our referral code; if expired, just leave a comment and we’ll issue a new code ASAP]
Ingredients: all kinds!
Company information: Pawalla.com, 9415 Culver Blvd.; Culver City, CA 90232
Web Presence: At Pawalla.com, Facebook, etc.

Pawalla Mini boxThe folks at Pawalla.com are pretty good to the Bows. In fact, that’s what the company is set up to do — pamper your pets. They recently came up with a more compact version of their monthly subscription box of “all-natural or organic” dog and cat goodies, and sent us a complimentary box in exchange for a review. This was also a good opportunity to see how far they’ve come since we reviewed their full service kits back in July 2012.

In each Mini box, a subscriber can expect three full-size items, including at least one treat, one toy, and one other “surprise” such as a dietary supplement or grooming aid. For this review, we received:

  • Grizzly Salmon NuTreats, one pack (6 oz)
  • Wigzi Tasties Treats, Roasted Duck flavor, one pack (6 oz)
  • Wigzi Lock n’ Play dog toy, medium
  • Gerrard Larriett Happy Jasmine Aromatherapy Freshening and Shining Spray, one bottle (4 fl. oz)

Pawalla Mini box February 2013

How nice of them to include not just one, but two full-sized treat offerings to round out the overall value (as will sometimes happen at Pawalla’s discretion). A quick tabulation of retail price on these goodies tops me off at about $36, with a third of that accounted for by the Gerrard Larriet aromatherapy spray. Now, whether or not one would actually pay $12 for pet-specific fragrances is another matter… and not even the 25% discount code included in the box was enough to convince me that this company offers anything that my dogs need or want. Perhaps if this had happened to arrive on the day of our most recent horse poop adventure, I would have thought otherwise…

Silly to me, but it was indeed unexpected. And the whole point of the Pawalla box is to offer a variety of surprises with the expectation that there will be enough novelty in each box to make the deal worthwhile. So that one dud aside, how’d they do?

The Bows, as usual, showed greatest interest in everything edible.

Very interested in the Grizzly Salmon NuTreats

It was pointed out to me that the above picture makes the Grizzly Salmon NuTreats look like something I picked up on a morning walk. They’re actually quite appetizing, crunchy bites! We mainly know Grizzly Pet Products as a trusted brand in salmon oil supplements. Nice to know they make a training-sized treat with simple ingredients, as well.

The “star” of this box was Wigzi, a Washington, D.C.-based pet product company. Their Tasties treats are grain and wheat-free, made instead with chick pea and tapioca flour. We got the roasted duck variety (other possible flavors include peanut butter and Wisconsin cheddar), which were eagerly gobbled as one of the “forbidden flavors” not typically fed at the House of Two Bows.

The treats, however, are just a bit too crumbly to insert into the company’s own Lock ‘n’ Play chew toy with a treat pouch, which otherwise serves as an interesting alternative to typical rubber chew toys. Wigzi toys are all made in the U.S. (a rare find in non-edible pet products!) from some special “advanced material… [that] has zero BPAs or Phthalates, uses FDA approved material and is also recyclable.” If an object could glow with pride from being manufactured under superior conditions, I suppose this toy would do just that.

Lock n Play

Personally, the Bows have limited interest in toys. The few we keep around are usually functional and interactive, as this one is. Too bad we don’t have a heavy chewer around to test its durability, but it does look — and smell! — unique.

Overall, the Pawalla Mini box looks promising if you know you’re going to spend at least $12 per month indulging your pets with extras. No wet foods or “main course” meals are included with Mini boxes, so it’s a good option for those who already have fairly set menus (perhaps cat owners?), and prefer to explore other, supplemental offerings. In this particular box, we really only made use of the treats, which I feel just barely makes it a $12 value — the lowest price per box for a 12 month subscription at Pawalla’s new tiered pricing scheme. At $14 a month for a six month subscription, my pet(s) better be inclined to enjoy both food and toys. At $17 a box for a one-time affair, we’d better be sure to love everything, and honestly, that wasn’t the case with this box.

Like the full-sized Pawalla box, the edibles here were all corn and wheat-free, with no artificial colors or flavors. Having a certified pet nutritionist on board is reassuring, but more importantly, Pawalla cares to maintain consistent high standards. This would make an awesome “puppy-warming” gift for a new pet with no protein allergies who might still be exploring their taste preferences. New subscribers can knock $5 off their first box with our referral code; otherwise, it’s most cost efficient to just spring for a six or twelve-month subscription.

FINAL GRADE: A-

EDIT: On 22 August 2013, Pawalla announced that it is “no longer operating as a subscription service.”

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