Sustainable Business Models

I love the fall because it is the gateway to the holidays and I love punkin' pie! Aside from my love of all thinks punkin', I think my infatuation with the fall is rooted in my childhood love of family, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and the school breaks associated with them.

It has always amazed me that world around us knows to prepare for seasonal changes... Trees shed their leaves as there is not enough sunlight for photosynthesis to occur, making leaves a waste of energy. People pull out warm clothes, forget about tans and get used to shorter days, longer nights, snowboarding and fireplaces (and indoor play with our pets!). The earth and most or all of it's creatures know what is to come and we prepare and adapt or do our best to guess what is to come based on previous years and intuition.

It is important to note how closely the business cycle or product cycle mirrors this ecological and social cycle, as discussed in my previous blog "The Cycle of Inventory and Sales". But what's more amazing is that businesses cling to the same models, policies, rules and regulations rather than using the environment as an organic model; always growing, changing and adapting to the seasons. We are always growing at Paw Pets, constantly re-thinking our rules and procedures, revising our products and questioning our assumptions and common sense.

Trees don't just drop their leaves on the same day, or even same month, each year because that's the way it's always been. They loose their leaves when it's not worth the energy to keep them anymore. Then, when summer comes some of the old branches will continue to grow while new branches reach out in different directions to capture new rays. So then, why would a business apply a rule written last year, or many years ago, to a new situation and a new year? Allow me to make this question even more clear: Why in the world do businesses not use the ecological and social environment around them to help create dynamic business models?

What I am describing is called a sustainable business model because it is a living, adapting, changing model that is used to survive in an ever changing and evolving world. Your business can either follow this model, one that has been tested by evolution and sustained life since before humans or business existed, or use a rigid business model. I'm not saying that we should not learn from the past and use prior successes as foundations or guides but adhering strictly to any one plan or model is much like being a stubborn child at the beach in August, shivering dumbfounded as a summer storm approaches, expecting it will get warm any minute just because it was warm in August last year and the year before.

Applying this principal to Paw Pets:
There are millions of different pet toys out there: Cat toys, dog toys, interactive pet toys, pet toys that pets play with by themselves, pet toys that pets learn from or with, and pet toys that are simply to be destroyed. Paw Pets makes interactive toys because we believe in interactive play and training with pets. But this does not mean that we are going to only make interactive pet toys, nor does it mean that we are only going to make one kind of interactive pet toy. Right now people seem to love Paw Pets and interacting with their pets. Hopefully we will get a lot of sales in Christmas gifts for pups or holiday gifts for dogs and family members. The beauty of Paw Pets is that they are great for the whole family so aren't just gifts for dogs, gifts for cats or gifts for pets, but are gifts for the whole family! Next year, we will have new toys and right now we plan to make them interactive toys. But if the market changes we will not be afraid to change our focus or our business model to make sure we are providing pups and their people with exactly what makes them happy!