The carpeting Kitty Condo LLC uses to swathe its cat furniture's condos, perches, and other features is seconds or overruns directly from mills in Georgia.
The “condos,” round upright tubes with holes offering cats an invitation to hide, are formed from the substantial but hollow pasteboard cores around which aluminum sheet used by can manufacturers was wound.
That's just two examples of how the Oregon business has been able to cut costs while using potentially unusable goods - and creating cat furniture it attests is “tough enough for a tiger.” The firm has more than doubled sales to nearly $1.5 million since Michael Stewart reorganized with different partners in 1997.
With that durability commitment in mind, one area where Kitty Condo has refused to trim costs is on the posts used to hold up tunnels and other features on the towers it makes. The posts are skinned logs, not cardboard as some competitors use.
Such touches make the company's products so attractive that Pet Supplies Plus stores in northwest Ohio and southeast Michigan stock few competing products, said Dominic Buccellato, president of the franchisee with 45 stores in four states.
“It sells very well,” Mr. Buccellato said. “Part of the attraction of Kitty Condo is they're very much hand made.”
Said Harvey Solway, Kitty Condo president and investor, before giving a tour of the Spartan Drive facility: “We're making sort of the Cadillac of cat furniture here.”
Founded as Kitti Kondo Kompany in 1989, the business has evolved from being housed in a garage to having custom-made equipment geared at making some tasks more efficient. Plus, while the predecessor had employees deliver to stores, Kitty Condo uses a distributor, which has helped the company expand.
Products, including scratching posts and batting toys, can be found in various pet-supply stores in the eastern United States. The most popular furniture item retails for $140 and has three perches, a tunnel, and a rope scratching log.
Kitty Condo, which has no debt, is on the prowl to go national. Last year, Kitty Condo formed a joint venture with a similar Washington firm, and the partners are lobbying national retailers to stock their products. Kitty Condo would make products for stores in the east, while Green Duck would in the west.
“If you want to sell to mass retailers, you truly have to have mass distribution,” Mr. Solway said.
Pet products certainly seem to be a growing market. Owners will spend an estimated $31 billion on their pets this year, up from $23 billion in 1998, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association, Inc., in Greenwich, Conn.
Kitty Condo, meanwhile, is working on increasing efficiency at its sole factory under Mr. Stewart, the firm's managing partner and largest investor. The business has been in its digs for three years.
Small Business Profile is a weekly feature on local companies. To be considered, send information about your company to Small Business Profiles, Business News, The Blade, P.O. Box 921, Toledo, Ohio 43697-0921.
First Published August 4, 2003, 10:59 a.m.
