Ollie's Co-Founder On Delivering Human-Grade Food To Your Dog

At Petcube, we’re committed to helping our users to be the best pet parents possible. Following the launch of Petcube Care Membership in March, we keep extending the Care partner program every month with new benefits, so members can unlock more pet care savings.

When it comes to their pets, 52% of Petcube users indicated that nutrition and diet is their top concern. One of the recent perks available to Petcube Care members is Ollie, a subscription-based service that delivers freshly cooked, human-grade food tailored to each dog.

Meet Your Pup Nutritious Needs

An estimated 60% of cats and 56% of dogs in the United States are overweight or obese. Alongside genetics, there’s a core element to it, and that’s what we feed our dogs.

Ollie’s co-founder Gabby Slome learned it firsthand when her rescue dog, Pancho, started gaining too much weight eating traditional pet food. She went to investigate what was really in her dog’s food, and was disturbed by the amount of preservatives, artificial ingredients, and mystery meat.

Following a vet’s advice to make food for Pancho, Gabby saw an immediate improvement in his health. But making food for her dog did not seem feasible long-term. Gabby’s co-founders had similar experiences, so together they founded Ollie to create freshly cooked, high quality food for dogs.

Redefining Dog Food

At Ollie, dog food is freshly made, vet-formulated, and gently cooked in a USDA-regulated kitchen to ensure the highest quality of nutrition and safety. Every single batch of food is tested and shown how it is made and what it’s made with.

"Of course, feeding your dog healthy, fresh food will make a difference too — but giving your dog the right amount of food is the best way to help manage their weight", says Gabby. That’s why Ollie takes dogs’ age, breed, weight, gender, activity level and body composition into account to calculate the exact number of calories that they should be consuming every day to be healthy.

However, if your dog is obese, they may need a prescription diet with restricted calories that still has all the required nutrients so you should talk to your vet if that’s the case.

Customized Dog Food At Your Doorstep

Subscribing to Ollie is super easy, just fill out your dog’s profile and Ollie will tailor your dog’s unique recipe, recommending the ideal protein and amount they should be served, which can help with weight management.

You can choose one of three meal plan options based on how often you plan on feeding Ollie to your dog. The portioned meals are packed in sealed, airtight trays and delivered to your door in an insulated, recyclable box.

Petcube Care members get 60% off their first order, when you subscribe to 10/30 day membership.

5 Tips for Choosing Food for Your Pet

Choosing the right dog food could be overwhelming, but there are some helpful guidelines you can follow, according to Gabby:

• Stick to diets that are higher in protein and lower in wheat and processed grains. They will give your dog more energy and less stomach troubles.
• Human-grade food can benefit your pet. It ensures the quality of the ingredients and the food safety standards of the facility it’s cooked in.
• Beware of meat ‘meal’ on the label. It means the meat has been ‘rendered’ in a facility with yucky animal by-products (like feathers!).
• Opt for fresh instead of canned food or kibble. The latter will have to go through extreme processing to make them shelf stable, sapping most of the natural nutrients. Fresh food also has a higher moisture content so it keeps your dog more hydrated!
• Avoid preservatives! Many traditional dog foods add artificial preservatives (even ones that double as pesticides!) to extend their shelf life. There are, however, some natural preservatives such as rosemary extract.

Get personal with CEO Gabby

Q: How do you keep your pet in shape, other than food/diet?

G.: Just like with humans, exercise is just as important as diet! I love to take Pancho for long hikes, on runs, and in the winter we play “hall ball” (where I throw him the ball over and over in our hallway) if it’s too cold to go outside!

Q: How do you deal with good and bad behaviors?

G.: I’m big on positive reinforcement so we reward Pancho’s good behaviors to encourage them. I also set boundaries for him by using markers — for example, his bed is his “place” and he knows that command. When I need him to chill out or know there’s a situation he probably won’t react well to (i.e., the vacuum cleaner or a delivery man) I put him in his “place” and he knows to stay there now.

Q: Do you follow any famous pets on Instagram? Who’s your favorite?

G.: Yes, there are so many! It’s really hard to pick my favorites, but I’m a sucker for any accounts with food and dogs (check out Dogs in Food as well as dogs and babies, like Mommas Gone City. I love “This Wild Idea”, where the guy travels around with his dog and takes gorgeous photos — which is my dream, so I get to live vicariously through that account!

Q: Can you share a cute story about your pet?

G.: How we found Pancho is probably one of the cutest--I was traveling with my husband in Colombia and this dog just started following us for 8 hours while we were hiking! He literally jumped into our taxi to make sure we wouldn’t leave without him and slept in our suitcase for the first four nights until he realized how much more comfortable our hotel bed was. We knew we just had to take him home with us after that!