The year of Samba

At Interzoo in Nuremberg, 19 companies from Brazil presented themselves, 16 of them in a community pavilion in Exhibition Hall 5. However, two of the biggest and most important companies from the country, Total Alimentos from Tres Coracoes and Supra Alisul Alimentos from Sao Leopoldo exhibited with their own booths. Their primary aim was the contact, not only to existing customers but also to buyers worldwide. The same could be said about the relatively young company Zee Dog from Rio de Janeiro, who had their stand in Exhibition Hall 1.Zee DogIt was around 2008, when recent college graduates trying to find what really challenged them in life got together. Entrepreneurship was something they had always loved. The friends had just welcomed "Zeca", a medium sized, brown furred mutt, and "Lico", a rescue Pug, to the family. "As we began going out to find products for them and for us that expressed our particular lifestyle, we encountered a sad reality: ugly looking products, badly displayed with no attention to detail and quality", Thadeu Diz stated. The friends founded "Zee Dog", born with five main principles: Build a community, not a brand. Use the power and reach of the community to advocate for and save abandoned dogs. Treat customers like family, because they are. Design and build products with the best quality available and sell them at reasonable prices. Profits are not the ultimate goal. Building something that matters, is.Zee Dog sees itself as a lifestyle brand focused on connecting dogs and people. "We create products of all types for that connection: Leashes, Collars, Beds, Bags, Poop Bags, Bandanas, Special training leashes, Dog toys and much more to come", Thadeu Diz continues. The customers are people who are tired of the same old boring pet products that the market has offered for ever, and want pet products that express their young in spirit lifestyle, fashion forward sense with world class quality. "We currently sell to 13 countries and after Interzoo that number will rise considerably", Thadeu Diz concludes.

The big onesThe pet food producer Total Alimentos (www.totalalimentos.com.br) was founded back in 1974. But it was 20 years later that the first own product line appeared with complete pet foods for cats and dogs on the…