Stylish collars, leashes feeding growing pet market

PET PROJECT: Up Country founder Alice Nichols with her new puppy, Minnie. She started the company 30 years ago, growing it from a one-woman startup to 30-person firm. / PBN FILE PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY
PET PROJECT: Up Country founder Alice Nichols with her new puppy, Minnie. She started the company 30 years ago, growing it from a one-woman startup to 30-person firm. / PBN FILE PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY

“This is good. Did your husband write it?”
That was the response Alice Nichols received when she presented her business plan to a consultant for what is now an internationally successful pet-accessory company with products designed and manufactured locally.
The year was 1984 and, Nichols said, things were very different then.
“I was so insulted,” she said. “This was a long time ago and people didn’t take women as seriously. Things have totally changed.”
Much has changed for Nichols in the nearly 30 years since she founded Up Country, which is housed in an East Providence studio with 30 employees.
In that time she’s taken the company from a single-woman startup with a couple of cute products to one that has produced items for well-known retailers such as Crate and Barrel, Macy’s and Neiman Marcus.
“Everybody thought the collars and leashes were really cute but they felt it wasn’t a practical idea. I always felt that [it] was,” Nichols said. “I had no idea, however, how big this would be.”
Getting to the beginning is half of Nichols’ story.
Born and raised in Philadelphia, she moved to Massachusetts to attend Wheaton College in Norton for her undergraduate work and then ventured to Washington, D.C., to attend American University Washington College of Law.
That ended up a brief venture.
Nichols had by then met her future husband, Jack, and with him in New York City, something to had to give.
“It was love. We decided we wanted to get married,” she said, adding they then moved to Boston. “When he got out of [Harvard Business School], I said, ‘Wherever we go next, we’re staying.’ ”
The family – they have two sons – settled on Providence. Nichols went back to school at Brown University and earned a master’s degree in modern British and American history.
She started work on her doctorate – which she still hopes to complete – but found the demands of motherhood fit better with teaching. The idea to strike out on her own came while she was working as head of the middle school at Gordon School in Providence.
“I started investigating different businesses and the pet industry was growing really quickly at that point,” Nichols said. “I’ve always had dogs and couldn’t see much in the way of interesting products. I just kind of felt that maybe there was a niche.”
Others weren’t so sure.
Nichols had six designs for dog leashes and collars based on the theory of transforming utilitarian objects into mini works of art by adding colorful patterns.
Friends and other people she approached thought no one would buy the then-$8 or -$9 leashes, calling them too expensive and extravagant for pets.
“It was eight years for us to really break even. I [reinvested] what money I made back into the company,” Nichols said. “The first major milestone was when it got back to me that one [manufacturer] was going to start [selling them]. I realized if I was serious, I was going to have to have control of [manufacturing].”
That meant investing in machinery and employees, so she did. From there, the company progressed in being able to respond quickly to market trends and build on its made-in-America reputation.
Up Country started making cat collars, then harnesses and pet beds.
“It’s designed for your home. It’s décor fabric, not dog fabric. Again, [it’s] machine washable and practical. We listened to our customers,” Nichols said. “One thing I didn’t realize [going into business] was how patient you have to be. You have to plan and give it enough time … to see the market come around. That was one of the things I was most fortunate to have.”
Back when she started the business, she said, pet food and accessories was a $4 billion industry. The American Pet Products Association reports that in 2012 there will be an estimated $52 billion in sales and that 62 percent of households own a pet. In 1988, the first year the association collected survey data, 56 percent of households did the same.
“But it’s not a huge jump in quantity [of household pets],” she said. “It’s just that people have come around and are spending so much more [on their pets]. That’s what changed. I [pay] an exorbitant amount of money for [dog] food and I’m thinking I must be crazy but you do that for your dog.”
Up Country products are sold in retail stores worldwide, including locally at Plaid and Stripe on Providence’s East Side and the Shaggy Chic Pet Boutique in North Kingstown, and through its online catalog. They sell, too, to groomers, boarders and veterinarian offices.
The company also sells treats, toys and pet-related gifts.
There are 120 designs for various products now, most of them coming from Donna Bodell, a Rhode Island School of Design graduate, who has been with the company on and off for nearly 20 years and also serves as marketing director.
“She really has made a huge difference in helping us brand our product,” Nichols said. “I did [the early designs but] nobody had any design then, so any was better than nothing.”
Artistic challenges were not her only hurdles when she started.
She sold the products anywhere she could, including at industry trade shows where she quickly realized the pet business was male-dominated.
At her first show, she said, she was one of three women with exhibitor booths.
“People didn’t take a woman as seriously,” she said. “I would be interested to know how many [women are in the industry now] but I’d say it’s at least 50 percent. Women have brought style to this industry.” •

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