he introduction of kitchens. Cue Swaggle, a hyper-personalised pet care platform that is disrupting the market and doing things differently with the goal of being “Australia’s favourite destination for each and every pet moment.” Swaggle is being run as a standalone entity within Coles Group. It began just over a year ago after Coles’ new ventures team identified the opportunity for a digital-first pet-focused business.  Since then, it has grown into a 20-strong team and has increased monthly revenue nearly ten-fold from the beta-testing friends and family launch phase in November last year. The brand launched nationally in January. What is Swaggle? Swaggle is an online marketplace platform that sells pet-care products, ranging from a dog’s breakfast right through to kitty litter. It aims to compete with established players through its personalised customer experience, expert recommendations and advice from vets. The business is based in Victoria, where the logistics and warehousing operate from. “We want to deliver on the moments that matter, and the moments where pets display that ultimate happiness – that’s what we call the Swaggle,” Chad Burke, GM and head of Swaggle, told Inside Retail. Burke was Swaggle’s first employee and started building the business last January. A former Coles Group category manager with overseas experience as a grocery buying manager at Tesco and Waitrose, he built a team of five in the first three months of operation. “We built a team and minimum viable product launched in November,” he said.  “Obviously, [we] took it quite easy over the Christmas months as we were testing our technology, making sure it all came to life and delivered what we expected. “Now it’s just progressively building and sharing Swaggle with more and more customers as we go to a full national launch.” Currently, Swaggle stocks over 3000 products, which it is continuously expanding, across over 190 brands that cater to a broad range of pet’s needs. They include both market leaders and brands usually only found in vets and specialty stores, a mix that Burke sees as a strong point of difference for Swaggle. “Our suppliers have been great, embarking on this journey with us,” he said. “We’ve been mindful to work with them. […] They have great expertise and no one knows their brands better than themselves.” Raining cats and dogs In 2024 the Australian pet food market alone is projected to generate US$3.06 billion in revenue and is expected to grow annually by 3.27 per cent. Burke acknowledged that the pet care market is highly competitive, but believes that Swaggle is creating its own lane amongst, “some great retailers”. “We realised an opportunity to make customers’ lives simpler. So we’re not coming in just as a kind of ‘me too’ and our name says that. Coming in as Swaggle, we want to be different,” he added. The ongoing costs of caring for a pet is perceived as a significant barrier to consumers in this space. In Australia, the average spend at the vet, per visit, is $500-$600. Swaggle aims to focus on value through its competitive pricing in addition to showcasing value-adds, such as helping customers make decisions and navigate the abundance of options for their pet-care needs. “There’s a lot of advice out there and it can be overwhelming. So we really want to make their life simpler and easier, saving them time and delivering on our purpose and vision to be Australia’s favourite pet destination and delivering happiness,” Burke said. At the same time, he noted, that it’s vital for Swaggle to deliver on the basics. “There’s definitely a gap in the market for putting pets first and being that destination for each and every pet moment. As we embark on building our CDP [customer data platform], what’s important is truly putting the pet first in that journey. We’re not all pet parents, but we all have our pet stories and our moments with pets and recognising that each pack is different,” Burke said. Launching to friends and family Swaggle beta-tested to a small skew of friends and family in November last year after almost a solid year of building out the back-end of the business. It now delivers to most postcodes nationwide. “We extended from friends and family to a soft public launch on January 29, with a scaled marketing and media approach,” Emma Wynne, Swaggle’s head of marketing, told Inside Retail. This shifted to a hard launch in April with a scaled media spend, starting with a ‘Swaggle Hunt’ – a guerilla marketing activation in Sydney last weekend.  “We’ve got a lot of exciting stuff lined up over the course of April,” Wynne said. “This month is when we’re starting to make a bit of a noise in the market in terms of who and what we are and talking to more and more customers.”