Auburn Hills, Michigan-based Whisker, launched its Litter-Robot 4 on Tuesday, the newest iteration of its automatic, self-cleaning litter box.
In light of the occasion, Benzinga spoke with Jacob Zuppke, the firm’s president and CEO.
Context: Founded in 1999, Whisker’s Litter-Robot is an automatic, self-cleaning litter box for cats of any breed or size.
Patented machine-learning, laser and weight sensor technologies keep units cleaner for longer while providing owners further insight into the health and weight of their animals.
Pre-2020: Prior to the firm’s third evolution of the Litter-Robot, in 2015, Zuppke joined Whisker as a consultant and led some of the brand’s marketing initiatives.
“I did all the influencer marketing before that was even a phrase,” he said. “We launched and that forever changed the direction of our company.”
In one month, Whisker hit $1,000,000 in sales and about 33,000 website visitors. The influencer marketing endeavor was a game-changer and that kicked off a new era of innovation for what was already an established and well-known seller of automated litter boxes.
“We became very aggressive after that. We launched Internet of Things (IoT) versions of our litter box and we were the first company to launch a connected litter box.”
Pandemic: In 2019, the brand bought out some original partners and added strategic equity partners who assisted in accelerating product design and development, as well as sales and marketing.
“The pandemic era was an accelerant for our business,” Zuppke said.
“We even built up our supply chain helping us become one of the few appliance companies that have successfully been able to ship the product within a couple of days.”
Iterations: Through the pandemic, pet adoption surged. Yet with families set to spend less time at home, tools are needed to keep pets and homes cleaner effortlessly.
Whisker’s solution to this problem is the $650, American-made Litter-Robot 4, a tech-enabled litter box with built-in WiFi, Bluetooth, Amazon Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) Alexa integrations and machine learning.
“We’ve done a really awesome job on the product design,” Zuppke said. “For me, it hits home. I have a cat that was repeatedly going into and out of the Litter-Robot. We were notified and we rushed to our vet who found a blockage in her urinary tract before it became a problem.”
The unit’s advanced odor control dumps excrement into a large sealed container which means less cleaning for owners. Litter can last in excess of five weeks with the unit's new hopper.
“I’m currently at day 15, right now, without having to empty the drawer. That’s exceptional.”
The Litter-Robots sport upgrade and in-home trial periods.
Innovation: Presently, Whisker has nearly 400 employees, 70 of whom are in customer service and trained to capture feedback and assist research and development initiatives spearheaded by the firm’s 40 or so engineers.
“We’ve built out our engineering teams across various disciplines including software, firmware, electrical, and mechanical,” the CEO said. “We’re taking learnings from the other platforms and rolling those into our newer units.”
Outlook: Cognizant of pandemic pet trends and workers going back to the office, Whisker will “continue educating America and beyond on why they need an automatic litter box,” and add to the 700,000 units it has in homes right now “at a very exciting rate.”
“The Litter box is going to be a thing of the past just like traditional thermostats.”
Photo courtesy of Whisker.
