Dinovite??

[Heather & Brinkley]

Has anyone heard of Dinovite? My mom's friend swears by it for itching but I'm skeptical:

http://www.dinovite.com

Thanks in advance!

[F, Calla & Luca]

Thanks Lisa.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Thank you, Lisa.

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

I have to say that Im on Karen, F and Adinas side. I dont have half  quarter the knowledge they have, but I have had some training and done lots of research myself. No dog (or cat, or person etc) should need supplements unless its for a particular illness or they are getting crappy food (and in that case just switch to good food, it often works out to be the same price anyway due to feeding much less)

Id also like to say that I would never buy a dog from a breeder who has kennels (ie not house raised dogs) and so i therefore wouldnt buy supplements from them either!!!!

[Donna K & Quincy]

 This company has been in business for over 10 years and only have 50,000 customers, how good can that product really be? If it were the wonderful product they claim, we would all be beating a path to their door. Joining a website and immediately engaging aggressively in a discussion, questioning a persons knowledge about a topic when they are in ignorance about the site or any of it's members smacks a little bit of desperation to me. I guess they are afraid they would lose customer 50,001 or maybe they thought it was a chance to get some free advertising. Wow, did you guys ever bark up the wrong tree!

[F, Calla & Luca]

Love the barking up the wrong tree.

[ClarkP]

Well... if those are all current customers that average even $30/month (supplements are not one time sales, continuity is huge), that puts annual sales at $18 Million dollars.  With a 50% margin on costs, that puts $9 million dollars in their pocket every year.  Not bad.  Sounds like a strong business to me.  :-)

I just have a problem with how they did it here today.  Do this math:

   Loving pet owner (complete love of a pet!)

+ FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) about proper care and feeding of the wonderful dog

= Lots of sales for any person providing an quick and easy wonder solution.

As a marketer, I GET THIS.  I use the sales formula of Problem-Agitate-Solve myself.  (I just try to agitate real present problems and then deliver valuable and quantifiable solutions.)

But what I have a problem with, is when any company agitates an uncertain and imagined future health problem to loving owners of otherwise healthy dogs.  I'm not sure if Dinovite intended to do this or not.  But that is what happened.  If these pet owners don't happen to have F, Karen, or Adina available for questioning, they might believe that without this supplement, my dog WILL be "itching", have an "un-fresh smell soon after bathing", be "licking and biting the paws", have "red or dark irritated areas of the skin on belly, haunches and paws", "can also result in hair loss", "his skin can get crusty and get sores and he will be miserable", etc. etc.  It sounds horrible!  And it is.  If it were true.  The problem is that it's not an honest assessment of the future health of even a small minority of dogs.  Especially not the dogs of owners who are actively seeking out ways to keep their pet healthy.   They say "if left untreated ... really be detrimental to the dog's health."  What is the treatment?  Why of course our wonder supplement.  So unknowing people purchase the supplement to stave off this future hell for their dog.  They LOVE their dog and would do anything to prevent THAT.  Any loving pet owner would spend the money to eliminate that hell.

And another sale is made...

I'm not saying Dinovite did this by design.  It could have been over-zealousness by someone intimately connected to the company - as she obviously is.  Dinovite should work diligently to avoid this impression of their company.

But if this is done by design, they join the ranks of the millions of other scammers that prey on the hopes and fears of others every day.

[Ed Lukacevic]

Donna,

I personally think 50,000 regular customers is pretty good. Lots of work keeping that many people happy. Audra does not have an aggressive bone in her body. I guess she will learn from it. She answered the question: "Has anyone heard of Dinovite? My mom's friend swears by it for itching but I'm skeptical:" Then quickly got in over her head.

In all fairness how would she possibly know who anybody is? I think it is quite possible much more has been "read between the lines" than what was actually there.

As far as barking up the wrong tree, tell me about it.

The truth be told no one on this thread has used dinovite. Except the mom's friend and she swears by it.

Don't hear what I'm not saying. It sounds like most everyone on this site is feeding a very good dog food and that is great. There are however many people who are not and need help. Audra, I'm sure, was trying to help.

10 years is a long time. Humble beginnings but nothing to be ashamed of actually quite the opposite. Audra, my eldest help put lids on the jars, she was 13 ish, Eddie, 6 ish brought empty jars and Hank, 4 ish put scoops in the jars. We called Hank, scoop dog. Cindy and I worked 16 hour days. Lots of questions and physical labor. Hard but fun.

We're still a pretty small company. We hired all our friends and their kids and our kids. It's a fun place to work and we do a lot of good.

If this thread causes us to lose every last customer so be it. Maybe, Heather's mom's friend will continue to order. Hope so.

[BG and Gavin]

Here is one customer that was clearly dissatisfied:

http://www.ripoffreport.com/pet-shops-supplies/dinovite/dinovite-fa...

[F, Calla & Luca]

Well, now the satisfied/dissatisfied ratio is equal. Not so good.

[ClarkP]

Ed,

I truly hope this thread does not cause you to lose every last customer either.  I would not wish that on you because of any posts here on Doodle Kisses.  You sound like a straight up guy with a great family.

But please do work on the information presented as fact.  Don't exacerbate the FUD of trusting people whose only crime is loving their dog and being uninformed.  Supplement sellers of any variety have a tough row to hoe.  It is absolutely essential that anecdotes don't become 'facts' in your sales pitch.  Anecdotes can never become predictive of what will happen to other peoples pets.  Horror stories are not indicators of what will happen for anyone else.  Make sure you don't present them that way.

Pet supplements probably don't have regulations like the FDA regulations about supplements for humans, but I think a similar level of honesty is still required.

Best wishes,

Clark

PS.  Who is Ted Schmitt?  Is that "Eddie" or is it another profile created by Audra?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Clearly a lot of down time at the company that allows the president and two other employees to join DK, set up profile pages, and post lengthy comments here in the middle of a workday.

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

Of all days for me to be offline...we were visiting a "butterfly farm" in Mass....great fun, but now as entertaining as DK was today apparently.   My first reaction was to be really upset (there's a better word, but I won't use it) about the way in which Karen and F were disrespected (Adina too but not directly).  Once I got past that I began to realize that all of this has now created a Marketing nightmare for Dinovite.  If Audra worked for me, today would be her last day.  I'm guessing she may be "family" which might be her saving grace.  All F said initially was that she didn't feel a dog needed this supplement if they had a good diet.  They could have/should have left that alone.  Now this discussion has brought into light a lot more information (none of it good for Dinovite).  Every time a prospective customer searches this product going forward, this is what they're going to see.  Hardly a resounding endorsement for this product.  Dinovite execs, you need to be on a different website.   DK members are too savvy for this.  Karen, F, and Adina are incredibly well-respected for their experience and knowledge, and for you to even think you are qualified to get into a debate with them on this subject is laughable.