Vetted raises $3.3M to treat your pet at home
What’s worse than going to the doctor? Taking your pet to the doctor.
Not only is it a major hassle to actually transport your dog or cat to the vet, but you usually end up paying way too much for way too little time spent with the actual veterinarian.
Vetted wants to change this. The startup provides on-demand veterinary services to your house for a flat $99 fee. To help achieve this, they’ve raised $3.3 million in seed funding from Foundation Capital, with Amplify LA, Sterling.VC and Reimagined Ventures also participating.
The viability of Vetted rests on the practicality of performing veterinary services on your living room floor. But Ali Shahid, co-founder and COO of Vetted, says that 89 percent of the issues related to vet visits can be treated at home — including skin, ear, eye and gastrointestinal issues. If your pet has a major issue that requires a procedure done in a sterile and specialized environment, Vetted will direct you to a local brick-and-mortar veterinarian that they’ve… vetted (pun intended?)
So while a Vetted veterinarian won’t be able to treat all issues, they probably can treat a lot more issues than you think without having you trek into an office. They also explained that vet techs call the owner after each appointment is scheduled to discuss symptoms over the phone, and determine if the issue can be treated at home before they even arrive.
Included in the $99 fee is an exam, Q&A, nail clippings and ear cleanings (which most vets charge extra for) and a follow-up video or phone call. Any additional services like vaccines or prescriptions are also provided at 25-40 percent cheaper than brick-and-mortar vets. Unlike some on-demand companies that are opaque about their pricing and monetization strategy, Vetted is pretty up-front about it. These cost savings essentially come from not having to pay the overhead costs like rent and maintenance associated with a physical location.
Other companies are also working in this space — Treat, based in San Francisco, also offers $99 visits, as well as the option to chat online with a vet before they come visit. PawSquad is an U.K.-based startup doing the same thing overseas. But the market is huge — estimates say Americans spend around $60 billion a year on their pets — so there’s definitely room for multiple players, especially if they’re currently all tackling different regions.
Right now Vetted is just live in West Los Angeles — which helps give it a response time of less than 90 minutes as long as they have a vet available. They’ll slowly expand throughout Los Angeles and Orange County, with this new funding being used primarily for broader west coast expansion.