If we were going to get pet parents to pay more for us again, we’d need to stop competing on taste and get people to think about cat food in a new way.

We’re the brand that promises to deliver ‘what cats want’, and as everyone knows, cats love fish (fish form 30% of our best performing SKUs).

But with declining ocean health, if nothing was done, the fish cat's love would be hugely under threat. So, we made a long-term commitment, to ensure a future with fish.

This commitment had to start with the product, so we developed a new food philosophy: ‘Taste with Integrity’. It was fundamental we didn’t lose the element of enjoyment, after all it’s the key category driver, but rather strengthen it with eco-conscious credentials.

The next step in the journey was the use of 100% sustainably sourced fish. A huge move that meant delisting one of our most premium lines at a cost of €5m.

This was a solid start, we’d stopped harming the oceans. Now we needed to find a way to replenish them too.

An estimated 25% of all marine life, including Tuna, depends on coral reefs, but current projections say almost 90% of coral will be gone by 2043. So, Sheba launched a 10-year global programme to restore 185,000 square metres of reef - roughly the size of 148 Olympic swimming pools - making it the world’s largest coral reef restoration project.

This was huge. But the problem was bigger.

To make a real impact we needed to engage people in our efforts. The challenge was that environmental catastrophes like forest fires and flooding have become everyday occurrences in our news feeds. The more we see, the more apathetic we become, feeling hopeless about the state of our planet.

To overcome this deep sense of apathy, we planted hope; proof that there are man-made solutions to man-made problems.

In 2019, Sheba created the world’s first ‘billboard’ made from real, living coral. Over two years in the coral triangle off Indonesia, Sheba transformed a barren site of dead coral into a new thriving reef, the size of two Olympic swimming pools. When viewed from the air, it spelt out a simple message: HOPE.

It was the spark of hope that spread across the world, turning apathy into action.

This initiative, and ground-breaking media partnerships with Google Maps, YouTube and Spotify, catapulted reef restoration and Sheba into global news. We got major news outlets, the scientific community and pet parents talking about an issue that previously wasn’t on their radar, increasing coral reef restoration conversations by +267% globally [1].

And, we brought life back to the oceans, with +70% coral coverage and 300% more fish found at Hope reef [2].

As for Sheba, the 6ppt increase in the ‘worth the price’ metric seen in our brand tracking [3] was reflected in the numbers, growing sales while charging a price premium, reducing the number sold on discount, and driving a +300% ROI [4].