Do you use CBD for your pets? Do you use CBD for yourself? Less than 10 years ago we would have been surprised if you answered “yes” to either of those questions. If we asked you those same questions today we speculate that we would see about 50% “yes” and 50% “no.” If we instead asked if you had heard of CBD being useful for pets or if you had heard of any friends or family who used CBD themselves we would expect most people to answer “yes” to at least one of those questions. Now based on this preliminary information you probably would assume that pet CBD is growing in popularity and might very well be the future of pet wellness, but what do the numbers say? Just because more people are talking about CBD doesn’t mean people are necessarily using it more or that it won’t be a short lived fad.
Last year in 2020 the pet CBD market generated $426 million in sales. Studies currently estimate that pet CBD will generate $629 million in sales this year. If that happens, that means that pet CBD sales increased by nearly 50% from last year. Those same studies estimate the market will be making over $1 billion dollars by 2025. These are not small numbers and are so far continuing to increase at a very rapid rate. But will they continue to increase?
Of course we can not conclude that they will increase this fast forever or even increase at all but studies conducted by Brightfield Group seem to indicate that they will. Brightfield Group is a CBD and cannabis focused market research group. Many of their studies are extremely insightful and give possible indications of what the future of pet wellness will look like.
The first insights they provided were of the demographics of pet owners who use CBD. They found that 53% of pet CBD consumers are millennials and that 46% live in the city and 30% live in the suburbs. They also found that, “today's pet CBD consumers are likely to be younger women living in the city who use CBD themselves” (Forbes). Seeing that the majority of users are millennials gives us reason to believe that the next generation will also be CBD users. But while it is most likely for new generations to follow what those before them did, there is no guarantee that will happen as generational shifts are very common. For example, there was a generational switch when millennials started using so many CBD products themselves.
Some of the other interesting findings of the study were related to CBD and veterinarians. From 2020 to 2021 the number of consumers who discussed CBD brands with their vets more than doubled. They found that 70% of CBD buyers discussed with their vets but very few purchased from their vets, only 5%. Not only can people talk to their vet about pet CBD but they can also buy it from them, this information indicates that many vets are also supportive of CBD products for pets.
As you can see the pet CBD industry is continuing to grow in many regards and is likely to continue to increase for at least the next five years. Whether CBD for pets will carry over to the next generation is unsure, but we do know that pet CBD is the future of pet wellness at least for the next few years.
Works Cited
Dorbian, Iris. “Pet CBD Product Sales Estimated To Rack Up $629 Million This Year, Says New Report.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 6 May 2021, www.forbes.com/sites/irisdorbian/2021/05/05/pet-cbd-product-sales-estimated-to-rack-up-629-million-this-year-says-new-report/.