Maisy’s Organics

That’s our goal.  “Treating” your pets better.  We’ll ensure that we use human-grade, all natural, organic ingredients.  We make everything by hand - no preservatives, no artifical flavors.  All of the peanut butter in our Peanut Butter ‘n Molasses Treats is organic.  The tomato sauce in our Deep Dish Pizza Treats is 100% organic.  So, too, are the apples in our Oat ‘n Apple Treats.

But, for us, the organic, natural ingredients in our dog biscuits and treats aren’t the only essential part.  These things also taste and smell great.  Opening up a bag of our Peanut Butter ‘n Molasses Dog Treats the smell of pb comes on strong.  Maisy, our CTO (Chief Tasting Officer) loves them.  In fact, they’re the ones that launched the company.  Equally important is the impact they have our our dog.  Maisy is full of life and energy - and that’s because she’s only eating healthy stuff.
There’s nothing like peace of mind - when it comes to your “best friend”.  I remember back to the summer of 2007 and just about everyday another brand of dog food and treats was announced as being part of the worldwide recall because of poison in the ingredients.  Just like you guys, I was panicked.  That’s when we pulled up a bed for the Rooster (Maisy’s nickname) and dug into the PB jar.  We selected these high quality ingredients mostly because that’s what we feed ourselves.

So, isn’t it time to “treat” your dog better?  Pick the dog treats with integrity.

It’s been a while since we checked in last, but we’ve crossed some very important milestones.  First, we’ve sourced the designer for our labels, the printer of our labels, and our bags.  The really incredible part of all of this is that we really aimed for the stars in both the design and composition of our packaging, and we think we’ve come up big.  The bags will be partially made out of Illinois corn.  They’re a special plastic that’s created from a renewable resource!  There’s more information about the process here.  Sticking to our mantra of “Treats with Integrity”, the packaging was one of our top concerns.  The labels will also be green - as they’re printed with soy inks.  These two essential building blocks will help us further our cause of ensuring that EVERYTHING we do at Maisy’s Organics, we do with integrity.

The final, very exciting piece of news is that we’re working with a prototype designer who’s begun to make our custom-made dog treat cutter.  This isn’t the final design, but the first iteration.  We’re really getting excited about putting everything together. Here it is:

We’ve also begun work on the storefront portion of our site.  Stay tuned for our selections of Deep Dish Pizza Crust Dog Treats, Peanut Butter ‘n Molasses Dog Treats, Oat ‘n Apple Dog Treats, and Carrot n’ Cheese Dog Treats.  We hope to have those four versions shipped when we open.

If you haven’t already, make sure you subscribe to our email alerts on the top right.  We’ll be putting all sorts of deals and news in our email blasts.  Of course, the cool kids are doing it!

I just baked up 3 “mini-batches” of our 100% Organic dog biscuits.  2 tries at varations on the Oat ‘n Apple Treats and a few Carrot ‘n Cheese Treats.  I went with organic carrots and organic parmesean cheese along with outs, soy flour, flax seeds, and water.  I know they turned out perfect because even after a full bowl of food, our CTO (Chief Tasting Officer) Maisy, gobbled up six of them!  A bit more experimentation is on the docket this weekend.  The Chicago Style Dog Treat along with the Carrot ‘n Cheese Treat will be run through their paces once again.

In other news, we’ve progressed a bit on the cutter front.  After some initial designing, we’ve settled on a design and have begun discussions with a maker of our prototype.  In buidling a premium brand, we’re certain that Maisy’s Organics will need a unique and memorable design on the actual product.  I’m reall excited about this phase of the progression.  Once we get the prototype built, we’ll start to price the actual die and get the cutter made.  We could go with an “off the shelf” look, but this is one of those times when you have to go just a bit further.

Finally, we’ve settled on a mantra:  Treats with Integrity.  We think that sums up our operation.  Our desire is to create THE best premium, organic animal treats on the market.  That’s our purpose for being.  If we’re not making the best, most healthy, nautural food for our best friends, we wouldn’t be starting this shop up.

While we’ve nailed our flagship organic dog treat (the PB Bones), we know that we’re going to have to offer more than one variety of organic treats if we’re going to be able to compete with some much larger suppliers. Our “bakery” has only one oven and one small mixer, so it takes a bit to churn out a batch of treats. Today, we sourced some new organic ingredients and attempted to put together our first batch of Organic Apple Cinnamon Pies. We tried a few different versions - all of them circular - and none of them were perfect. Sure, Maisy, the CTO (Chief Tasting Officer) loved them, I’m just not thrilled with their texture. They weren’t “flakey” enough. We tried various dough techniques, baking times, and ingredients, but none met our rigid standards. Here’s a few pictures of our hand at these treats:

Tomorrow’s a new day and we’ll get started with some new ideas. Of course, we’ll stick to our core mission of using only the best organic ingredients we can get our hands on.

Maisy’s Organics is still in our gestation period (no official documents with the State of Illinois filed), so we’re operating under the LLC agreement of Corederoy Partners - my incubation “space” where plenty of consulting goes down.  There will come a time when we’re ready to set Maisy’s Organics free, but for now, the notion, company, and products are resting comfortably here at Corederoy Partners.

The idea behind Maisy’s Organics came to us over the past few years.  Like many of you, the pet food scare and recall of 2007 shook us to our core when it comes to caring for and feeding Maisy.  We couldn’t trust these big brands any longer.  They betrayed us with their slick marketing and fooled us into thinking that dog food and treats were different.  Turns out, they’re all the same.  Made from the same place - with the same ingredients.

We’ve decided to be different.  Very different.  From our 100% all organic ingredients to the extra boost that your dog will feel from our organic flaxseeds and glucosamine, Maisy’s Organics is unlike any other dog food product out there.  Our PB Bones, Apple Cinnamon Pies, CavalierCorn, and Chicago Style Dogs are made with the utmost care and pride.  Maisy, our Chief Testing Officer (CTO) wouldn’t have it any other way.

This is a long, interesting process for us.  Take us back 3 months and we never would have thought that we’d bein the organic dog treat business.  Tonight, while Natalie is out with her girlfriends, Maisy and I are set to finalize a few of our product recipes.  After spending the past 12 months up to my elbows in organic peanut butter and apples, it’s time to get moving on the operational side of Maisy’s Organics.

Towards that end, we’ve sourced our products, lined up an artist to help us bring Maisy’s Organics to life, and have begun the certification process.  We’ll be enlisting plenty of our friends through this start-up and if you’re interested in being one of our “Alpha Dogs” for our initial tests, we’d sure love to have you.  Send a note to maisysorganics@gmail.com and include your mailing address.  We’ll ship out our best as soon as the batch is ready!

After the pet food scare of 2007, most owners weren’t sure who to trust.  The pet food brands that we had come to rely on in the past lost our trust and their food was getting recalled.  Natalie and I didn’t know where to turn.  We couldn’t find any healthy, organic dog treats that we could give our puppy Maisy (that’s her on the right).

We knew there had to be a better way to care for our dog.

12 months later, after spending plenty of hours elbow deep in organic peanut butter and rye flour, Maisy’s Organics was born!  Our goal is to create a better tasting, 100% organic treat that your dog will enjoy and will give you the piece of mind that you’re rewarding your best friend with something totally healthy.  We bake our treats fresh in Chicago, not China.   We’re still perfecting our recipes, assembling the business plan, getting certifed as well as getting set up business-wise, but we’re on the road to ….well….somewhere, but we hope it is the road to success.

We’d love to hear from you about what you’re doing to keep your best friends safe and healthy.  We’ll be rolling out more and more features, stories, and even an online store (hopefully!), so stay tuned to the feed or email subscriptions.

Our goal is to be as transparent in this process as we can be as we try to build a community of like-minded souls around Maisy’s Organics.  Thanks for checking us out and hang on for the ride!