Our Story

A Hungry Dog Named Dugger.

Dugger Dinners was co-founded by Dugger and his best friend Ken Barlow. It all started with a fight over a Qdoba burrito - and Ken commenting to Dugger: "You're not getting any of this burrito."  This all happened about 5 years ago - when the idea first came to Ken: Why don't fast casual or dining places like pizza restaurants have special take-out treats for dogs like Dugger? 

When he sold his government payments software company in July 2020, Ken finally was able to begin investing time and resources to the idea. 

• A long-time friend and an entrepreneurial business associate suggested - "hey, not only restaurants, but what about this whole 'pet friendly hotel' trend";
• An annual Myrtle Beach golfing trip introduced him to a successful entrepreneur with expertise in product branding and packaging;
• A nationwide Indeed search led him to consultants skilled in building quality pet products and marketing them; 
• A friend for many years emerged as a sales and marketing collaborator - skilled at selling into hotels and restaurants; 
• A random trip with Dugger to Louisville introduced him to a hotel where the GM was providing a Welcome Kit to all pet guests;
• Another long-time friend and fellow technology business entrepreneur noted: "When you go to a hotel with your dog, you always need another bowl - make sure any kit includes that";
• The user fees charged by hotels to their pets with guests utilized a user fee model - similar to models Ken was very familiar with, used in the government payments software space; 
• By consulting with hotel GMs, the Dugger sales and product teams began working beyond solutions that just were good for the dogs and began working to deploy solutions that streamlined processes and improved communication between hotels and guests with pets;  
• Incorporating ideas from many hotels and restaurants nationwide who were already doing great things on their own - innovative ideas like a guide of local pet friendly resources and destinations.

Today, Dugger Dinners is a small, entrepreneurial company - still focused on getting dogs like Dugger the things that they need and want when they are visiting restaurants or staying overnight in a hotel. 

But we have also smoothly transitioned into a 360-degree focused pet solutions company that works with entities in the hospitality industry to streamline their pet friendly operations and turn what could be an incremental expense (buying treats for pets) into an opportunity to increase revenue.