Q&A Interview with Kelley Marian, Founder of Green JuJu

Professionally, what makes the pet industry a good fit for you? What do you enjoy the most about working in pet?

I unknowingly stumbled into the pet industry after getting a degree in psychology and marketing and thinking I was going to climb the corporate ladder. A lot of us who are in the industry get that pet dog or pet cat in our 20s and I had that dog. She was the reason I didn’t sit at a desk job because I wanted to be out with her all day. So I started a dog-walking business. Then she got cancer. Chemo and radiation didn’t work so we didn’t have any options. It made me reevaluate my days with other people’s puppies. I wanted to spend more time with her. This concept of green juju and essentially juicing for dogs came up, and I wanted her to be sitting at my feet, chewing bones, while I juiced all day. So that’s how I got into the pet industry. What I’ve really enjoyed about being in it is this mentality. It’s so empowering to teach people that you can make little changes and have big results. I love talking to people about their pets and having whatever issues they’re having, telling them if you try this, that could happen and to hear them say oh my god, that worked. I’ve always liked being in a service-helping role, and this has been a fun way for me to do that. 

What is your leadership philosophy?

My overall philosophy is that I want my energy to be what leads the company. I want my enthusiasm, my positivity and my passion for this to be what people gravitate towards and what sets the tone. I believe in hiring people who are good at what they do, who know things better than I do and giving them the space to do that. I don’t hire people to do jobs that I know how to do because I wouldn’t need them otherwise. 

What aspect or aspects of your personal work ethic have helped you most to become successful?

It sounds cliché, but it’s just my passion and my drive. I don’t think I have a work ethic in terms of wake up and go to work. This is just legitimately what I want to be doing. It’s actually what I’m interested in. It’s what I get excited about. It truly doesn’t feel like work because it’s fun and exciting to me. I think the pieces that have made me successful in it are the obsession and passion of always thinking about it. There’s no on and off button for me, which probably isn’t that healthy. I say I work 

60 to 70 percent of every waking hour because my brain is always on. I’m always thinking about things. This company feels like a big art masterpiece that I just get to keep working on. 

What are some of your career accomplishments you value the most while leading Green JuJu? 

Certainly, when the company hit some of our first revenue goals. Forbes has a crazy statistic that only 2 percent of women-owned businesses ever hit $1 million in revenue. I think one of the unique things about me in this business is that I didn’t intentionally start a business. I started this to help my dog and it turned into a business. My goals have never been number-focused, so it’s never been I want to hit this in revenue. It’s always been I want to develop this to do this, or I want to be accessible in this area, or I want to have a product that serves this category. Those are my benchmarks. The $1 million was a big one, where I thought wow, I’m not selling Tupperware here. 

[Another accomplishment],getting distribution across the country, export markets, having e-Comm up and it’s not to compete with the retailers, but it’s for the people that are driving three hours to their pet store. 

Honestly, a huge milestone was being able to hire a team that I trust and that allowed me to take my first family vacation and turn my phone off. That was huge. I’ve been self-employed for almost 18 years now, so my family never knew me to just be available. 

At this point in your career, what are your professional goals, and what opportunities are there in the pet industry to help you achieve them?

When I got into this, I had this little green thing. My goal was that this little green thing could go into any bowl, no matter what people were feeding. My vision all along has been this continuum of people feeding a grocery store kibble all the way up to fancy DIY raw. I wanted to provide something for people anywhere in that. I’m really big on there not being any shame in what you’re feeding because we all get pets because we love them. We feed them because we love them. There’s a transfer of energy every time you feed them of giving love to them. Nobody wants to feed their pet badly. We’re doing what we know, what we can afford and what we have time for. I’d say my biggest goal with this whole company is to provide something for everybody on that continuum. There are a lot of different ways that could look in terms of what we develop over the years. But I want to have something that people can feel good about, no matter where they are in those categories. 

How would you describe the current state of the pet industry? 

We’re learning more about quality. As business types we have learned that the pet industry is a good place to be and so we’ve had a huge influx of money. We’ve had companies like Farmers Dog and Ollie, those D2C lightly cooked types of things, those have been making big waves. It’s one of those things that I can sit here and pick those apart from a quality standpoint and say this is not the best thing to be feeding your dog and it’s a huge step up from kibble. If their marketing dollars are working and it’s getting delivered to your door, then great. Good job. I feel like that is a win. The pet industry as a whole is moving towards fresher foods, which is great. I love the language around fresh food instead of it just being raw. We try to speak to fresh a lot because raw can be pretty alienating and fresh is what matters. There is also a lot of economic concern and that’s where it’s important to remember that when it comes to what we’re feeding our pets, some is better than none. That is something we say a lot. You can make a huge impact in your pet’s bowl just by changing 20 percent of what you put in there. If you’re feeding kibble and put 20 percent fresh food in there, you can make a huge difference. It’s important from the manufacturer’s side to be aware of the economy and how we can still help people make a difference, even if it’s on a smaller scale.

When it comes to driving product innovation, what is the role of  manufacturers? 

If we’re trying to improve the health of pets, there was a period a long time ago where we got way into processed and maybe we lost sight of that. If our goal is to improve the health of pets, then we need to do that in a way that we need to stop ingredient splitting. We need to stop putting questionable ingredients in there and making them seem like they’re good. 

Make the highest quality product that you can with what you can do. Don’t try to make it seem more high quality by splitting ingredients or by using meat meals or something like that. Be straightforward with where you are in the market and what you’re doing. Not everybody has to be the highest quality thing; there is a place for everybody. We just need to be authentic and genuine about what we’re doing so that we’re not confusing our consumers. There’s nothing worse than somebody taking the jump from kibble to fresh food and everything goes wrong because maybe what they got wasn’t what they thought they were getting. 

What are the top two to three issues manufacturers are currently facing? What are some of your pain points right now?

Definitely sourcing, supply chain. We’re seeing a lot of price increases in things like beef—things that shouldn’t be hard to get but are all of a sudden way more expensive. The positive about that is we’re seeing it at the grocery stores too so it’s not a huge surprise. Supply and labor are also true amongst all industries. Manufacturers in general, we’re growing faster than we can forecast, which is great, but it’s tough to keep in stock. 

Also, I really believe in not growing too big, too fast. There’s a piece of sustainability; you’re trying to meet the demand and you’re also trying to stay sustainable and keep it small and slow. 

Where do you see the freeze-dried food and treats category headed throughout 2025 and going into 2026? 

I think we’re going to keep seeing growth in the fresh food sector. I think that those brands, Farmers Dog and Ollie, they are an intro brand and they may lead to people moving toward more of the brands in our independent pet world. Freeze-dried is almost always a gateway to raw. All paths lead towards more fresh food.

What do you attribute to Green JuJu’s continued success? What are some key values and features of Green JuJu that make you an industry leader? 

One of my core values and what has driven pretty much everything that we have ever done, is that it has to be different than what I can buy in the store. If I can go buy it in the store, and somebody else is doing it well, I will 100 percent support what they’re doing, but I have no need to make it myself, which is something that we see a lot of in the industry. I have to be able to say we’re doing this because it’s different. Sometimes that might be in how we’re making it or how we’re formulating. It might be a completely different product, but whatever it is, it has to be when I walk into a store and somebody asks how is this different than X brand, there has to be a clear, solid answer. So that’s what drives a lot of our innovation—is it out there? Is it something I would feed my own pet? To be honest, just about everything I have ever made is something I wanted for my dog but couldn’t find. This has also made it such a fun journey because I basically get to make all of these cool things for my own dogs. 

Early on, I would go into pet stores and all I wanted was food without fish oil. I had two dogs that couldn’t tolerate fish oil and it was absolutely impossible to find until we made it. And I wanted something that didn’t have synthetic vitamins and minerals. All these things we wanted, we were then able to make. And it turns out I wasn’t the only picky person who wanted those things or that had pets that couldn’t have fish oil. Honestly, I feel lucky to be in this position where I’m able to create these things because I’m not the only person with a pet who has these issues. 

How does the company continually fill gaps within the freeze-dried food and treats category and address pet owners’ pain points with its solutions-based products?

Our pets are not getting healthier as time goes on. More and more of us are dealing with sensitivity issues in our pets, and one of my biggest issues was figuring out what was triggering my dog. What is she actually having an issue with? If you’re going from one brand that has 17 different ingredients to another that has 24 ingredients, you’re never going to figure it out. You just can’t. Manufacturers are putting all those things in there because each one of those things is a buzzword. Somebody sees it has strawberries and they know those are healthy. People read through the ingredient panel and it builds them up. But in reality, what I wanted was the simplest ingredient panel. So people can say alright, there are three things in there. So if my dog doesn’t do well , then it’s one of these three things. And so that was the goal. We treat our food as an elimination diet, so that if you have a dog that is super sensitive, then you just feed them that. 

How does Green JuJu demonstrate its commitment to supporting its retail and distributor partners?

We are working on some more things for this upcoming year. This past year, we have put a lot of time and energy into creating videos and video assets that we can use through our Retail.pet platform for training or use on our social media for retailers to share. We’re going to make a retailers portal that is retailer-facing about Green JuJu that they can put up and share product information. We participate in Astro, so we do their frequent buyer. We do Astro offers quarterly. We have one whole person on our five-person team committed to retail and making sure they are being supported. 

At a time when pet owners are looking to stretch their dollars, how will Green JuJu work with its retail and distributor partners to mitigate the impacts of supply chain delays and the rising costs of conducting business? How are we meeting consumers where they’re at from an affordability standpoint while still meeting that focus on the highest quality products? 

This is one of the things that I love about Green JuJu as a company and how we built out this line. Our veggie blends and our raw goat milk and our bone broth and even our fermented paste, all those things are around $10 to $15. That will last even a medium-sized dog at least a week. So you’re looking at maybe $40 a month. You can still make a huge improvement in your dog’s bowl just by doing at least a green and a goat’s milk. Those two things together will make a huge impact on their diet, no matter what the base diet is. You can do grocery store kibble or raw, that will still make a big difference and it’s not a huge impact on the budget. The veggies are the prebiotic, and the goat’s milk is the probiotic and they work really well together. Gut health is at the core of it all. You will see some kind of difference. I’m a big believer in some is better than none. The biggest problem is when people are changing their diet, but people are so scared to make a big change and tune you out. Starting with these small changes is really the way to go. It gets people to open their minds to making more changes. It doesn’t have to be a huge monetary impact right from the start. 

How do your product lines set Green JuJu apart from your competitors in the freeze-dried food and treats category? 

The simplest, the cleanest and the most transparent. 

I believe in keeping your head down and staying in your lane. I don’t spend a lot of time looking at what competitors are doing. And I have obviously interacted with competitors who have different perspectives on it. You never get ahead by looking at what somebody else is doing. Keep your head down and do your thing. 

What are your top goals or areas of focus for Green JuJu as we head into 2026?

Our top goals for 2026 are finally getting the Extras food launch launched. We’ve had more delays with this line than anything, but great things come to those who wait. We’re doing freeze-dried this month, and then we’ll have frozen next month. Every year we say this year we’re going to slow down and it hasn’t happened yet. We have a potential products folder and we have a shelved products folder. We have some things in the potential products folder that could happen this year. Some of them which I’m really excited about. What I’m really excited about is we’re finally settling into a rhythm of the company, which feels so good. We have certain people for certain things. We have the right people in place, and it feels like we’re settling into a much more strategic, sustainable place.