In case you missed the latest news in the Pet Store sector, Petco announced they are taking aggressive steps to reshape its retail footprint in 2025 by closing dozens of underperforming stores. The company announced plans to shutter up to 30 stores this year, following 25 closures in 2024, as part of a broader effort to streamline operations and adapt to evolving consumer shopping behavior. Under the direction of new CEO Joel Anderson, the company is leaning into a leaner, more efficient retail model by exiting locations that no longer meet performance expectations. 

During the same period, PetSmart only closed 11 stores, with no plans or announcements to close any stores in 2025. We were curious as to why Petco had taken this sudden move so we took a closer look at the data from our vendor Placer.AI, and the numbers are telling an interesting story. Year-over-year store traffic increased for 2024 for both brands, with Petco outperforming PetSmart in year-over-year (YoY) visits since January 2024. Both brands finished off Q1 with minor YoY visit lags of 0.8% and 2.8%, respectively. But in May, visits to the two brands began to pick up – with Petco experiencing a 3.7% YoY foot traffic boost and PetSmart seeing a slight uptick of 0.6%. On a global level, PetSmart drew more overall visits between January and May 2024, with 62.1% of total foot traffic going to the two category leaders, while Petco drew 37.9% (source. Placer.AI)

The closures reflect a growing trend present across retail stores as brands look to reduce their brick-and-mortar exposure in favor of hybrid and digital-first models. However, we don’t see any particular reasons for concern in 2025 when looking at the two leaders in the pet store sector. Our research tells us that the pet ownership is at the highest levels it had ever been in US, with 1 in every 5 households owning a pet in 2024; we also saw the fastest increase in pet ownership occurring post Covid, taking us from 67% to 70% of the total population now owning a pet, and given that pets have 8-15 year holding cycle, we don’t see any cause for concern in the foreseeable future.   

To read more on the traffic paterns for both brands, visit link at Placer.Ai here – https://www.placer.ai/blog/petco-and-petsmart-a-head-to-head