Meet the UAE Founders on a Mission to Feed Pets Better
From one Saluki’s health struggles to a growing range of fresh meals, treats and functional nutrition, The K9 Kitchen began with a simple belief: pets deserve better.
For many pet parents, choosing what goes into their pet’s bowl can feel overwhelming. Ingredient lists are not always easy to understand, nutritional claims can be confusing and the number of feeding options continues to grow.
For Jan and Amy, the founders of The K9 Kitchen, those questions became deeply personal long before they became the foundation of a UAE pet-food brand.
Their journey began at home, with their own dogs and a desire to understand exactly what they were feeding them.
It started with one dog
More than 20 years ago, Jan’s Saluki, Sarhan, was struggling with recurring allergies and infections. She experienced itchy skin, chewed paws and areas where her coat would not grow back.
Jan tried different approaches, but nothing seemed to make a meaningful difference. Eventually, someone suggested changing Sarhan’s diet and exploring fresh feeding.
It was unfamiliar territory for Jan. As a lifelong vegetarian, preparing fresh, meat-based food for a dog was far outside her comfort zone. But when an animal you love is struggling, you become willing to reconsider what you know.
According to Jan, the change in Sarhan after moving to fresh food was remarkable. Her experience shaped a belief that has remained central to The K9 Kitchen ever since: food is more than something that fills a bowl—it can play an important role in a pet’s everyday health and long-term wellbeing.
What began with Sarhan gradually expanded to Jan’s other dogs. Friends became interested, more pet owners started asking questions and the idea behind The K9 Kitchen began to grow.
Meet the founders behind The K9 Kitchen
The K9 Kitchen is built around the complementary strengths of its two founders.
Jan leads the nutrition, recipe development and product side of the business. Her focus is on understanding ingredients and developing food that supports pets in a practical and meaningful way.
Amy leads the brand, customer experience and community. After helping to shape The K9 Kitchen behind the scenes while continuing her corporate career, she eventually stepped fully into the business and the shared mission behind it.
Together, they have developed The K9 Kitchen from a personal approach to feeding their own dogs into a homegrown UAE brand serving a wider community of pet parents.
One founder focuses on what goes into the bowl. The other helps pet parents understand the thinking behind it.
More than a raw dog-food company
Although The K9 Kitchen’s roots are in raw feeding, the brand has grown into a much broader pet-nutrition range.
Today, its products include raw and gently cooked meals, freeze-dried food, natural air-dried treats and functional nutrition such as toppers.
This variety reflects an understanding that there is no single feeding format that suits every household. Different pets have different needs, while pet parents also have different routines, lifestyles and levels of experience with fresh feeding.
By providing several formats, The K9 Kitchen aims to make it easier for pet parents to introduce better ingredients into their pets’ diets in a way that works for them—whether that means serving complete fresh meals, choosing the convenience of freeze-dried food or adding functional nutrition to an existing routine.
The brand remains primarily dog-focused, although selected treats, toppers and freeze-dried products are also suitable for cats.
Knowing what goes into the bowl
At the heart of The K9 Kitchen’s philosophy is a desire for greater transparency around what pets eat.
Its products are made using high-quality, human-grade ingredients in a municipality-approved commercial kitchen in the UAE. The food is manufactured in-house, allowing the team to remain closely involved in its production and quality.
Its recipes are developed with veterinary nutrition expertise and designed around recognised FEDIAF nutritional guidelines.
For Jan and Amy, maintaining control over the process is important. It allows them to stay connected to the ingredients, recipes and finished products rather than outsourcing the heart of the business.
Their approach is guided by a straightforward question: is this something they genuinely believe is right for the pet and the person feeding them?
That philosophy also means resisting the temptation to follow every new trend. The aim is to create products with a clear purpose rather than introducing something simply because it has become popular.
Made fresh in the UAE
The K9 Kitchen is proudly developed and produced in the Emirates.
Being a local manufacturer allows the brand to remain hands-on and close to its customers. It also gives the team the flexibility to listen to UAE pet parents, understand how they feed their animals and continue developing products for different needs and lifestyles.
The result is a product range that has evolved considerably from its raw-food beginnings while remaining connected to the reason the company was created.
Every meal, treat and topper still comes back to the same principle that first emerged through Jan’s experience with Sarhan: what pets eat matters.
From feeding pets to educating people
The K9 Kitchen’s mission now extends beyond making food.
Through founder-led education and initiatives such as its Pet People Partnership, the brand is developing content around pet nutrition, health, behaviour and the relationship between people and their animals.
The initiative includes educational conversations with pet professionals, including Dr Sarah Ramsey, co-owner of Dr Well Veterinary Clinic in Dubai. These bite-sized discussions are intended to make complex subjects easier for pet parents to understand and apply.
It represents a natural progression for the brand. The journey may have started by finding a different way to feed one dog, but it has grown into a wider effort to help pet parents make more informed decisions.
A personal philosophy that continues to guide the brand
The K9 Kitchen has expanded, its product range has evolved and more pet parents have joined its community. However, Jan and Amy’s central belief has remained unchanged.
The food must be something they would feel confident giving to their own pets.
That personal standard continues to guide how products are developed, how ingredients are selected and how the brand communicates with its customers.
What started at home with one dog has become a UAE-made pet-nutrition brand—but for Jan and Amy, it still comes back to the animals at the centre of it all.
Pets deserve better.
