Material World

Dave's Soda and Pet City

151 Springfield St.
Agawam, MA
(413) 786-3339

Various locations

www.davessodaandpetcity.com

As the legend goes, Dave's Soda and Pet City was born in the 1970s, headquartered in the bay of an empty gas station. Of course, the earliest Dave's store didn't cater much to pets and their owners—unless they drank soda. When Dave Ratner opened in first store in 1975, it was called Dave's Soda City. It wasn't until 1978 that he saw the growing potential of the pet food market and, being a free-thinking sort with a penchant for quirky but effective marketing, decided to tweak the company name a bit and set off to conquer two barely overlapping markets. Today Dave's is a mini-chain of regional superstores with an enormous pawprint in the pet food market. In fact, while Dave still sells a little soda, his pet-related business has grown and broadened and now serves not just the needs of pet owners, but of backyard farmers raising, say, chickens or ducks, too.