How Golden Pet Brands CEO Apu Mody Is Building an Employee-Owned Growth Engine

Golden Pet Brands CEO Apu Mody on Leadership in an Employee-Owned Company

When Apu Mody stepped into his role as CEO at Golden Pet Brands last year, there was one thing on his mind: purposeful business growth. 

Earlier this year, Golden Pet Brands acquired a Petsource pet food production facility in Nebraska, expanding to two U.S. manufacturing facilities and increasing production and operational control over its brand portfolio.

“You can imagine that it was a high-stakes decision but one that we knew was important to the future of the business,” Mody said.

For Mody, growth starts with alignment around the mission and vision. The leadership team then worked together to develop a company-wide strategic roadmap so every employee understands where the business is headed and how their work contributes to the mission.

“We review our goals every two weeks as a company and celebrate when we are achieving or overachieving on the goals we all set for the business,” Mody said.

As Golden Pet Brands scales, Mody is focused on prioritizing clear communication, recognizing employees’ hard work and generating excitement for the road ahead. 

Below, Mody shares more about his leadership philosophy, what collaboration at Golden Pet Brands looks like, and what excites him most about the company’s future. 

 

 

CEO Apu Mody’s Leadership Philosophy

In your current role, what — and who — do you lead?

I am responsible for enabling everyone who works at Golden Pet Brands to grow the business together. I’m responsible for ensuring the team understands our vision, our mission and our values. In addition, I work with a very talented leadership team that has developed a clear strategic roadmap for the business and is responsible for ensuring all of our employees understand the important role they play in our organization. Since all our employees are also owners, I work for them.

Share a recent decision that reflects your management style.

We recently completed our first acquisition as a company. You can imagine that it was a high-stakes decision but one that we knew was important to the future of the business. We debated upfront as a management team if this was the best path forward. While some team members thought building our own facility would be the better long-term solution, we agreed to let the facts guide the decision by visiting the site, evaluating the pros and cons, and determining a price that could make sense. I steered the majority of the negotiations while the team that was better equipped to do the due diligence did their work. We set an ambitious goal for ourselves on timing, and once we all had agreed to move forward, we managed the various stakeholders. The team led the entire diligence process, from legal and environmental to business and financial and the transition of employees, and got the acquisition done in less than two months! It’s important as a leader to understand that you need to bring others along with you on the journey and then enable them by getting out of their way and letting them do what they are best at.

 

“It’s important as a leader to understand that you need to bring others along with you on the journey and then enable them by getting out of their way and letting them do what they are best at.”

 

How does Golden Pet Brands set goals and track progress?

From day one, the leadership team established a focused growth strategy designed to align priorities and guide the company's next phase of growth. We broke this into a common set of objectives and goals we could share with the team. Each leader then worked with their teams to dive deeper and understand how this would influence their team priorities and develop measures that are clear to everyone and that we can hold ourselves accountable for. We review these goals every two weeks as a company and celebrate when we are achieving or overachieving these goals. If we are not on track, we talk through any learnings as well as what we need to do to get back on track.

 

How do you balance short-term delivery with long-term vision at Golden Pet Brands?

This is easier to say and much harder to do. We have short-term goals we have laid out for the teams, so it’s very easy to get focused on those. Some decisions to forego short-term goals are easier to make if it’s going to impact pets or one of our retail partners, or if it’s going to risk employee health and safety. We make decisions not just for today's results, but for the long-term health of the business. 

 

 

How Golden Pet Brands Handles Employee Recognition and Communication

How does your team celebrate wins or recognize contributions — formally or informally?

We believe recognition should be frequent and visible. Employees can celebrate one another through our informal Slack channels and peer-to-peer awards, and we regularly spotlight teams that have achieved great results through collaboration. When hosting our bi-weekly town hall meetings, those teams often share success stories. We also recognize outstanding performance across our creative, sales and manufacturing teams through monthly awards tied to specific preset goals. 

 

How are company-wide goals and team expectations communicated and reinforced throughout the year? What helps employees understand where Golden Pet Brands is headed?

We set our goals annually and then break them into quarterly department goals. As a company that is owned by its employees, we are transparent with our shareholders about our progress and results. During our bi-weekly town halls employees have the opportunity to stay informed, celebrate achievements, and foster open dialogue across the company. We also encourage managers to have frequent check-ins with their teams on quarterly priorities and progress we are making toward that. All of this comes together with our rewards philosophy, which is centered on making sure every employee is clear on what’s expected in their role, how that contributes to their department’s goals and ultimately how that contributes to the company’s objectives.

 

Golden Pet Brands’ Growth Trajectory

What excites you most about the team’s roadmap for the next year?

I think what’s most exciting is we are a team that really came together less than a year ago. We had to develop a vision, articulate our values, and build a strategic roadmap for the year. What’s been the most rewarding for me is to see how much excitement there is from our whole team around the vision and the mission for this business. I can see how people are collaborating and achieving strong results already. We’ve also had some unanticipated challenges; these are sometimes more interesting to see. I’ve watched our team lean in to attack the issue and look for solutions rather than point fingers and look for scapegoats. That has been encouraging, and while there is still a lot of work ahead of us, what excites me most is having a passionate, engaged team that is ready for it.

 

 

Frequently Asked Questions