Clarke Pet Opportunities (CPO) invests in brilliant entrepreneurs building companies to improve to the lives of pet parents.
We work with and invest in businesses with clearly defined differentiation looking for their long-term operational and strategic partner.
40+
years or Pet Care Industry Experience
Over
$300mm
value created in Pet Care companies
Over
20
engagements across M&A advisory, consulting and Growth Strategy.
*Numbers are aggregate for managers and employees while at prior or affiliated firms or from their own personal accounts. They are not the results of Clarke Pet Opportunities Fund I LP.
Investors and Operators
CPO brings together a group of some of the most successful operators and investors in the pet industry.
Clarke Capital creates a unique platform to help entrepreneurs and companies at many stages of their growth.
Mr. Clarke is the Chair of the Fund’s Sponsor, Clarke Pet Sponsor I, LLC, and the Fund’s General Partner, Clarke Pet GP I, LLC. Mr. Clarke is the Founder, CEO and Managing Partner of Clarke Capital Partners, a family office investment group. He currently serves on the Board of PetIQ (NSDQ:PETQ), where he Chairs the Nomination and Corporate Governance Committee. Mr. Clarke is the Governor appointed Vice Chair and Trustee of Utah Valley University, Utah’s largest university, with over 42,000 students. Mr. Clarke is a Founder at the Rollins Center of Entrepreneurship & Technology and Brigham Young University. He currently Chairs the Board of Directors of Brandless. Mr. Clarke was Founder and CEO of CLEARLINK, which was acquired by Pamlico and then Sykes (NSDQ:SYKE). Mr. Clarke is a graduate of the OPM program at Harvard Business School, has a master’s degree in Major Program Management from Oxford University and BA from Brigham Young University. Mr. Clarke is an active investor, mentor, board member and advisor.
Mr. Levin is a Member of the Fund’s General Partner, the CEO of the Fund’s Investment Manager, and on the Fund’s Investment Committee. Mr. Levin was the Chief Investment Officer for L2L Capital, a family office overseeing a private equity investment business focused on technology and financial services. He was also a portfolio manager for Monoceros, LP, a growth fund focused on private investments in late stage businesses. Mr. Levin founded Insured Capital Management (sold in 2009) and CIS Ventures, LLC. Mr. Levin is interim CEO of PetPremium, an online pet insurance platform, and was the President of PetAssistant, an online platform that helps us all be better pet parents. Mr. Levin currently serves on the Board of Pet Assistant Holdings.
We have lived through the experience of raising growth capital in the Pet Space and have seen the lack of options available from folks who really understand the category. It is fascinating to think that Pets—as an asset class—despite its immense growth, is still considered a sub-category of ‘consumer’ in the minds of most analysts and investors. This is about to change.
Today, we see exceptional entrepreneurs out there building meaningful companies against‘ access to capital’ odds. Yet, with the increasing importance of pets in a household and the change from “pet owner” to “pet parents”, consumer spending has and will continue to increase disproportionately to general consumer products growth.
With no end to this trendline increase, we intend to help bring more great products and services to the pet parent, so we have created Clarke Pet Opportunities.
CPO is the investor the pet world has been waiting for, built by people with an unmatched track record in pet.
We are operators first and investors second; the ideal partners to help build your dream business.
Welcome to CPO.
James Clarke, James Harrison, Rob Levin, Dustin Bertram and Aaron Hirschorn
Why Pets?
Pets are part of the family = Robust growth and economic resiliency
The Pet Parent is real and the effect on the market has been to bring new demand for products and services for our four-legged friends
Lack of Investment Options for growing Pet Businesses
Inadequate funding, combined with a lack of platforms to support them as they scale, remains a major obstacle to otherwise accessible growth.
High Levels of M & A = Attractive exit opportunities
We are the bridge that enables great entrepreneurs to build their businesses with the operational and financial resources to position them for the best possible outcome.
We are exclusively focused on, and dedicated to, helping pets, their owners and businesses making a difference in for pets and their owners.
Digitization, home delivery and personalized services
Local, sustainable, healthy products
Access to healthcare and insurance
Better for us as Investors,
Better for you as Companies
The CPO team has over 40 years of combined experience in the pet care industry as investors, operators, advisors and founders.
This experience across investing and operating in the pet sector gives us insights and connectivity that enables us to identify trends and opportunities before other investors.
In addition, we embrace and deeply understand the digital disruption in the Pet industry.
CPO provides immense value to our portfolio of companies as operators and investors
Leveraging the same model which provides us with the feedback needed to invest with conviction earlier than others, we can provide tremendous value to portfolio companies via hands on help and support.
We don’t just use a template of metrics to invest in companies, we utilize historical and real-time feedback from our portfolio companies.
Our combination of operator and investor expertise is unparalleled in this sector and positions us as the ‘go-to’ firm for early stage and trend setting businesses.
- Highly reputable track record
- Focus on long-term, high quality growth
- Digital Marketing and E-commerce know-how
- Strong Industry Relationships
Our advantage
CPO offers investors the potential to own businesses across the pet landscape. The structure of the fund and its operating partnerships creates a virtuous circle and a sustainable competitive advantage as companies benefit from access to capital and operating expertise to help them grow throughout their lifecycle.
Our team
Clarke Capital Team
Mr. Clarke is the Chair of the Fund’s Sponsor, Clarke Pet Sponsor I, LLC, and the Fund’s General Partner, Clarke Pet GP I, LLC. Mr. Clarke is the Founder, CEO and Managing Partner of Clarke Capital Partners, a family office investment group. He currently serves on the Board of PetIQ (NSDQ:PETQ), where he Chairs the Nomination and Corporate Governance Committee. Mr. Clarke is the Governor appointed Vice Chair and Trustee of Utah Valley University, Utah’s largest university, with over 42,000 students. Mr. Clarke is a Founder at the Rollins Center of Entrepreneurship & Technology and Brigham Young University. He currently Chairs the Board of Directors of Brandless. Mr. Clarke was Founder and CEO of CLEARLINK, which was acquired by Pamlico and then Sykes (NSDQ:SYKE). Mr. Clarke is a graduate of the OPM program at Harvard Business School, has a master’s degree in Major Program Management from Oxford University and BA from Brigham Young University. Mr. Clarke is an active investor, mentor, board member and advisor.
Mr. Harrison is a Manager of the Fund’s Sponsor and a member of the Fund’s Investment Committee. He is a Partner at Clarke Capital Partners, where he concentrates on the pet portfolio, including PetIQ, PetPremium and PetAssistant. Mr. Harrison is also a Director of Curza, Brandless, PX.com, and Pet Assistant Holdings. He was CEO of Contour prior to its sale. He founded Safeonline and Insurancewide, the first insurance aggregator in the UK, which revolutionized the industry. Mr. Harrison won UK e-commerce awards in 2003. Mr. Harrison is a graduate of the OPM program at Harvard Business School and received a BA Hons from Bristol University and graduated from Eton College.
Mr. Thayer is a Manager of the Fund’s Sponsor and COO of the Fund’s Investment Manager. He is also a Partner at Clarke Capital Partners focusing on deal execution, legal and compliance. Mr. Thayer was Founder and CEO of Unifylegal, an online platform that connects attorneys with clients. He was a Manager of Contour, acquired by a PE consortium. Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Mr. Thayer was Senior Counsel and Executive Director for Goldman Sachs International in its Investment Banking Division. He was also an Associate at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. Mr. Thayer has a JD and LLM from the Duke School of Law and a BA from Brigham Young University. Mr. Thayer fills various rolls in a number of other Clarke Capital businesses.
CPO Operating Team
Mr. Levin is a Member of the Fund’s General Partner, the CEO of the Fund’s Investment Manager, and on the Fund’s Investment Committee. Mr. Levin was the Chief Investment Officer for L2L Capital, a family office overseeing a private equity investment business focused on technology and financial services. He was also a portfolio manager for Monoceros, LP, a growth fund focused on private investments in late stage businesses. Mr. Levin founded Insured Capital Management (sold in 2009) and CIS Ventures, LLC. Mr. Levin is interim CEO of PetPremium, an online pet insurance platform, and was the President of PetAssistant, an online platform that helps us all be better pet parents. Mr. Levin currently serves on the Board of Pet Assistant Holdings.
Mr. Hirschhorn is a Member of the Fund’s General Partner and a Managing Director of the Fund’s Investment Manager. Mr. Hirschhorn is a successful entrepreneur in the pet industry. He was Founder and CEO of DogVacay, backed by Benchmark Capital with over $100M of sales, it merged with Rover.com which is now a $1B pet services company. Mr. Hirschhorn is also Founder and interim CEO of Gallant, which focuses on stem cell banking and regenerative medicine for pets and was featured on Shark Tank and backed by Maveron and other industry leaders. With a background in growth and venture capital, Mr. Hirschhorn is an active investor, advisor, and board member in the pet industry.
Mr. Bertram is a Managing Director of the Fund’s Investment Manager. Prior to joining Clarke Pet Opportunities, Mr. Bertram spent the last nine years advising companies globally on over $100B of M&A transactions as well as IPOs, capital raising, investor relations and a variety of other corporate finance matters. Most recently, he led coordination and coverage of the pet care industry globally at Morgan Stanley as an Executive Director in the Consumer & Retail team where he advised on Mars’ $9.1B acquisition of VCA, Inc, Procter & Gamble's $200B proxy fight defense against Nelson Peltz, and an IPO of the largest veterinary care chain in China. Prior to Morgan Stanley, Mr. Bertram worked in the M&A team at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Mr. Bertram has an MBA from the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business and B.S. in Finance and Accounting from the University of Central Florida.
Target Companies
Premier Destination for High Quality Companies in the Pet Space.
Companies benefit from:
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Access to capital
-
Digital marketing and e-commerce know-how
-
Strong industry relationships
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Deep management relationships / resources
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Structuring expertise
-
Operational improvement expertise
Until now there has never been an investor with the kind of expertise and focus on the pet industry that CPO brings.
Are you passionate about your business, pets and pet parents and have a differentiated product or service that is on track to achieve at least $5mm in revenues?
We would love to hear from you…
……..though we will be surprised if we don’t know who you are already….☺
Welcome to CPO.
Our Competitive Advantage
CPO Leverages the Combined Knowledge and Experience to Drive Value Creation for Portfolio Companies and a Competitive Advantage for CPO.
Transactional Expertise
- Growth
- Carve-outs
- Acquisitions
- Buyout
- IPO
Pet Industry Expertise
- Food
- Digital
- Care
- Insurance
- Wellness
- Rx
SEO Optimization
- SEO Optimization
- Subscription Commerce
- Digital Engagement
- Physical Product Development
- Brand & Content Development
- SEM
Contact Us
Headquartered in Provo, Miami and New York.
