Seventeen Years of SmartPak, Uckele, and Growth

Smart Start on Supplements

Before the SmartPak Customer Care Team members ever pick up a phone, they go through extensive training on equine health, wellness, digestion, nutrition and more. This is just as true now as it was seventeen years ago when I started! Back then, I was one of the only Customer Care SmartPakers without an Equine Science degree, and our coursework was extra important to me.

Our lessons were taught over 12 weeks by the SmartPak Staff Veterinarian and heavily focused on learning all about ingredients and supplements. The courses were designed to encourage a really complete understanding on how individual ingredients worked together in a product to support horse health and paired together with trainings from supplement companies we worked with to give us a really solid foundation to best support our customers and fellow riders.

#1 Uckele Fan

I remember in my first year on Customer Care, a representative from Uckele came out to train us on their supplements. She was incredibly kind and passionate about their supplements – we learned about their human, equine and canine supplements. What I remember most though is how thoughtfully designed and well-researched their products were and that's where my appreciation for their formulas began. Almost immediately after the training with the Uckele rep I ordered a gallon of Cocosoya and added Tri Amino to my horse’s SmartPaks and since then all of my horses have been on those two supplements. Over the years I've expanded my Uckele products to include the GUT Pellets, Tri Amino, and Cocosoya Ultra SP (Cocosoya in SmartPaks). It's been fun to share my successes and personal recommendations for Uckele products with other horse owners throughout my journey at SmartPak from my start on Customer Care, to Marketing, to our Barns Team and now with our retailers.

A Perfect Union

In August 2022, SmartPak acquired Uckele Health & Nutrition’s equine brand and as a longtime SmartPaker and Uckele fan I was excited! With the acquisition of Uckele Health & Nutrition Equine brand supplements, we combined two brands of powerful, research-backed supplements and get to continue to offer these beloved products to our fellow horse owners and riders. It's been a great journey to bring all of their products into our fold, but we knew the growth of SmartPak and Uckele wasn't going to stop there.

Finding New Uckele Fans

In 2023 SmartPak started our journey on expanding our offerings, moving off of the internet and into the retail space, selling products directly to tack, feed, and supply stores. Simultaneously, my role started to shift from focusing on our partnerships with barns to partnering with these retailers and collaborating with them to put our products on their shelves. Nearly two and a half years later we're now actively partnering with many major retailers as well as a growing number of small, family-owned tack shops and feed stores. Seventeen years later I'm still talking about supplements, ingredients, and sharing a brand that creates some of the most thoughtful products on the market!