Embrace Pet Insurance Blog

Happy Fifth Birthday to Embrace Pet Insurance!

Happy Birthday to Embrace! This day five years ago, we sold our first policy to me and my cat Lily.

I distinctly remember when we got the go-ahead from our underwriters at the time, Lloyd's of London, and since I was out of the office on that day, I phoned in to purchase our first policy.

We'd been training our first 2 Embracers, Chris and Lea, on the phones by having people (including my mom) randomly call in to pretend to buy a policy so I didn't tell Lea, who happened to answer the phone this time around, that this was a "live" purchase until the end of the call. It was a giddy feeling for all of us when I told her to put through my real credit card info and really buy the policy.

A lot has changed since we sold that first policy but we remember our humble start fondly. We now have 24 Embracers, plus we're about to hire another 2. We broke even in June of this year and have insured thousands of cats and dogs and paid out millions in claim reimbursement. It feels really good to get to where we are now.

Here are some photos of the last 5 years at Embrace - do you have any fond memories of Embrace over the years you'd like to share? 

 

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BZTAT turns the Embrace Pet Insurance offices into an art gallery

I just love it when a path that most likely would end without any particular direction turns out to be the start of an amazing experience.

That random-walk-turned-new-adventure is what happened recently at Embrace.

The start:

• Blogpaws - I went to both Blogpaws pet blogging conferences in 2010 and made a lot of new blogging friends
• BZTAT - a pet blogger and pet-focused artist also went to both Blogpaws conferences and she also made a lot of new blogging friends
• a silent auction of pet art - I happened to buy several pieces from a silent auction at Blogpaws, which was organized by Vicki Boatright - aka BZTAT
• this led to a nice online relationship, probably one of many such relationships we both made at the confrences.

Now if it was just that, the path might have wandered on without direction.

The development:

But then me visiting Vicki's paint-a-thon to raise money for her local rescue organization in Canton OH led to Vicki coming up to Cleveland for lunch with me to pick my brains on the business side of her world.

And the kicker? A stray comment from Alex when he met Vicki in the office about turning Embrace into an art gallery seemed to tweak something in both our brains and the idea of the BZTAT Gallery at the Embrace offices fell into place.

What felt so right about this (apart from the fact that we love BZTAT art!) is that "Community and Environment" is one of Embrace's core values. Specifically:

We are passionate about making an impact on the pet world. We are committed to serving both the pet community at large & our own communities at home. We respect our environment & recycle, reuse, & reduce our waste wherever & whenever we can.

So this step makes total sense in all ways. Watch this space for news of BZTAT and Embrace in the near future.

And in the meantime, you can have help the pet community yourself by buying a piece of art from BZTAT.

Go on, you know you want one!

The new and improved Embrace Wellness Rewards program

Since introducing the Embrace Wellness Rewards program in 2009, we've been loving the attention our Embraced pet parents have been giving it. Many people love the program and have given us lots of feedback on how to improve it, particularly increasing the limit and giving us a laundry list of items to add to it.

So, as part of our recent insurance product changes, we took the opportunity to make a few changes to the Wellness program as follows:

• we have added nail trimming, anal gland expression, gastropexy, and umbilical hernia repair to the Wellness Rewards plan
• we moved the dental cleanings out of the Wellness Rewards coverage into the new Dental Rewards coverage so the dental illness prevention and coverage were in one place (just like human dental coverage) - more details in a post coming later this week
• in addition to the $200 Wellness Rewards coverage level, we now have Wellness Rewards Plus with a $400 limit. This will help those pet parents who live in an area with high veterinary costs (like NY and LA) or those with a lot of routine visits to the vet
  • Rewards Plus covers the same as the basic Wellness Rewards coverage but with a higher limit and also adds prescription diet food and OFA and PennHIP examinations.
• for costs, see the flyer below

 
I think most people are going to find something here to please their budget.

Related Posts - move to RLI
Embrace pet insurance policies finally move over to RLI!
Embrace moves 12 more states to RLI
Embrace has a new insurance partner - A+ rated RLI Corp
What the new Embrace / RLI partnership means for you - new terms and conditions
PennHIP Pet Insurance Discount now available at Embrace Pet Insurance
The new and improved Embrace Wellness Rewards program
Anyone interested in some Embrace Dental Rewards? Pick me, pick me!
Embrace Continuing Care Sublimits are gone!
Other interesting changes in the Embrace Pet Insurance policies

Great example of using your Embrace Wellness Rewards benefits

Over at the Embrace Pet Community blog, Lea recently posted about going online to save some money for her flea and tick preventative medication for Lyger.

It was so easy to squeeze out the most benefit from her wellness budget by shopping online (muchos dollares saved there) and by using the Embrace wellness plan (spreads the cost out over the year and saved $21!).

I like this bit best though :) :

And, since I use Embrace's Wellness Rewards program, to cover Lyger's checkups, vaccines, and preventative meds (even meds bought online) I'll be reimbursed $200 for today's costs!

Check out the rest here: Saving money on flea and tick medication

New Embrace friend alert - PetRelocation.com

New friend alert! PetRelocation.com (this is what happens when you hang out too much on Twitter!) 

If you have ever left the US or Canada to go to Europe with a pet, it's worse than trying to get your own paperwork in order. The rules aren't particularly clear, the airlines are some help but not particularly enthusiastic, and you have that awful feeling as you look out the window on the plane whether they will turn your family pet away at the other end because you overlooked some nuance.

In my prior life many moons ago (pre-kids, pre-MBA, pre-Embrace), I worked at a large life and health insurance company in Toronto, Canada. At the time, I was an actuarial student and lucky enough to get an internal job posting to Dublin, Ireland, which I jumped at. There was just one problem - what to do with my cat Simon?

At the time, there was a 6-month quarantine period for cats and dogs (to prevent rabies reaching the British Isles) and so if you took your pet across the pond, he or she had to wait at the border for half a year before rejoining you. When faced with such a long time in some sort of government pet facility (I'm afraid that however nice it is, my imagination really went wild on that one), I balked at the option and luckily some relatives took Simon into their home while I was abroad.

Now the rules have changed (it's a bit round about but you bring your pet into the UK under the new Pet Travel Scheme and then take it into Ireland) but I must say, if I was to ship a pet abroad while working for another company, I'd hire professional pet shippers.

Since I didn't look at the option all those years ago, I didn't really know much about pet shippers until I was on Twitter (@laurabennett) and bumped into Pet Relocation over there. We got talking and now PetRelocation is one of our most interesting affilate sites.

Since becoming acquainted with PetRelocation.com, I wondered what it would be like if I was moving to Ireland today: how would I do it; how much would it cost; what would be involved? Over at their website, I was quite surprised to find a ready list of most countries you might ever want to move to (and some you might not) and detailed requirements of what you need to do to get from here to there. Here's the page for Ireland.

Now why would a pet shipping company give you all the information so you could do it yourself? Because now you can see how involved the process can be. If you want to do it yourself, you can, but if you find it a little bit daunting (and it's not something you want to mess up either), you can get help from someone who knows what they are doing.

Anyway, it's a great place to start if you are researching moving your pet. Pet Relocation is a nifty example of how a small but focused company can get the job done well.

Shipping within the US starts at $1,000 and overseas starts at $2,500 so it's not cheap but it sure does take the worry out of shipping your loved ones to your new home. I've just put a quote in for my "move" to Ireland so I'll let you know how much that turns out to be.

P.S. If you are moving, you can get a 10% discount off PetRelocation's services over at the Embrace Pet Community in the services section.

Support our small pet-related businesses: waggintails

 

I've followed Waggintails for 5 years now. John Gigliotti, the founder, is really passionate about quality foods (read healthy and safe) for pets and has an exceptional online business that satisfies that niche admirably.

So, I was moved to action when I received the email below:

Dear Friend

I lost a good customer the other day. 

I was out of what the product needed, and she was able to find someone else that had it.  “I can’t keep my dogs waiting,” she emailed me.  

She had been with me for three years.  It hurts.

It hurts because I’ve built my whole business on always going the extra mile for my customers and trying hard to earn your loyalty.  And right now, with the economy slumping and with so many of our suppliers hurting, too, it just isn’t possible to always deliver the ship times you’ve come to expect.  I know that puts everyone in a difficult situation.  You can’t feed your dogs and cats apologies.

I could explain it all, but I’m sure you don’t want to hear it.  You may even be hurting, too.  In fact, if you’re feeling the slowdown in your own life or business, you definitely have my empathy. 

I just hope we can get through this together.  I can’t afford to lose another good customer at times like these. 

I wish I could promise things will be better next week or next month, but I don’t want to make a promise I can’t keep.  All I can say is, I will continue to do everything I my power to serve you, just as I always have.    

My values haven’t changed, and I know yours haven’t either.   I still sell only products that are good and healthy for pets.  And nothing matters more to my than your pets’ health, and your satisfaction.

There is one thing you can do to help.  If you can place your orders with some extra lead time during these difficult times, it would be very much appreciated.  I don’t want your pets to go hungry or have to switch brands.  And I definitely don’t want to lose another good customer.

With sincere thanks for your business — and your patience,  

John Gigliotti

So if you care about quality pet foods and small business in the US, please visit the Waggintails website.

Better yet, visit the Embrace Pet Community website first and get 10% off non-sale items by clicking through the Featured Partner field top right. We get nothing for your click except the satisfaction that a good business is being supported by people who care.

What do you think of John's email above?

The Embrace Pet Community giveaways

Make sure to check out the Embrace Pet Community's blog for our first giveaway on behalf of Paws to Save Pets.

Some pretty cool collars and a Merck/Merial Manual for Pet Health are up for grabs - check out the blog post for details on how to get your free stuff.

Happy dog adoption story

Last year, Lea found a dog at Case Western University that needed a home and I blogged about it in the hopes we would find someone to adopt her (North-east Ohio area dog and some kittens needing homes). Nugget was a small but loving pit bull mix that had been on the streets for a while and needed a caring home to go to.

Lea did find a home for Nugget and has posted an update over at the Embrace Pet Community blog on how she's doing. Nugget lucked out and has a wonderful grandma who loves her enough to send a letter to Lea from Nugget saying how she's doing.

I do love a happy adoption story to kick off my day. Warm and fuzzy all over.

Check out the update in Lea's post Happy Story from our foster friend, Nugget.

Shopping made easy for your favorite dogs and cats

In case you haven't seen it yet, there's a companion blog to this one that's all about shopping for your cats and dogs over at the Embrace Pet Community. Lea features something unique and interesting every day so you'll want to be a regular reader to get the most from it. You can subscribe via email or your blog reader.

In addition, the pet community has many partnerships where you can get deals as a member, such as freebies from Wysong, discounts from Pup Life and many more.

Especially now that Christmas is coming up and there are so many four-legged friends to buy for, start early.

How Embrace got its name

I tell this story a lot when I'm talking about Embrace and thought you'd like to hear it too...

It was July 2003 and Alex and I had just founded our new pet insurance company out of the pet insurance team that won the Wharton Business Plan Competition in April 2003. We sat around some coffee in the Au Bon Pain cafe at Wharton and we brainstormed all sorts of what we thought were clever and original names:

• Savannah Pet Insurance (hmmm, images of mint juleps and muggy nights on the front porch)
• Magenta Pet Insurance (female oriented - not quite pink but nearly)
• Casanova Pet Insurance (don't ask - the coffee must have been spiked)
• Merrylegs Pet Insurance (a Dicken's character's dog)
• Marigold Pet Insurance (a lovely flower and we all love flowers)

And then we set up a survey in Surveymonkey and passed it on to all the pet parents we knew and asked them to forward to their friends.

Well, as you might imagine, the results were not too stellar. I think the highest score was no more than 2.5 out of 5 - not very encouraging at all. But the message from the write-in comments was that we reflect the emotional bond between pet parent and pet. Alex and I looked at each other and Alex said, I dunno, how about Embrace? and I helpfully added "Angel", both of which we grimaced at - how touchy feely they were!

So we resurveyed with Embrace Pet Insurance and Angel Pet Insurance and wouldn't you know it, Embrace blew away the competition. I think the average was something in the high 4's - it was unanimous, Embrace Pet Insurance was our new name.

I have to admit, I was a bit dismayed and should I say a little bit embarrassed to tell people what the new name was for the first couple of days but I got back such a powerfully positive response, it didn't take long for me to love the name and realize how well it works.

From the dictionary:

embrace em·brace [ em bráyss ]

verb (past and past participle em·braced, present participle em·brac·ing, 3rd person present singular em·brac·es)
Definition:

1. transitive and intransitive verb hug somebody: to hug somebody in your arms affectionately or passionately, or hug each other affectionately or passionately
2. transitive verb make use of something: to welcome and take advantage of something eagerly or willingly embrace an opportunity
3. transitive verb adopt something: to adopt or take up something, especially a belief or way of life embraced free-market economics
4. transitive verb comprise something: to include something as part of a whole a new electoral district embracing both suburban and urban areas
5. transitive verb surround something: to surround or enclose something ( literary ) ( often passive )

noun (plural em·brac·es)

Definition: warm hug: an affectionate or passionate hug [14th century. < Old French embracer "take into your arms" < Latin bracchium "arm"]

em·brace·able adjective
em·brace·ment noun
em·brac·er noun

It's perfect in all ways don't you think?

So the lesson we learned is to ask our customers their advice when it comes to big decisions. We've been steered right so far.