JANUARY 2026

Hello hello everyone, this was supposed to be my new year note and if everything had worked according to plan, you would have already received this… but at the end of December our 3yr old golden (Blanca) went in full heat/estrus… and let me tell you, living on a school bus with Kingsley, our 3yr old GSD gunning for some action and Blanca flagging like it was going out of style, suddenly became “not a lot of fun” - I wasn’t able hear myself think for 2 weeks with all the whining and horny noises they were making! Fortunately they aren’t like that all the time.

2025 was our first calendar year living on the bus and, I’ve been thinking about what makes this whole thing work. Not the bus (though she’s held up remarkably well for 45,000 miles), but Austin and Kat. It’s not our products (although we are very proud of everything we make!). It’s not our relationships with retailers and customers. It’s not even the cute brand we’ve poured our hearts in to create. It’s the people. And I’m grateful to have such a cool crew alongside me.

  • florida campsites = amazon delieveries!

  • post surgery... limited to one dog at a time

  • the dogs taking us for a morning walk

  • I work, blanca looks for seals on the 101

First there’s the product team (Brayton, Ericka, Kristin, Maria, Zach)... I’m usually still in my pajamas on the bus somewhere when the production team show up at 5am every day to turn the recipes into the products your dogs and cats have come to trust. As you know, we make every product by hand at our very own “makery” in Seattle and I’ll be honest in saying that keeping a manufacturing facility whirring away while we’re away on the road has its challenges, but it’s worth it to know that everything we do is done… properly. And without the amazing team back in Seattle, it wouldn’t be possible.

Then there’s our small but mighty sales, education, and customer experience/support folk (Emily, Lilly, and me!) who ensure that people know why we use Longvida optimized curcumin, for example, and not just a (much) cheaper copy.

Our digital team (Aracely, Alex), makes the website look even better than I thought possible, and in finance is Simone, who makes sure everything ends up in all the right places. And Tim talks about AI all day, helps out everywhere, and never gets in the way 😉

  • waiting patiently to get back on the bus

  • keeping active while enjoying a great view

  • blanca and harper making full use of our sofa

  • not-so-stealth street camping in Seattle

And me? I get to talk to customers like you, which is always rewarding especially when we get to leave you with a healthier, happier, and calmer pet. I also get to visit retailers like Four Muddy Paws in St. Louis where this fall I did a staff training so they can help customers find exactly what their pets need. I get to listen in on the conversations about what ingredients actually work, and hear the stories first hand from customers who are so grateful they’ve been able to help their pet. Those moments remind me why we do this. Every store visit this year has been like that - real people caring about real pets.

But without you I never would have started Austin and Kat. You believed in me, and my search for the best hemp extracts. You’ve watched our quirky handmade brand through our changing packaging and non-stop ingredient talk! From me to you - I’m grateful for all the support, your comments/emails/reviews, the recommendations and intros to stores, and especially the photos you send in. Thank you.

I’m grateful for the chance to live on the road and explore with our dogs. With modern technology Tim and I are able to stay in touch with the business while the pups are running up and down unexplored hillsides each morning, all four of them tearing through the open space like they were born for it. But there are also the days stuck inside 300 square feet when the weather turns - and we’ve had plenty of those this winter, all of us piled up waiting out the rain. Kingsley paces. Blanca sulks. Harper pants. Austin just finds his spot and waits it out. And then the rain stops and we pile back on the bus and they ALL shake at once and I lose what’s left of my sanity.

Last year we drove east from New Mexico to Key West, then all the way up the eastern coast on US-1 to Maine (which was amazing!), before turning left and driving all the way along US-2 from the upper peninsula of Michigan through the vastness of North Dakota and Montana, and all the way to Seattle. Then south on the 101 to the worst storms in California at the end of 25… and now we find ourselves in the CA/AZ desert, armed with a plan to slow things down for a couple months so we can get our heads down for some product launches!

See, in 2026 we’re launching more new products than we launched in all of 2024 and 2025 combined! We’re starting with extending our mushroom products - we already source all our fungi from M2 Mushrooms out of SoCal and are, without doubt, the nerdiest mycologists you’ll ever meet that just so happened to grow the best organic mushrooms right here in the US. From a functional mushrooms lens, they are doing things that nobody else is, and we’ll be launching Lion’s Mane, Turkey Tail, Harper’s Mushroom Medley powders (all in recyclable tubs!) plus some new mushroom tinctures. We’ve a super high EPA/DHA fish oil with astaxanthin, a new KSM66 powder, and we’re upgrading the curcumin extracts for hips and joints. And that’s just the first 4 months.

2026 is going to be a good one. Stick around. And if you see a purple bus in Cali/Arizona with lots of dogs hanging out the window, then wave or say hi.

~kat 💜🐾

  • 2026 = more exploring ☀️🗺️

  • dog free for a run in NH on a dreary August day!

  • we hit LA during a shocking cold snap – dogs didn't care

  • A&K dog patrol in action around the SF bay
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