Nestlé Purina Collaboration Makes Behaviour Change Simple
Posted by Marketing & PR on 2 Apr 2025
Helping a dog maintain a healthy weight isn’t just about measuring food. It’s about the small daily decisions owners make and the habits that stick over time. Behaviour change is at the centre of this, and it’s where science can make a real difference.
Owners often know that extra treats or reduced walks can be detrimental to dog health, but without the right framework and support, it’s easy for old habits to creep back. That’s why this project set out to turn proven behaviour change theory into something simple and usable for every household.
The University of Sheffield team, led by Professor Thomas Webb, worked in partnership with Perfect Circle to base the health pack on the COM-B model, a proven framework for changing human behaviour. COM-B stands for Capability, Opportunity and Motivation.
For an owner, that might mean:
- Having the capability to assess their dog’s weight and portion food correctly
- Having the opportunity to walk the dog more often or swap treats for play
- Finding the motivation to keep going because they understand the health benefits
Perfect Circle developed a suite of concepts for intervention tools that could support owners across these three areas, which Professor Webb and his team then reviewed and analysed for behavioural rigour.
These concepts were subsequently tested with owners and vets to refine their usability and effectiveness. The beauty of this model is that it doesn’t just tell people what to do; it helps them understand why they behave the way they do and how to make lasting adjustments.
Tools that bring theory to life
The health pack was designed to bring these principles into everyday life. It contains:
- A Body Condition Score guide
- A journal to track food, exercise and progress
- A calorie infographic for treats
- Care cards to handle challenges like begging at the table
- A collar tag as a daily prompt
Owners reported that these tools made it easier to take action. They changed how much they fed, reduced high-calorie treats, increased walks and introduced more play. These aren’t dramatic changes, but they add up over time and improve both physical health and quality of life.
The role of collaboration
Nestlé Purina wanted this project to follow a peer reviewed, scientific and social marketing approach that could deliver positive health outcomes in dogs and was the first of its kind in this field. Perfect Circle was chosen for our specialist expertise in social marketing and behavioural change, with a track record of translating complex behavioural theory into tools that feel practical, engaging and effective in everyday life.
Working alongside the University of Sheffield and Purina, we helped to ideate and shape the tools within the pack, ensuring they were useful, usable and designed with owners’ real-world needs in mind. Co creation sessions with owners and vets played a vital role in testing and refining the concepts, ensuring the final resources were both acceptable and capable of influencing genuine behaviour change.
Crucially, the packs were distributed by vets when they identified that a health intervention was required to reduce a dog’s obesity. Their authority and trusted relationship with owners provided validation and credibility, greatly increasing the likelihood that the tools would be used and acted upon. With Purina’s support in testing and production, the project has bridged the gap between academic research and real-world application, creating a solution that is both effective and scalable.
Why it matters
When applied with empathy and creativity, it can make a real difference in people’s homes. For dogs, that means healthier lives.
For owners, it means peace of mind that they’re doing the best for their pets. For vets, it means having a tool to support conversations about weight that are often sensitive and difficult.
Behaviour change starts with small steps, and the right tools make help those small steps become repeatable habits. By blending science with social marketing, we’ve shown that such everyday habits can be reshaped for the better. That’s the power of collaboration with Nestlé Purina and the University of Sheffield.
Next in the series, we move from theory to evidence. We share the pilot results to show how owners and vets used the dog obesity health pack in practice and the measurable changes it created.
You can read the full paper here
If you’d like to discuss your next social marketing campaign, get in touch.
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