Our Story

The Petfood Consumer Rights Council was founded by a guy named Daniel Schulof.

Daniel wears a few different professional hats, all within the petcare world. (Here’s his LinkedIn profile.) He’s the author of this 2016 book about companion animal nutrition. He’s the resident expert on this podcast. He gives talks about veterinary nutritional science topics at conferences and media events. He’s also a lawyer who has successfully sued petfood companies for deceptive advertising and other malfeasance.

And he’s the founder and CEO of a startup pet food company called KetoNatural Pet Foods.

Huh? Yup, you read that right.

We think you should trust us anyway. Why? In short, because the PCRC was Daniel’s idea but he intentionally designed it to be completely outside of his control. The PCRC is accountable to one group and one group only: its members. Because that is the only way it can authentically pursue its mission.

There are two ways that individuals can control organizations like this one: directly, through their ownership/voting rights (like when the CEO of a company owns most of the company’s shares) and indirectly, through their outsized financial influence (like when a corrupt politician’s campaign is funded primarily by a corporate benefactor).

Rules baked into our bylaws and other formative documents (go here to read them yourself) prevent Daniel (and anyone else) from exerting either of these forms of control over the PCRC. In fact, there are six distinct rules in place to do this job:

(1)

According to our bylaws, our highest-level leadership (our Board of Directors) is selected by member vote, not appointment. The Board sets our agenda and makes all other key strategic decisions, including selecting officers and other day-to-day operations staff. And Daniel doesn’t choose our Directors, they’re elected by a majority vote of our members.

(2)

Each of our members (including Daniel) gets one vote. In the case of for-profit companies (and many non-profits too), a single individuals can hold the majority of the company’s shares or other voting interests. So it doesn’t matter what other shareholders want because they can’t outweigh the vote of the majority shareholder. That’s not how the PCRC works. In our organization all members get just one vote, including Daniel.

(3)

We limit how much any one individual can give to our organization. No one, including Daniel, can donate more than $1,000 per year. This means that we can never become beholden to a single wealthy benefactor. Small-money donors only, just like political candidates such as Bernie Sanders.

(4)

We prohibit financial contributions from organizations. All donors and members must certify that they are individual pet-owners, not representatives acting on behalf of a for-profit company.

(5)

We require all candidates for the Board and other high-level leadership to make in-depth conflicts of interest disclosures. So our members will always know if they’re electing people who might be inclined to place their personal interests ahead of the organization’s.

(6)

As a registered 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization, our financial records are subject to public review/audit. Our members will always be able to understand where our funds come from and how they are being used.

—-

Collectively, these rules are designed to prevent the PCRC from ever being controlled by any single individual or small, powerful group, regardless of whether that is Daniel Schulof, KetoNatural Pet Foods, the Illuminati, or Kermit the Frog. We are beholden to our members, period.

As the founder of the PCRC, Daniel’s role in running our day-to-day operations is limited to the ramp-up period prior to the election of our first slate of Directors. (The best analogy here is an airplane: Daniel is charged with getting the plane off the ground, but once it is airborne its pilots and flight plan are to be chosen entirely by the passengers.)

We anticipate that those elections will take place 90 days after our formal launch on Giving Tuesday (11/29) of 2022. No key decisions about how we spend our time, money, or effort, will be made prior to this point — all we are doing is raising money from donors so that our Directors can make decisions about how to spend it once they are elected.

One last thing: if you think there’s something else we can do to ensure that the PCRC independently and authentically pursues its mission, you should speak up. As a member, you have exactly the same amount of power as Daniel to modify our bylaws!