Kennel Connection adds Cantara partnership for sale advisory
Bottom line
Kennel Connection has announced a strategic partnership with Cantara Pet Advisors, a boutique advisory firm focused on helping pet resort operators prepare their businesses for sale and improve valuation. The arrangement gives Kennel Connection’s client base a referral path to Cantara for sale-readiness consulting and transaction advisory, while Cantara will also provide informal market insight to Kennel Connection and parent company 100GROUP. Kennel Connection said it supports more than 5,500 pet care locations in the U.S., extending the reach of the partnership well beyond a narrow software integration play. (kpaxtv.marketminute.com)
Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, especially those connected to boarding, daycare, grooming, or hybrid care-and-lodging businesses, the announcement is another sign that exit planning is becoming a more formalized part of the pet services market. Cantara positions itself specifically around pet resort transactions, with services tied to sale readiness, EBITDA presentation, and buyer outreach, reflecting a market where operational data, leadership depth, and growth capacity can influence valuation well before a business goes to market. That matters for practice leaders because adjacent pet care businesses are increasingly being evaluated with the same sophistication seen in veterinary consolidation and other healthcare services. (cantarapet.com)
What to watch: Watch for whether Kennel Connection turns this into a broader advisory ecosystem for clients, and whether more software vendors serving pet care and veterinary-adjacent operators add exit-planning or M&A support partnerships. (kennelconnection.com)
Kennel Connection is moving beyond software with a new strategic partnership aimed at one of the biggest decisions a pet care business can face: selling. The company said October 13, 2026, that it has partnered with Cantara Pet Advisors to give pet care facility operators access to specialized sale-readiness consulting and business sale advisory, framing the move as a way to help operators prepare for market and maximize value. (kpaxtv.marketminute.com)
The partnership fits with Kennel Connection’s broader positioning as more than a scheduling or facility-management platform. Kennel Connection traces its roots to 1994 and is now part of 100GROUP, which says it owns and operates multiple business software brands, including Kennel Connection, Hello-Groom, and PawLoyalty. Over the past several years, Kennel Connection has emphasized growth, platform expansion, and closer alignment with business performance for pet care operators, including after its earlier combination with PawLoyalty. (kennelconnection.com)
The immediate change is straightforward: Kennel Connection clients now have a dedicated referral relationship with Cantara if they’re considering a sale, preparing for one, or trying to improve the business metrics that buyers tend to reward. According to the announcement, Cantara will also act as an informal industry advisor to Kennel Connection and 100GROUP on market conditions and strategy. Cantara describes its work as focused specifically on pet resort owners, with offerings spanning consulting for owners who may sell one day and sale advisory for those ready to launch a process. (kpaxtv.marketminute.com)
That specialization appears central to the pitch. Cantara says founder Craig Pollack has operated pet resorts in the U.S. and Canada, co-founded private-equity-backed Village Pet Care, and advised buy-side private equity groups. The firm also says it targets operators with meaningful revenue, EBITDA, growth potential, and leadership infrastructure, suggesting a focus on businesses that could attract institutional or strategic buyers rather than only small local transactions. (cantarapet.com)
Public reaction so far appears to be limited mainly to the company announcement and related pickup, with no broad analyst commentary yet surfaced in trade coverage. Still, the logic behind the deal lines up with how both companies describe the market. Cantara argues that prepared sellers tend to achieve better outcomes, and Kennel Connection has increasingly marketed itself as a business ally to operators navigating industry change, not just a software vendor. That framing suggests the partnership is as much about customer retention and strategic positioning as it is about referrals. This is an inference based on how the companies describe their services and market roles. (cantarapet.com)
Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, this partnership is relevant even though it sits in the boarding and pet resort segment. Many veterinary groups either operate boarding and grooming directly or compete and collaborate with nearby pet care facilities for pet parent relationships, staffing, and local market presence. A more organized M&A environment in pet resorts could affect referral networks, local competition, service bundling, and the expectations buyers bring to adjacent animal-care businesses. It also reinforces a familiar lesson from veterinary transactions: clean financials, durable management systems, digital operating data, and leadership that can function without the founder are increasingly part of valuation, not afterthoughts. (kpaxtv.marketminute.com)
There’s also a technology angle. Kennel Connection says it powers more than 5,500 pet care locations in the U.S., and 100GROUP presents the platform as part of a wider software portfolio serving pet service operators. If software vendors become gateways not only to operations management, but also to benchmarking, financing, and exit preparation, they could gain more influence over how independent operators make strategic decisions. That would mirror a broader trend in healthcare and services, where practice-management platforms increasingly sit close to capital, analytics, and transaction planning. The final point is an inference drawn from the structure of the partnership and 100GROUP’s multi-brand operating model. (kpaxtv.marketminute.com)
What to watch: The next signal will be whether Kennel Connection publishes educational content, benchmarking tools, or event programming around sale readiness, and whether competing pet care software companies respond with their own advisory, financing, or M&A partnerships over the next 6 to 12 months. (kennelconnection.com)