Business spotlight: The dog that inspired a business

This article is a part of our Risk + Reward series. Capital One Business and Inc. partnered to survey 349 business leaders in November 2025 to explore the factors that affect how they weigh business risks and rewards in navigating modern business landscapes.

Entrepreneurial inspiration can come from anywhere. For Donie Yamamoto, founder of the pet supplement company Vital Pet Life, the muse was her dog, a terrier mix named Tuxedo. In 2017, he was struggling with itching and his coat had become coarse. None of the products sold at the big-box pet retailers were helping. “Most of the ingredients I was looking at, I couldn’t even pronounce, and they didn’t give him relief. So I began looking for my own natural, clean solution,” Yamamoto says. 

Through her research, she discovered Alaskan salmon oil, a supplement that promotes a shinier coat and reduces itchiness in dogs and cats, among other benefits, and began to research suppliers. At the time, she ran a children’s fashion line and had recently attended the Copenhagen Fashion Summit in Denmark. She realized she could apply fashion sustainability best practices to a pet wellness brand, including source traceability—tracking where raw materials come from to provide product ingredient transparency.

Most suppliers did not want to answer her questions about sourcing, but the ones that did proved to be ethical partners who could support her mission of creating sustainable and transparent pet products. When a fraudulent ingredient scandal shook the fish oil market in 2023, Yamamoto doubled down on her mission and committed to selling only third-party-verified ingredients. This made scaling challenging at times but fostered customer trust and loyalty to fuel long-term growth. That’s part of the reason that, despite a volatile business climate, Yamamoto is confident sales and profits will increase in 2026. Her prediction aligns with Capital One Business and Inc.’s second annual Risk & Reward survey, which found that 94 percent of business leaders expect revenue increases and 96 percent expect earnings increases over the next 12 months.

Yamamoto believes business success depends more on mindset and decision-making than on external factors like the economy, a belief shared by 57 percent of business leaders. “If you’re driven by external factors, everything will just be chaotic,” she cautions. Confidence and a sense of purpose can help you stay focused despite challenges.

And those decisions are paying off. This year, Vital Pet Life will launch its first brick-and-mortar partnership and a new product. Yamamoto is intentional about every offering, listens to consumer feedback and doesn’t jump on an ingredient because it’s trending. “I don’t really think about the sales,” she explains. “People see that everything I put out is intended for the health and functionality of their pet."

Vital Pet Life is family funded, driving growth by reinvesting its earnings back into the business. While Yamamoto would consider taking on investors someday, bootstrapping—the most popular financing strategy among business leaders, according to the survey—has been essential to her success. She has never had investors pressuring her to grow faster or churn out products she doesn’t believe in to drive sales.

This growth strategy wouldn’t have been possible without Capital One Business. The bank provides a reliable credit line and cash-back rewards she uses for research and development, advertising and consumer education. “I know they’re behind us and that if we need to increase a line of credit, they’ll be there to help us. It just makes things easy,” she says.

Yamamoto looks for ways to give back to the pet community, including donating to local shelters and hosting a podcast, Unleashed Curiosity, with evidence-based tips for pet owners. These efforts don’t lead to immediate return on investment, but they support her mission of helping pets live longer, healthier lives, which is more important to her in the long run, she says.

And the pup that started it all, Tuxedo, turned 13 in February, remaining Yamamoto’s inspiration. “I feel like he’s the one leading me,” she says.