Southeast Pet is honored to have their Founder & CEO awarded a Pet Age 2016 ICON Award.  Each year, Pet Age honors pet industry leaders who have shown a long-term commitment to the success of the pet industry based on experience, integrity and leadership. Chosen from a vast pool of qualified candidates, those selected to receive the ICON awards have at least 20+ years’ experience in the pet manufacturing or servicing industry. They represent members of the industry hailing from every region of the country, with unique and yet equally valuable experiences.

Everyone at Southeast Pet feels that Greg Judge has earned his place as he is this year's longest running member of the pet industry in the group! You can read Greg's segment from Pet Age's September 2016 Icon article below, or click here to read about all of the 2016 award winners. Congratulations Greg!

Greg Judge
Founder and CEO
Southeast Pet
Austell, Ga.
Years in Pet Industry: 51!

What do you feel is your biggest contribution to the pet business and/or pet owners? For me, it’s about giving back—to both our team members and retail partners. Over the years, our team members and our customers have been extremely loyal to Southeast Pet. So much so, that as I looked toward retirement, I didn’t want to do anything that would betray that loyalty. Selling the business to the employees was the only way I could think to take care of my team, while ensuring that Southeast Pet remained independent and focused on the independent retailer.

What is the best decision you’ve made during your career in the pet industry and why? The best decision I’ve made during my career in the pet industry was to strike out on my own and start Southeast Pet. It’s allowed me to work in an industry I love for 51 years. Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to work with a lot of wonderful people at Southeast Pet, and the friendships I’ve made are priceless.

What inspired you to get into the pet industry? In my case, necessity was the inspiration. In 1965, I was managing a retail tropical fish store for my family. We weren’t able to find or buy the livestock we needed. To address the issue, my uncle and I started Long Beach Fisheries, which quickly became the second-largest tropical fish importer in the US.

Company description: Southeast Pet is the leading full line pet product distributor in the southeast, offering its independent retailers in excess of 13,000 SKUs from quality manufacturers. In addition, we’re the only 100 percent employee owned pet distributor in the country.