“It took her about nine months of sending me photos of puppies that she saved with the incubator (until) I broke down and said I could really do this as a hobby business.” “She pushed me to start this company - I was a very reluctant entrepreneur,” Sunden said. Ultimately, Endsley convinced him to produce the incubators on a wider scale. in Battle Creek, a company that specializes in smart heat management and thermal engineering.Įven after hatching the idea for Puppywarmer and discovering that Endsley found overwhelming success with it - saving 17 of the next 18 SGA puppies - he continued on with his full-time job. His most recent stop was a 17-year tenure at Nexthermal Corp. Sunden’s professional background is rooted in technical sales. The company has the capacity to manufacture roughly 100 incubators a week.īreeders, veterinarians, nonprofit organizations and educational institutions have all used the Puppywamer, some calling it an emerging industry innovation. The Sundens are at the helm of Puppywarmer in addition to two full-time employees. Dickman Road in Battle Creek, the same facility that houses the city’s economic development arm Battle Creek Unlimited. Puppywarmer now operates a 5,000-square-foot facility at 4950 W. Those units are manufactured by a third party based on Puppywarmer’s specifications. The company also offers a coinciding oxygen concentrator, which can be used in tandem with the incubator. This ensures puppies are warmed from all sides. A sensor monitors and controls the air temperature while the closed cell foam floor mat warms up similar to how the sun heats asphalt. Instead of blowing warm air like traditional incubators, the Puppywarmer uses an infrared heater that emits wavelengths to heat a puppy about an inch into its body. This includes SGA puppies or those born via cesarean section. He has developed a series of proprietary incubators primarily used to support puppies that have gone through a stressful or traumatic event. Sunden eventually built a business around the product, called Puppywarmer. “I built one and gave it to (Endsley), in part because I had empathy for her and also in part because I wanted to build it and stop thinking about how I would make an incubator,” he added. SGA puppies are essentially the runts of the runts and have difficulty regulating their body temperature.Īfter buying Chaos, “I was pulling off into rest stops while I was driving around during the day and sketching out how I would make an incubator for her - I know, that sounds totally normal,” Sunden said sarcastically. Sunden learned two of the five puppies were small for gestational age (SGA) and did not survive. Sunden found this to be true when he and his wife Debbie purchased a puppy, Chaos, from Ohio-based dog breeder Susan Endsley five years ago. BATTLE CREEK - When Ken Sunden gets the itch to solve a problem, it’s nearly impossible for him to avoid scratching it.
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