Around twenty years ago, Aisha Byrd drove home from a pet store with what she thought was the perfect gift for her dog Benjamin’s first birthday: a store-bought cake, labeled for dogs, wrapped and ready. The next morning, Benjamin was at an emergency vet clinic with pancreatitis. The cake had been loaded with sugar and fat that his system could not tolerate, and the visit revealed a wheat allergy she had not known he had.
“It was the most expensive birthday cake I’d ever bought,” she said.
It was also the last store-bought one she would ever need. Byrd began baking for Benjamin herself, working through recipes, researching ingredients, and studying the nutritional standards maintained by the Association of American Feed Control Officials to understand what dogs at different life stages actually need. She baked for her own dogs for years, then for the dogs of family and friends. As she paid closer attention, she noticed other pet owners facing similar situations: dogs with allergies, sensitive stomachs, pancreatitis histories, and few commercial options that addressed those needs in any direct way.
By 2018, she had formalized that accumulated knowledge into R&B Dog Bakery, debuting at a craft fair in Bedford, Texas, with four treat flavors and one cupcake variety. The name paid tribute to Benjamin and his companion Reese, the two dogs who had started everything.
What Goes Into Every Treat
The brand’s approach is visible in its ingredient lists. The company’s baked treat line runs to around 20 SKUs, according to Byrd, with each recipe built around a short list of ingredients chosen for a specific nutritional purpose. Salmon treats are formulated with salmon, sweet potato, and blueberries. A pumpkin-cranberry variety pairs two ingredients commonly associated with digestive and urinary care in dogs. Everything is produced without artificial additives, added sugars, or added salt. Recipes are developed in line with AAFCO guidelines, the company says, and are baked in an off-site commercial kitchen. A freeze-dried meal topper line, produced through a third-party contract manufacturer, rounds out the range.
Custom cakes remain among the company’s most requested items. They come in peanut butter, apple, and carrot varieties, with frostings made from Greek yogurt or cream cheese, customizable to any design a customer wants. Natural food colorings replace the synthetic dyes common in mass-market alternatives. The Mansfield store also features a soft-serve doggy frozen yogurt bar, made with Greek yogurt and no added sugar, that has become one of its in-store draws.
From Arlington to Mansfield, and onto Walmart
R&B Dog Bakery opened its first retail storefront in Arlington, Texas, in 2021. In February 2026, the company relocated to a new, larger space in Mansfield, Texas, adding the frozen yogurt bar and a dedicated Chew Bar to the in-store experience.
Distribution has expanded well beyond the physical location. R&B Dog Bakery products appear on Walmart Marketplace, and are sold at Chick-Fil-A locations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and through several local pet businesses in the region. Byrd is currently in discussions with Omni Hotels about placing treats in hotel gift shops, according to the company, a move that would extend R&B Dog Bakery into the pet-friendly hospitality market.
A Nonprofit Running Alongside the Bakery
In 2024, Byrd founded Paws 4 A Cause Pet Food Pantry, a registered nonprofit based in Arlington that provides pet food and supplies to families facing financial hardship, including veterans and senior citizens, across the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The pantry works with the Dallas and Fort Worth Veterans Affairs, according to the company.
“I don’t think people who are having a hard time should have to make a choice between feeding their family and feeding their pets,” Byrd has said.
R&B Dog Bakery directs two percent of its profits toward Paws 4 A Cause, the company says. The commitment now appears on every package the bakery ships: during a 2025 rebrand, the company redesigned its packaging to feature the outlines of Reese and Benjamin alongside a note about the pledge, making the nonprofit’s mission visible at every transaction.
Building Toward the Next Stage
The rebrand came out of a focused period of development. In 2025, Byrd completed the Walmart Retail Readiness Entrepreneurship Program through the Watson Institute, an entrepreneurship organization that works in partnership with Walmart.org, which helped her reposition the company as a consumer packaged goods brand prepared for retail scale. She is also completing the Intuit IDEAS accelerator, a year-long program providing small business owners with coaching and grant funding. The trade publication Pet Food Processing documented her participation in both programs in an independently reported profile published in July 2026.
Most recently, she was selected for the third cohort of the Black Pet Business Network’s Retail Inclusion and Success for Entrepreneurs program, a structured initiative designed to give Black founders in the pet industry access to mentorship and retail relationships. R.I.S.E. participants are scheduled to present at SUPERZOO 2026 in August.
Plans for a mobile pet treat truck are also in development. The concept would bring custom cakes, cupcakes, and the frozen yogurt bar to dog birthday parties, dog parks, and community events throughout the region. It would be a mobile version of the same instinct that built R&B Dog Bakery in the first place: that a good treat, made with care and shared at the right moment, tends to bring people back together.
