The commercial is set to “I'd Do Anything” from the musical Oliver! Along with the spot, which will air in shorter clips on linear and broadcast, PetSmart will run social media and digital ads as well as shorter videos with DoorDash and Hill's Science Diet, a vendor.

In Kia's “Robo Dog,” a lonely robot dog in a store pines for someone to adopt him and take him home. He spots the owner of an all-electric Kia EV6 on the street and escapes the store to chase after him.

Actor, Theatre UAB grad Noah Holcomb is PetSmart pitchman.

Those remote control pet robot puppy dogs actually run on wheels, so that they cannot have realistic dog-like limb movements. Examples include WowWee CHiP and Chippies robot dogs, and Zoomer robot dogs. There were only a handful of laboratories and companies that can manufacture quadruped walking robots.

BigDog is a dynamic quadruped robot that walks, runs, and carries heavy loads. It works as a pack mule to assist soldiers in carrying gear.

Jim DoughertyJanice Dougherty PetSmart/Founders

JC Chasez Not only does the spot show off the brand's wet food product, it also introduces viewers to the Tabby 5, a cat boy band fronted by JC Chasez of 'NSync.

The Chinese robotics company Unitree's latest robot dog is the Unitree Go 2, which starts at an incredible $1,600. After shipping and duty fees and all that, it'll cost more like $2,400, but that's still a bargain compared to an industrial robot.

The first known robotic pet was a robot dog called Sparko, built by the American company Westinghouse in 1940. It never got sold due to poor public interest. The first robotic pets to be put on the market were Hasbro's Furby in 1998 and Sony's AIBO in 1999. Since then, robotic pets have grown increasingly advanced.

BigDog is a dynamically stable quadruped military robot that was created in 2005 by Boston Dynamics with Foster-Miller, the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and the Harvard University Concord Field Station. It was funded by DARPA, but the project was shelved after the BigDog was deemed too loud for combat.

In demonstrations, BigDog ran at 10 kmh, climbed slopes up to 35 degrees, walked across rubble, climbed muddy hiking trails, walked in snow and water, and carried up to 150kg loads. Development of the original BigDog robot was funded by DARPA.

The first PetSmart opened its doors in Phoenix, Arizona in 1986 and the chain has since expanded to 1,669 locations as of March 2022, more than any other North American pet specialty chain. PetSmart was also listed among the leading retailers in the United States in 2021.