July 7, 2009
Dog food days
Yesterday, I was dropped into Focus DIY store yesterday where I saw they now stock that useful DIY product, dog food (but very little useful timber). Funny stuff dog food. Like pooches, dog dood comes in all shapes and sizes – and prices.
Everyone knows dogs eat anything. And the more disgusting the better. A glutinous rotting corpse of some long-dead animal will disappear down their gullets fast than you can say “drop if you filthy ****** animal!” My dog even relishes eating shit.
The cows in the field behind us mean fresh (and not so fresh) food is always on tap. It will even eat mud.
So the question is - why pay the earth for top dollar or top quality dog food when your pet is happy eating excrement? Simple. Most people buy their dog food as a status symbol – the same reason they buy their dog.
The best dog food is the most expensive surely? Erm no – far from it that is just clever marketing. Is it the dog food you get from vets? No – that again is clever marketing. It’s handy business for vets, bringing gullible pet owners through the door more regularly. Better still, if you don’t break into tears when you pay a vet bill, you’ll love the rip-off price.
Dog food is interesting for the claims the makers make too. The guys who make Chum, Pedigree claim to be world leaders - while their biggest competitor, Hills, their main competitor, claim to be Global leaders. Meanwwhile, Eukanuba resist claiming to be pan-galactic leaders andsimply appeal to our vanity and gullibility by charging a lot.
It intrigues me that a tin of Pedigree Chum can feed a dog the size of a tin of Pedigree Chum – or the size of a sofa. There’s a lot of skill & nutritional know -how involved in that. Just think – everything you need for a fit and active lifestyle, not to mention a waggy tail - all in one tin.
Until recently the garden centres and pet stores catered for a green welly brigade buying ‘lifestage nutrition’. (You guessed it – another clever marketing wheeze). If you shopped in supermarkets you could see the same stuff repackaged and rebranded – and much cheaper. And in the vets of course it would be loads more expensive.
Now things have blurred a bit and you can even get the expensive stuff in supermarkets, much to vets’ chagrin.
To my mind there is just one thing about dog food that is important . Digestibility. Because the more digestible it is, the less pooh you have to pick up – which really is something worth paying for.
If the science behind dog food interests you too – there is plenty of good reading at the Waltham web site. It really is remarkable what goes into dog food nowadays – when dogs are quite prepared to eat what comes out the other end. And hey – the good folk from Waltham develop cheap dog food too.
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