The-Truth-About-Pet-Foods
The-Truth-About-Pet-Foods
The-Truth-About-Pet-Foods
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packaging and brand name. Contract manufacturers have many standard<br />
formulas they will allow aspiring pet food marketers to use. <strong>The</strong>n, to<br />
make it “different” and “new,” it is only necessary to add or remove a little<br />
of this or that. Viola! A “new” pet food is born. <strong>The</strong>re are now hundreds<br />
of companies and thousands of brands, with nothing really new achieved.<br />
Processing remains the same, ingredients usually remain the same, and<br />
therefore the only truly “new” things that happen are perceptions created<br />
by packaging and marketing.<br />
Although the true purpose of industry should be to create useful, high<br />
quality products, the advanced ability to deceive or mislead through<br />
marketing and advertising techniques makes it possible to convince<br />
consumers that quality is high where it is not. Complex products in health<br />
care and nutrition are particularly susceptible since the public is not<br />
sufficiently informed to cut through to the truth. <strong>The</strong> temptation for modern<br />
enterprises, under tremendous pressure to sweeten the bottom line, is to<br />
make it cheaply, convince the public that it is more, and sell it expensively.<br />
You now, however, armed with the philosophic framework discussed<br />
in this book, know better. <strong>The</strong> truth – creatures are designed for their<br />
natural in-the-wild foods – acts like a filter to separate true health value<br />
from flimflam and potential disease.<br />
<strong>The</strong> following section will give examples of how pet food marketing<br />
can be evaluated using this truth. I have before me the literature and<br />
website material from four different producers. <strong>The</strong>y have been chosen<br />
because they have either directly or indirectly criticized the health and<br />
nutritional approach described in this book, or demonstrate egregiously<br />
the points made above. Excuse me for getting a little excited here and<br />
there in the responses. Hopefully, you’ll see why.<br />
<strong>The</strong> outrageous claims, falsehoods, exaggerations and incompetence<br />
revealed in what follows, and prevalent throughout the industry, put pets<br />
in harm’s way. All to turn a dollar.<br />
After some 25 years of research into the diet-disease link, I am<br />
convinced that food is serious business. Feed wrong, and suffering and<br />
death wait. Feed right, and full health potential is possible.<br />
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