Ask Bill: The TRUE cost of dog food.

Seen the Wal-mart commercials about how good pet food now costs even less?  Not so.  Grocery store brands, no matter how inexpensive the bag, end up being more expensive to feed.

Still Not Convinced?

We know it's hard to believe that "cheap" doesn't always equal "less-expensive" so we did another side-by-side comparison.  This time we stopped by Walmart and picked up a variety of dog foods.  Our findings?  Just because it's at Walmart, it doesn't make it inexpensive, no matter what the commercials tell you.  Purina ONE Lamb 34lb bag for $30.99 at Walmart.  (Ingredients:  lamb, brewer's rice, corn gluten meal, whole grain corn, poultry by-product meal, oat meal, animal fat, lamb meal)  According to the bag, a moderately active 50 pound dog should eat 4 cups of food a day, at a daily cost of $.81 and a yearly feeding cost of $271.79.  Premium Edge Lamb 35lb bag for $34.69 at Happy Tails (Ingredients:  Lamb, lamb meal, whole grain brown rice, cracked pearled barley, oatmeal, millet, egg product, white rice, chicken fat, potatoes, tomato pomace, flaxseed).  According to the bag, a moderately active 50lb dog should eat 2.5 cups of food a day, at a daily cost of $.60 and $201.59 a year!  And at Happy Tails, when you buy 10 bags of Premium Edge, you get the 11th free! That brings the cost down even lower.  So really, that $3.70 you are saving per bag by buying ONE actually means you will be spending more than $8 more a month.  That doesn't even count the inevitable vet bills, which means even more $$ down the line.  Cheap food?  Sure thing.  Inexpensive?  Not even close.

How does Ole Roy stack up?

You might be surprised to find out that there are less expensive (and far superior) alternatives even to Ole Roy!   A 44lb bag of Ole Roy costs $15.50 at Walmart (ground yellow corn, meat and bone meal, soybean meal, chicken by-product meal, wheat middlings, animal fat, natural flavor, brewers rice).  That is $.39/lb.  An average 50lb dog should eat 3.25 cups per day, at a cost of $.30.  That's $8.35 a month, and $100.21 per year.  Diamond Naturals Beef and Rice costs $20.98 for a 40lb bag at Happy Tails (beef meal, cracked pearled barley, ground rice, peas, egg product, chicken fat, rice bran, beet pulp, flaxseed)  At .52lb, an average 50lb dog should eat 2.5 cups a day for a daily cost of $.29, a monthly cost of $8.31 and a yearly cost of $99.73.  The difference in the quality of ingredients (beef meal vs meat and bone meal) makes Diamond's savings much, much greater.  

Remember, you are buying nutrition.  No matter how cheap or expensive the food, if it isn't nutritious and made from the things dogs and cats need, you are wasting your money, and will be throwing good $$ after bad when your pet ends up ill at 5 or 7 years old.  

Other Useful Comparisons

To find out more about the foods we carry, click on the links to their websites in the column on the left hand side of this page.