Is Purina good or not

Purina Cat Food Review

Weve taken a close look at Purina and graded it according to the Cats.com standard, evaluating the brand on species-appropriateness, product variety, price, ingredient quality, customer experience, and recall history.

The Cats.com StandardRating Purina On What Matters

Weve rated the brand on six key criteria for quality.

Ratings

• Species-Appropriateness 5/10
• Ingredient Quality 5/10
• Product Variety 8/10
• Price 8/10
• Customer Experience 6/10
• Recall History 4/10

Overall Score: 6/10

In total, we give Purina cat food a 36 out of 60 rating or a C+ grade.

About Purina

Purina is one of the largest and oldest companies in the cat food industry. It started in 1894, when a group of three entrepreneurs founded the Robinson-Danforth Commision Company.

Believing that animal feed would sell despite the poor economy, the company started packaging up a mixture of molasses, corn, and oats and called it horse and mule feed.

During the next few years, the company expanded, got a new name, and explored various product offerings.

In 1926, the company, now called Ralston-Purina, established a pet nutrition and care center, where they developed their first pet foods.

Purina Dog Chow was introduced in the 1950s and reached national distribution in 1957. A few years later, cats, too, had a Purina food to chow down on. Purina Cat Chow was introduced in 1963.

The companys growth continued through the 20th century, as they added on multiple brands, including household names like Friskies, Fancy Feast, and Kit & Kaboodle.

In 2001, Purina merged with the Swiss food giant, Nestl. Today, Nestl-Purina is the second-biggest pet food company in the world.

In 2017, Nestl-Purina PetCare generated over twelve billion dollars in revenue. Put together, Mars Petcare, Inc. and Purina Petcare earn about half of the revenue in the global pet food industry.

Sourcing and Manufacturing

Purina says that most of their ingredients are sourced from North America, but grants that they will source from other countries when necessary.

For example, their grains are sourced from the United States and Canada. Most of their meat ingredients are sourced from the United States, with the exception of New Zealand lamb. Their vitamin packs are sourced from suppliers around the world.

All of their ingredients must meet or exceed FDA, USDA, or AAFCO standards for pet food and comply with Purinas standards for ingredient safety and specifications.

Most, but not all, Purina foods are manufactured in company-owned manufacturing facilities. Purina operates dozens of plants in the United States and Canada. In addition to USDA and FDA regulations, the manufacturing process is overseen by onsite quality assurance staff and laboratories.

Has Purina Cat Food Been Recalled?

Purina has issued several recalls during its 90-year history in the pet food industry. Heres a brief overview of Purinas recalls in the last two decades.

2016

In March, 5 varieties of Purina Pro Plan wet dog food were recalled due to inadequate levels of vitamins and minerals.

2015 Beneful Lawsuit

In 2015, California dog guardian Frank Lucido filed a class action lawsuit against Purina, alleging that over 1,400 dogs, including three of his own, became sick or died after eating Purina Beneful dog food.

Analysis of Beneful dog food samples found that the foods contained three toxinspropylene glycol, mycotoxins, and heavy metals. The levels of these toxins, however, didnt exceed the FDAs permitted limits.

Ultimately, the court ruled in Purinas favor. The United States District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that the lawsuit failed to prove that Beneful was unsafe.

You can learn more about the lawsuit here.

2013

Purina initiated a United States market withdrawal of their Waggin Train products after the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets found trace amounts of antibiotic residue in the treats. These antibiotics are considered safe in small quantities.

Theyre legal in several countries, including China, where the treats are manufactured, but not in the United States.

Later in 2013, a batch of Purina ONE dog food was recalled due to low levels of thiamine.

2012

A single lot of Purina Veterinary Diets OM Overweight Management Feline Formula was recalled due to inadequate thiamine levels.

2011

Some Purina cat foods were recalled due to possible salmonella contamination.

2007

Purina recalled all sizes and varieties of Alpo Prime Cuts in Gravy dog food due to potential melamine contamination.

What Kinds Of Cat Food Does Purina Offer?

Purina stands behind some of the most easily-recognizable brands in the cat food industry.

Fancy Feast was created in 1982 and is positioned as a gourmet cat food providing delicious, sensory experiences for cats. Fancy Feast includes over 100 recipes, including pats, broths, and morsels in gravy.

Purina ONE is marketed as a top-of-the-line cat food dedicated to the lifelong potential of your pet. The brand includes dry and wet foods.

Friskies is one of the oldest and most popular cat food brands. In 2017, it was the United States leading wet cat food, generating almost 586 million dollars in sales. The Friskies product lineup includes economy-level dry food, wet food, and treats.

Beyond is Purinas natural food line. All Beyond foods are free of corn, wheat, and soy, with no poultry by-product meal or artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives.

Purina Beyond foods are made in US facilities and are covered by Purinas Traceability Guarantee. The brands Simple Origins line is Non-GMO Project verified. The Beyond cat food lineup includes wet cat food, dry cat food, and treats.

Purina Deli-Cat is a low-cost dry food. Its a plant-based, corn-heavy food made with the flavors of turkey, fish, and liver.

Similar to Deli-Cat, Kit & Kaboodle is an inexpensive cat food brand. It offers just two recipes, and both are dry foods.

Purina Muse cat food is available in dry and wet varieties. All Muse cat foods are made with natural ingredients and are covered by the brands Clean Plate Guarantee. This guarantee promises a refund if your cat doesnt love the food.

During Purina co-founder William Danforths experience as YMCA secretary in World War 1, he observed that soldiers got excited when their meals were called chow rather than food. When he got back, Danforth substituted the word chow for feed in the names of all their products.

When Purina started making cat food in the 1960s, they called it Cat Chow. Today, Purina Cat Chow is available in a variety of formulations for unique needs, including life stage and lifestyle.

Purina Pro Plan was developed in 1986 and, according to the company, was the first brand of pet food to feature real meat as the first ingredient. There are four lines of Pro Plan cat food.

The Savor line offers a variety of aromas, tastes, and textures. Focus provides nutrition geared towards specific health needs, including hairballs and urinary tract health. The True Nature line emphasizes instinct-satisfying, meat-based foods. The Prime Plus line is developed for senior cats age seven and over.

This is Purinas line of prescription diets for specific health needs. The lineup includes food for dental health, diabetes, GI issues, allergies, and more.

Purina Cat Food Top 3 Recipes Reviewed

What Do Customers Think Of Purina Cat Food?

Millions of people buy and feed their cats Purina cat food every day. Most customer reviews are positive, saying that Purina food is affordable and appetizing.

At the same time, Purina gets its share of negative comments.

As we saw in the 2015 Beneful lawsuit, thousands of people have reported that their cats and dogs got sick after eating Purina food. With a reach as broad as Purinas, its hard to know which of these incidents are coincidences and which are the result of something Purina did wrong.

Positive Reviews

Ive gone through a lot of foods including high end brands searching for something that wouldnt come right back up after eating. Ive tried the other flavors of BEYOND but my cats seem to prefer the Whole Oatmeal formula. Ive noticed with this flavor there is much less heaving and vomiting after meals. I expect that with time it will stop altogether. Hairballs have lessened as well. Focus, reviewing Purina Beyond Simply White Meat Chicken with Oats

My 3 indoor cats just love Purina Indoor Formula cat food. My Callie cat is so healthy and is approaching 13 yrs of age and has eaten this food the whole time. I have to 4 yr old boy cats who are also healthy and they also love this food. NatureLover, reviewing Purina Indoor Complete Cat Chow

Negative Reviews

My cat refuses to eat anything but this food. Ive tried to switch her to grain free foods. High protein foods. Healthy foods. She will starve herself until she gets her junk food back. Im rating it a 1 star because the ingredients are awful (cats dont need corn), her fur isnt healthy and her feces smells awful and is very soft. Im not expecting poo to smell great but this is rancid I will continue to buy this because I cant have her starving herself kitandluna, reviewing Purina Indoor Complete Cat Chow

Junk food for cats, naturally they love it. I will feed occasionally, fed up with serving wholesome natural ingredients that most of mine turn tail and walk away. Farmerjane, reviewing Purina Fancy Feast Chicken Feast Pat

How Much Does Purina Cat Food Cost?

Their products range from ultra-cheap to premium, covering everything from grocery store kibble to veterinary products available by prescription only. Theres a Purina food for every budget.

If youre shopping for wet food, daily feeding costs range from about $1.22 per day for Friskies cat food up to $6.40 a day for Muse grain-free filets in broth.

Purinas dry foods are cheaper than their wet foods. Kit & Kaboodle, for example, will cost about $0.09 per day. Purina Pro Plan Veterinary Diet DM costs about $0.71 per day.

Overall, Is Purina A Good Choice?

Purina cat foods are affordable, easy to find in stores around the world, and cats usually love the way they taste. However, they arent the safest or the most species-appropriate choice.

The company has initiated at least five recalls and one market withdrawal since 2004, and most of their recipes contain at least a few artificial ingredients and plenty of plant matter.

If you choose to buy Purina food, opt for their wet foods, which have higher meat content, lower carbohydrates, and provide the hydration cats need.

Purina Muse stands out as their simplest wet food, while some canned Pro Plan and Beyond recipes may also be a good choice.

If youre on a budget, Purina Friskies and Fancy Feast are good options to consider. While they contain animal by-products and artificial ingredients, these foods are more carnivore-appropriate than most dry foods and some premium wet foods.

Where To Buy Purina Cat Food?

Purina cat food is easy to find in grocery stores, pet specialty retailers, and big box stores around the world. Online, youll find it on Amazon, Chewy, and a variety of other online retailers.

Is Purina Dog Food Safe for Dogs?

Explore the safety and nutritional quality of Purina Dog Food in our comprehensive article. We examine ingredient sourcing, manufacturing processes, and recall history, providing a balanced view of this well-known brand. Empower yourself with knowledge and make an informed choice for your furry friends diet.

Most of us go to the grocery store to purchase the food we eat. We can find food for our dogs there, too: Pedigree, Purina, Iams, and the like are found in nearly every store in the country. Its estimated that around 86 million US American families own dogs, so the market is strong for dog food, and foods like the brands listed above sell like hotcakes.

But are they healthy for our dogs? Weve established that foods like Pedigree generally are not. Filled with corn, meat by-product, and corn and wheat gluten, cheap dog food might do more harm than good. But is that always the case?

Theres a Purina factory in Flagstaff, Arizona, and Ive driven by it countless times on visits to my parents. I always plug my nose when I go by; when I was younger, I commented that the factory smelled like ground-up horses mixed with cereal. Its not far from the truth. In the past, some Purina foods were found to have horse meat in them usually under the category meat by-products. The foods were mainly those sold in Italy and Spain, where it might not be so unusual to eat horse.

Take this scenario for example: I was visiting a friend in Paris, France, and staying with her family, who live on the outskirts of the city. One day, she came upstairs and asked me if I would be eating the horse her mother was cooking for dinner, or if I wanted something else. I could barely keep my jaw off the floor. Horse! Suddenly the smell coming from downstairs made me feel nauseated. I tried not to show my disgust, but my dear friend picked up on it.

Its no big deal to eat horse in France, she said.

So it would follow that its no big deal for it to be in dog foods, either, but the problem was that it wasnt listed as such in the Purina food.

In fact, Purina, like Pedigree, uses blanket terms for many of its ingredients: meat by-products, for example, instead of the more specific (but still undesirable) chicken by-products.

Lets break down a few components of a label from a popular Purina dog food, the Purina ONE Chicken and Rice Smart Blend.

No products found.

A Purina food breakdown

Unlike Pedigrees comparable chicken and rice food, where actual chicken never once makes an appearance (a huge red flag!), the first ingredient of Purina ONE Chicken and Rice Smart Blend is chicken. This is a strong start! After chicken, theres rice flour a decent, but not excellent, source of energy. After that, theres corn gluten meal. Corn gluten meal isnt evil, per se, but it sure isnt helpful to your dog. Corn gluten is the very last protein thats left of corn once its processed, and the fact that its the third ingredient means that it makes up a lot of the protein in Purina dog food. (When really, a quality source of meat protein like chicken meal or broth would be more appropriate.)

After corn gluten meal, the fourth ingredient in the Purina ONE Chicken and Rice Smart Blend is whole grain corn, which again isnt terrible but isnt highly nutritious for your dog especially that high up in the ingredients list. But the real problem comes in ingredient number five: chicken by-product meal.

What, exactly, is chicken by-product meal? Its the parts of the chicken that the human food companies couldnt use, i.e. the chicken feet, necks, beaks, unhatched eggs, and organs, that are then rendered and ground into a dry meal that goes in your dogs food. Yes, this provides protein but not a quality protein! Good dog foods will stay away from chicken or other meat by-product meals.

The next two ingredients are whole grain wheat (which is better than not whole grain wheat but is another source of non-animal protein) and soybean meal. Some dogs can have allergies or intolerances to these ingredients, but their presence isnt whats bad; its that they are both so high on the ingredients list when, again, whole meats, vegetables, and fruits should be up there too.

And thats another red flag: they arent. The only two vegetables that appear on this ingredients list are carrots and peas. With such an animal protein-low, grain-high food, youd hope theyd at least add quality amounts of vegetables AND fruits. But no!

So, Purina isnt the healthiest dog food on the market. Its also not the unhealthiest.

Lets look at food safety recalls. Most pet foods encounter them at one point or another, so a recall alone isnt enough to raise alarm. But its worth paying attention to why a pet food was recalled and how the company responded to it.

Purina recalls

There have been about four recalls in the last ten years for Purina pet food, and the reasons have either been possible salmonella contamination or low mineral levels in their complete and balanced foods. Honestly, this isnt terrible. Its not like there was visible pig bristle in the kibble! (Im looking at you, Pedigree.) The company has been active in promoting the recall of affected foods and modifying the food to make it safe again, which is also a good thing. Again, Pedigree responded in a different (worse) way by announcing that pig bristle wasnt such a big deal because it was perfectly edible to dogs. Yuck!

All told, Purina dog food is safe enough. Its not the best dog food out there, but itll do if youre on a budget and if youre careful to read the labels to make sure you choose a Purina food that has higher quality ingredients.

The other day, I decided to check out some canned Purina dog food to give to Eira. After putting a couple choices back on the shelf the more expensive plastic tubs, strangely enough, had worse ingredients I settled on a can of Purina ONE Smart Blend True Instinct wet dog food.

Testing out Purina dog food.

The first six ingredients in this dog food are beef, beef broth, chicken, liver, pork lungs, and salmon. Thats a lot of protein, but its not necessarily a mix Id give Eira all the time. Also, theres nary a vegetable or fruit to be found in the entire can, which is a negative point. So I definitely got this food as a treat for Eira kind of like a candy bar would be for a human. Still, the fact that this can has salmon is impressive! Also, there are no meat by-products in it, which is another bonus.

Always read the ingredients list before you purchase Purina dog food or any dog food, for that matter!

Did Eira enjoy the food? She did. I was a little grossed out by the gelatinous glob of goo at the bottom of the can, which reminded me of that gelatin stuff in canned SPAM. Ew. But Eira loved it.

Eira chows down on her Purina dog food.

You cant see the gelatin stuff in this photo, but its there. After I got the food out, it was in a big clump at the bottom. But most wet dog food doesnt look that appealing anyway. And gelatin is found in many human foods, including popular marshmallow brands. So I really shouldnt be that grossed out I do love smores.

But its safe to say I wont be buying Eira Purina food often. Its not deadly or even harmful, but its far from the healthiest dog food on the market.

If you want to try the can Eira tried anyway, find it here.

No products found.

Laura Ojeda Melchor grew up with two beloved German shepherd dogsClancy and her daughter, Bella. From the time her family brought Clancy home, Laura took on the duty of pooper-scooper and potty trainer. As a teenager Laura helped her mother care for Clancy during her pregnancy. She still remembers fondly the exciting, frigid winter night when the seven special puppies were born. Laura kept the youngest puppyBellaand potty trained her, too. She taught Bella important commands, took her for long walks, and spent hours throwing tennis balls for her.

InNovember, Laura brought home a sweet new puppy, Eira Violet. Eira is halfAlaskan malamute and half German shepherd, and Laura loves her deeply. Shechose not touse a crate to potty train Eira and was pleasantly surprised atthe results. She now has a sweet, energetic dog who always uses the pottyoutside, plays well with Laurastoddler, and enjoys long family walks inbeautiful Alaska. If you were to meet Eira, shed bound up to you with awagging tail and get you running around the yard with herin no time.