"premium" Food Vs "economy" Food

[lisahe]

When shopping for a food pretend every single bagged or canned option is packaged the same, in a plain, black bag with the ingredients, GA, and no other unnecessary information. No gimmicks, no buzz words, no advertising allowed. Your choices might actually differ if you pretend the pictures and description words aren't there!

You know, I like this thought a lot. Sometimes it's also important to stop listening to all our advice, too, because it's most important to listen to your cat and what you know about what that will and won't eat. And what might cause vomiting, diarrhea, gas, or other unpleasant things.

1 bruce 1 , for example, mentioned Fancy Feast and Instinct and for our cats, given their weird stomachs, I'd much rather feed them a Fancy Feast Classic once a week than Instinct once a week, because of the vegetables. (Of course they also disliked Instinct when I tried it out on them shortly after we adopted them, another reason not to feed it!) For us, feeding is all about keeping the carbs down and the protein up so, like @MargoLane, we find that feeding a lot of raw food (plus homecooked) works best. In our case, we found that getting rid of potato got rid of room-clearing smells, not to mention vomit, so no potato (it's ubiquitous!) is a huge limiting factor on foods. Many of our cats have those limiting factors, which seem to me ot be the most important piece of this.

 

[1 bruce 1]

You know, I like this thought a lot. Sometimes it's also important to stop listening to all our advice, too, because it's most important to listen to your cat and what you know about what that will and won't eat. And what might cause vomiting, diarrhea, gas, or other unpleasant things.

1 bruce 1 , for example, mentioned Fancy Feast and Instinct and for our cats, given their weird stomachs, I'd much rather feed them a Fancy Feast Classic once a week than Instinct once a week, because of the vegetables. (Of course they also disliked Instinct when I tried it out on them shortly after we adopted them, another reason not to feed it!) For us, feeding is all about keeping the carbs down and the protein up so, like @MargoLane, we find that feeding a lot of raw food (plus homecooked) works best. In our case, we found that getting rid of potato got rid of room-clearing smells, not to mention vomit, so no potato (it's ubiquitous!) is a huge limiting factor on foods. Many of our cats have those limiting factors, which seem to me ot be the most important piece of this.

Exactly =)
We had a dog that threw eggs up, no matter if they were raw, or cooked in any way. That dog did not do well with eggs but the dogs we have now LOVE them and get then frequently.
Our non-raw fed cat really liked Wellness but one day decided "nah, bruh". IDK why but he decided the food he liked before he no longer wanted, so we swapped brands and so far it's all good. If he goes off FF, we'll try something else.

 

[lisahe]

Exactly =)
We had a dog that threw eggs up, no matter if they were raw, or cooked in any way. That dog did not do well with eggs but the dogs we have now LOVE them and get then frequently.
Our non-raw fed cat really liked Wellness but one day decided "nah, bruh". IDK why but he decided the food he liked before he no longer wanted, so we swapped brands and so far it's all good. If he goes off FF, we'll try something else.

I know! They can be so weirdly moody about their canned food! I have a bunch of Rawz, formerly a favorite for both cats, in the bottom rack of the cat food cart because they're just tired of it. I'll reintroduce it in another month or so, that often does the trick!

 

[sallyfry]

I also opt for canned Friskies Classics and Fancy Feast Classics, due to their low/no carb features. I had to pick my battles with cat food and feed them the best I could afford. I opted for as few carbs as possible as I feel that is the most important thing.

Me too. I had to investigate carbs when one of my cats was diagnosed with diabetes. She didn't make it; had a very hard to control glucose level, but I ended up feeding her Fancy Feast Classic pates, since that seemed to have a fairly low carb content and she would eat it! Had to argue the point with my vet, since they seemed to feel that Fancy Feast was "just loaded with sugar".

 

[laura mae]

My previous cat, Hazel lived to 19. She was born in 1984(lived until 2003). So ideas on cat nutrition might have been different. I remember the vet she had at the time was pro-dry food for teeth. Hazel did have beautiful teeth but I think that's because she was very bitey and my knuckles kept her pearly whites tarter free. I wanted to spoil her though and she had free feed of Purina One (which was the luxury brand of the day) and Fancy Feast twice a day.

In 2003 when we started acquiring enough cats to be on the evening news, I decided that they would be canned cat food cats and not Friskies but better brands. I can tell you I tried every single brand of canned cat food I could find and they were unexcited about almost all of them. The adult adoptees took to Wellness okay and it helped Estelle with her GI issues tremendously. The others had to be bribled to eat the premium canned foods with courses of Fancy feast (2 different kinds). So I fixed them plates of good canned food with 2 side dishes of the Fancy Feast. And they always ate the Fancy Feast and maybe some of the better canned foods.

The premium foods that don't have potato or peas or chick peas or any of that foolish "grain-free" carb are okay with the cats. I'm not a fan of the artificial flavoring that goes into Friskies. And frankly the Friskies pate might get eaten but the cats were always super hungry much sooner.

Fancy Feast has lost favor. Boo will only eat Weruva and Lotus Just Juicy Pork. He loved the freeze dried raw but can't have it because of constipation issues. I've fixed the freeze dried raw for Scooter who is 18 now and hyper thyroid. Finding canned food that doesn't have the various gums or fish added is next to impossible unless I'm going to feed him chicken all the time.

I'm not going to put together a raw diet. I did try a homemade cooked meat diet with some vitamin nutrient mix (can't recall the brand) to mix with the cooked meat. Went over like a lead balloon. I supplement with unseasoned cooked meat that we might be having for supper.

I've thrown away a lot of premium food that went untouched. Food that smells great to me is usually rejected by the current brood.

 

[Cara80]

I've only cared for 2 cats, one lived to 16 and the other is now 17.5. We fed them purina dry food for the longest time, up until they were around 10. Then my one kitty started having chronic vomiting issues, so we decided to try out premium brands and fed an 80% wet food diet, she did so much better. We gave a variety of foods and brands, and the simpler the ingredients the better.

I do think switching to a mostly canned food diet helped both cats, less stomach issues, better bowel movements and no more constipation, healthier looking coats. I don't think you necessarily need to buy high end food, just quality protein that's low carb and doesn't have meat by products too high up on the ingredient list. I'm not against feeding dry food, I just don't want it to make up more than 25% of their diet. It's really important for cats to get moisture from their food since they tend to not always drink enough water. Also, senior cats are prone to kidney disease and being chronically dehydrated isn't good for senior cats. Just my personal opinion, i'd never feed an older cat an all dry diet

 

[1 bruce 1]

My previous cat, Hazel lived to 19. She was born in 1984(lived until 2003). So ideas on cat nutrition might have been different. I remember the vet she had at the time was pro-dry food for teeth. Hazel did have beautiful teeth but I think that's because she was very bitey and my knuckles kept her pearly whites tarter free. I wanted to spoil her though and she had free feed of Purina One (which was the luxury brand of the day) and Fancy Feast twice a day.

In 2003 when we started acquiring enough cats to be on the evening news, I decided that they would be canned cat food cats and not Friskies but better brands. I can tell you I tried every single brand of canned cat food I could find and they were unexcited about almost all of them. The adult adoptees took to Wellness okay and it helped Estelle with her GI issues tremendously. The others had to be bribled to eat the premium canned foods with courses of Fancy feast (2 different kinds). So I fixed them plates of good canned food with 2 side dishes of the Fancy Feast. And they always ate the Fancy Feast and maybe some of the better canned foods.

The premium foods that don't have potato or peas or chick peas or any of that foolish "grain-free" carb are okay with the cats. I'm not a fan of the artificial flavoring that goes into Friskies. And frankly the Friskies pate might get eaten but the cats were always super hungry much sooner.

Fancy Feast has lost favor. Boo will only eat Weruva and Lotus Just Juicy Pork. He loved the freeze dried raw but can't have it because of constipation issues. I've fixed the freeze dried raw for Scooter who is 18 now and hyper thyroid. Finding canned food that doesn't have the various gums or fish added is next to impossible unless I'm going to feed him chicken all the time.

I'm not going to put together a raw diet. I did try a homemade cooked meat diet with some vitamin nutrient mix (can't recall the brand) to mix with the cooked meat. Went over like a lead balloon. I supplement with unseasoned cooked meat that we might be having for supper.

I've thrown away a lot of premium food that went untouched. Food that smells great to me is usually rejected by the current brood.

You hit on a great point with age and health issues being a driving factor. People might say "a cat in the wild wouldn't have canned food/cooked food/kibble", etc., which is true. But a cat in the wild probably won't see 18-20 years, and a cat in the wild with diabetes or hyperthyroidism would be dead without these food options.
My cats liked the primal freeze dried as treats and stuff. We tried hydrating it and the results were very meh. They do like THK which is weird because apparently lots of cats don't.

 

[lisahe]

You hit on a great point with age and health issues being a driving factor. People might say "a cat in the wild wouldn't have canned food/cooked food/kibble", etc., which is true. But a cat in the wild probably won't see 18-20 years, and a cat in the wild with diabetes or hyperthyroidism would be dead without these food options.
My cats liked the primal freeze dried as treats and stuff. We tried hydrating it and the results were very meh. They do like THK which is weird because apparently lots of cats don't.

Yes, there are definitely some places where the "cat in the wild" argument definitely breaks down! It's a jungle out there! Of course I do agree that cats should be fed meat, meat, and more meat, with minimal vegetable matter, and the fact that wild cats eat whole animals -- which include what we humans think of as by-products -- is a big reason why I don't think by-products should be totally banned from the diets of posh indoor cats served by Cat Catering. Like C Cara80 , we saw lots of positive changes when we took our cats off dry food (and then foods with potato) and switched them over to various kinds of canned and raw foods during the months after we adopted them.

Our cats love Primal -- that and Rad Cat are probably their two favorite food brands. I wonder if yours like The Honest Kitchen because of the potato/carbs, 1 bruce 1 ?

 

[Purr-fect]

When shopping for a food pretend every single bagged or canned option is packaged the same, in a plain, black bag with the ingredients, GA, and no other unnecessary information. No gimmicks, no buzz words, no advertising allowed. Your choices might actually differ if you pretend the pictures and description words aren't there![/QUOTE

I do exactky that.
Its surprising how many of the expensive foods still have potatoes, carrots and peas in them.

 

[thehistorian]

All right. I am going to weigh in on this.

I too also once worked in the pet store industry and I too bought into the gimmicky advertisements of "high end" pet food brands such as Blue Buffalo, Wilderness etc.

However, the honest to god truth is:

1.) Cats must be fed mostly either pure meat wet food or raw food with little to NO plant matter.

2.) Most "high end" cat food brands STUFF their wet foods with crap like peas, potatoes and other plant matter that are of little to no nutritional value to cats. If anything, they do more harm than good.

3.) Yes, stuff like Fancy Feast and Sheba have "by-products" and some "sketchy" looking chemicals, but when you do the research most of them chemicals are either not harmful or filtered out of the cats body. The thing that is important is that brands such as Fancy Feast and Sheba (I also use Proplan True Nature with my babies) are seriously just meat with added vitamins, minerals and HEALTHY animal byproducts such as hearts and prey guts shoved in a can.
4.) No, the meat put in these brands are not "human grade", but what does human grade even mean in this case? Human grade just means the meat was processed to be edible for human consumption or chosen as "human grade" because it is not disgusting to us humans. Fact: byproducts are by and large healthy for and tasty to kitties.

5.) Most high end cats brands market to humans with cat kids like they would market to humans with human kids: fresh "human grade" meat, peas and carrots! This literally is the opposite of cat nutritional needs.

In short: you are better off feeding cats stuff like Fancy Feast, Sheba and Proplan True Nature for wet. My babies love these brands and I have seen better results with it than feeding them wet food brands crammed with plant filler.

As for dry food, I feed it only to help keep their poops firm and they are only allowed 1/4th a cup a day between them. The rest of their meals are all wet. For dry foods, I do turn to "higher end" brands because they are better than "low-end" brand dry foods. Basically, they are the better selection of what is really not a good main staple for kitty diet.

But dry food does help with firm stools because of the fiber content...and my boy does get very excited over his crunchies. Haha.

 

[1 bruce 1]

All right. I am going to weigh in on this.

I too also once worked in the pet store industry and I too bought into the gimmicky advertisements of "high end" pet food brands such as Blue Buffalo, Wilderness etc.

However, the honest to god truth is:

1.) Cats must be fed mostly either pure meat wet food or raw food with little to NO plant matter.

2.) Most "high end" cat food brands STUFF their wet foods with crap like peas, potatoes and other plant matter that are of little to no nutritional value to cats. If anything, they do more harm than good.

3.) Yes, stuff like Fancy Feast and Sheba have "by-products" and some "sketchy" looking chemicals, but when you do the research most of them chemicals are either not harmful or filtered out of the cats body. The thing that is important is that brands such as Fancy Feast and Sheba (I also use Proplan True Nature with my babies) are seriously just meat with added vitamins, minerals and HEALTHY animal byproducts such as hearts and prey guts shoved in a can.
4.) No, the meat put in these brands are not "human grade", but what does human grade even mean in this case? Human grade just means the meat was processed to be edible for human consumption or chosen as "human grade" because it is not disgusting to us humans. Fact: byproducts are by and large healthy for and tasty to kitties.

5.) Most high end cats brands market to humans with cat kids like they would market to humans with human kids: fresh "human grade" meat, peas and carrots! This literally is the opposite of cat nutritional needs.

In short: you are better off feeding cats stuff like Fancy Feast, Sheba and Proplan True Nature for wet. My babies love these brands and I have seen better results with it than feeding them wet food brands crammed with plant filler.

As for dry food, I feed it only to help keep their poops firm and they are only allowed 1/4th a cup a day between them. The rest of their meals are all wet. For dry foods, I do turn to "higher end" brands because they are better than "low-end" brand dry foods. Basically, they are the better selection of what is really not a good main staple for kitty diet.

But dry food does help with firm stools because of the fiber content...and my boy does get very excited over his crunchies. Haha.

Our raw fed diets are probably 90% of what would technically be "by products"...livers, kidney, hearts, tripe, spleen, bones, etc. =)
I tell people not to freak out over by products. If these by-products are handled safely, there won't be a problem. Organ meat is one thing many people flip out over but it would do us all some good to eat it (I can't eat a lot of it even though I know I should!) MY cats have eaten whole mice that they've caught, and I wouldn't consider downing a mouse anything remotely human grade!
I do usually caution people on "meat" or "meat by products" if they're looking for something that they feel is better than the current diet...if the meat is unnamed, it could be anything.
Named meats in a meal form doesn't bother me as it's just without the water weight.
I like the idea of using ingredients that are good, and clean, and maybe that's where human grade thing comes from.

 

[laura mae]

You hit on a great point with age and health issues being a driving factor. People might say "a cat in the wild wouldn't have canned food/cooked food/kibble", etc., which is true. But a cat in the wild probably won't see 18-20 years, and a cat in the wild with diabetes or hyperthyroidism would be dead without these food options.
My cats liked the primal freeze dried as treats and stuff. We tried hydrating it and the results were very meh. They do like THK which is weird because apparently lots of cats don't.

It's always in the back of my mind when I read what cats in the wild would eat. I will agree that the primary point is that a meat based diet is best. In the wild, cats just don't live very long, as you point out.

I sure wish my cats like Honest Kitchen. It smells really good. But they really, really don't like it. I had a box of it, and tried all sorts of water to food ratio. The most that would happen is a polite try. I couldn't even pawn it off on the stray cat that showed up with regularity at my patio door.

The old guy Scooter switches between Primal and NW Naturals. He's still thin, but not as bony thin as he was. Even with the methimazole at the right level, he doesn't gain much weight.

 

[Nature9000]

A lot of good information. I do have my two cats on Wholehearted (Salmon). When I worked for pet supermarket and got Prince from them, he was on Nutro at first, when Performatrin came out (the store brand, which we proceeded to "suggest" to every bloody customer that walked in the place), I put him on that and he ate it up so well. Still young.

When I left them and worked for Petco for a little bit, I asked what they preferred and unlike Petsupermarket, was given different answers (which I adored about them, because they didn't shove a particular brand down customers throats). I got Wholehearted from one guy, Solid Gold from the lady manager who I consider a "catspert" and Merrick from another (The lady told me it's a lot of customer preference, so different employees may suggest what they like to use or brands they trust for their pets as opposed to shoving a store brand down someone's throat).

I got Solid Gold and Prince had a food problem for the first time, wasn't eating as much and was having loose stool, so I took it back and the lady looked at the ingredients on that bag, the ingredients on the Performatrin bag I still had and explained to me that oils were as high as the third ingredient in Solid Gold, and therefore because Prince was still a young kitten, it was most likely far too rich for his stomach and he wasn't digesting it properly. She suggested Wholehearted because it had probiotics in it and less oils. I got that for him and he's loved it ever since.

Then I learned from my manager at the other Petco that she considers important to focus on the first five ingredients. The first five ingredients are supposedly the largest amount or something, so if Salmon or Chicken is the number one ingredient, then that's going to be in the largest chunk of food and so on.

 

[1 bruce 1]

IDK if this person was playing with me or not.
I went to a pet store recently to buy some dog treats that my dogs like and there was a nice lady that approached me as an kibble company rep. She asked if I had dogs and I said yes, and we talked a little. I then told her I was sorry but I fed my dogs raw and wasn't in the market for a kibble but talked with her a bit. She might have been fibbing (not accusing, just knowing how customer service and stuff sometimes works) and she admitted her dogs eat the food she represents, but feeds them some raw "treats" like gizzards and hearts as treats.
I did thoroughly enjoy talking to this person and told her that I felt that the brand she represented was a quality brand (which I do).
Probably 10-15+ years ago I drove to a local farm store for livestock supplies and was approached by another rep from a different company, and I said the same thing (not in the kibble market, but thank you, appreciate your work and dedication and this too was a brand I felt was quality) and she told me raw was deadly. Pass.
Mini rant brought to you by Bruce--if any kibble companies happen to be reading this, sending in *personable* reps that talk with people and don't slam them for NOT feeding your brand leaves a cattle-prod style branding in my brain as to the integrity of a company and their attitude towards owners in general. If the company is quality, and the reps are friendly and nice to talk to even if you don't feed that brand, that memory is imprinted and you never know who might have a really, REALLY big mouth (...who, me?), and might spread this information among their training friends, their customers with dogs and cats, etc. that might strike up a conversation about feeding our pets.
(Sorry...rant over!) =P

 

[2BSH]

Personally I notice a huge difference in my cat's fur when I feed them premium vs "economy " cat food. Their fur is incredibly soft and plush and shiny on the better food. Plus I avoid additives and artificial chemicals myself so I don't want to feed them to my cats. That's not to say all premium food is great and not economy food is bad. Ingredients make a big difference. Gotta read ingredients. I aim for low carbs and high protein and no crappy ingredients. So I guess here is my vote that all in all it does matter. As long as your cat will eat it and it agrees with the individual cat's needs.

 

[pegleg]

I really like Applaws and Instinct High Meat dry foods. My cats are quite small he especially (<-the black one) is an absolute gannet for whom just looking at a grain causes a kilo of weight gain and the worst smelling poo. The relatively small amount of veg is acceptable.

Since the only Sheba without sugars and other nonsense has been discontinued I've luckily found that the local cheap supermarket own brand 55c 400g cans of pate is not only just meat and nutrients but she (the torte point) will actually eat it.

The shop I buy the dry from often has pretty good reductions on food nearing its sell by date so occasionally I'll get Orijin or something for 70% off, which is nice.

Mine have always had really, really good fur so I can't comment on that.

 

[chandler49]

~ The more expensive foods contain less filler and higher quality ingredients. Some contain no by- product at all . They are made in smaller batches. You also get fancy marketing and labeling : Non GMO ; Free Range Chicken ; Kitty Kosher ! ... etc . As far as I can tell the nutritional content is almost identical. I think by law it has to be .
I think cats can become fussy if we spoil them. They like the flavor, smell and texture . I feed the different varieties of Friskies wet food and Purina soy/corn free Beyond dry kibble ($ ! ) . Fancy Feast is a treat once a week . Sometimes I steam a chicken .
We have had cats that lived over 20 years . They know we love them and that's the most important thing .

​

What formula of Beyond Dry do you use. How long have you been feeding it? Just bought a bag of the Beyond Chicken & Egg. Haven't opened it yet.

 

[1 bruce 1]

~ The more expensive foods contain less filler and higher quality ingredients. Some contain no by- product at all . They are made in smaller batches. You also get fancy marketing and labeling : Non GMO ; Free Range Chicken ; Kitty Kosher ! ... etc . As far as I can tell the nutritional content is almost identical. I think by law it has to be .
I think cats can become fussy if we spoil them. They like the flavor, smell and texture . I feed the different varieties of Friskies wet food and Purina soy/corn free Beyond dry kibble ($ ! ) . Fancy Feast is a treat once a week . Sometimes I steam a chicken .
We have had cats that lived over 20 years . They know we love them and that's the most important thing .

​

We had cats on bargain basement brand foods live into their 20's as well. They also got other stuff (lots of outside time in cat-safe areas, loads of fresh air, exercise, cat-cat interactions and relationships/friendships, as well as a bond with a special human. I do think nutrition matters, but I see no reason why the aim for a healthy pet has to stop at food =)
That said, marketing is so tricky and labels can be so deceiving. "All natural" means squat. Non-GMO is good IMO for those wishing to avoid GMO's for themselves and wish to do so for their pets (this isn't hoping to start a GMO debate, I say save that for the OT forum!), as well as free range.
Check labels. If a bag or can states "organic ingredients", "free range ingredients", "non-GMO ingredients", turn the bag or can over and read. If this is your goal and you know your stuff and are satisfied, great, but if you do NOT see non organic/non GMO/non-free range ingredients in the first 5 ingredients and the 6th ingredient is "organic barley" or "non-GMO lentils" or "free range chicken broth", examine the first ingredients to see if you're paying a lot for something that really doesn't line up with your beliefs. You'll be paying a lot of money for something that is marketed to hopefully blow over your head. Be smart.
There are some vegetarian and vegan friends that avoid meat consumption for ethical reasons (the meat industry can be brutally gross), and aim for free range, organic, and non-GMO. I would rather see them feed such a food to their cats, feeling that the ethics are superior and line up with their standards as close as possible (when it comes to feeding a pet carnivore), than throw up their hands in disgust and feed that vegan cat food crap. JMO =)

 

[JamesCalifornia]

What formula of Beyond Dry do you use.

~ They also make grain-free and I mix them together . ( $$ ! )

We had cats on bargain basement brand foods live into their 20's as well.

~ Yes - so have we ! Friskies and Meow Mix . I just don't like all the corn meal and soy flour in those inexpensive dry foods .

 

[Furballsmom]

The thing that bothers me when people say they've had cats live long lives is that I think the commercial foods available at the early and mid stages of those cats lives were not full of strange additives and ingredients like they are now.