stella & chewy's on backorder everywhere

stephanie42

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not sure if anyone else has been trying to buy stella & chewy's for weeks, but i have.  and i've not been successful. 

my local independent pet store is full of dog varieties and snacks, but no cat food.  one of the employees told me the food has been on backorder for some reason.

so i contacted stella & chewy's and was told this:

"Thank you for your email.  We apologize for the shortage situation you’re noticing through your retailer.  Due to unprecedented demand among our customers, as well as our unwavering commitment to quality, we are experiencing some temporary out-of-stock situations.  We will soon be able to boost our production, and feel we will be able to meet our stores’ increasing needs.   We appreciate your loyalty and understanding as we address what we hope is a short-lived issue."

i've also had trouble finding it online - it's out of stock with a lot of the online retailers too :(
 

catfamily7995

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They're probably on back order because it's the holiday season. Buying stuff online will take alot longer to ship now, because EVERYONE is trying to buy things for the holidays. That's my best guess, anyways, I hope that it will become available to you soon! :)
 

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One reason for the "unprecedented demand" may be that people who have been relying on Nature's Variety and Bravo have been left looking for new food sources.  Nature's Variety stopped making raw frozen cat food some time back, except for those ridiculously expensive and freezer-burned "bites".  Bravo seems to have stopped making cat food ("Balance") altogether.   I heard about the supply issue from two local pet stores just last week.

If I were 100% dependent on one of those two brands for my cats, that sudden supply disruption would be a really serious issue.  I'm thankful that I went the homemade route, and after these events I wouldn't ever consider going back to commercial raw.  I do like keeping some Stella and Chewy's freeze dried raw around for emergencies and extra special treats, though...hope they get their supply straightened out.
 

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not sure if anyone else has been trying to buy stella & chewy's for weeks, but i have.  and i've not been successful. 
Is it the freeze dried Stella and Chewy's that is on backorder or the frozen Stella and Chewy's? I've been able to find both at the local pet stores.
 

ritz

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Amazon has the freeze dried stuff.

Also regarding treats, the ones for dogs are, like the ones for cats, made with 100% freeze dried meats. I buy the ones for dogs, I think they are cheaper.
 
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stephanie42

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Is it the freeze dried Stella and Chewy's that is on backorder or the frozen Stella and Chewy's? I've been able to find both at the local pet stores.
freeze dried - as far as i know, there isn't any frozen stella & chewy's options for cats.  just dogs :(

i went to another independent store a bit farther away and found what i wanted.  cats are happily eating it.
 

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It may also be that S&C's rabbit is on back order because it is a new, "novel" protein in their line of food for cats, other than just the fowl and fish flavors. It's also single protein with minimal veggies / fruit, just pumpkin. It's hard to find a commercial  raw rabbit that isn't mixed with another protein other than Primal rabbit, which my cats eat, but which contains more fruits and veggies than S&C. But Primal is great nonetheless, my cats wolf it down.  I agree regarding NV's new line for cats - way over priced for those 1 lb bags and the rabbit isn't single protein since pork is added.  To NV's credit, however, no added vitamins or supplements are added to the food, other than taurine. My cats don't really like S&C's freeze dried turkey but I'm willing to try their frozen rabbit when it becomes available.
 
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lisahe

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ooooh i haven't seen that in any stores yet - i would love to try the rabbit.  my cats seem to enjoy rabbit.
One of our local stores ordered some of the frozen food for me... our two cats like them a lot. I added a little extra water and mushed them so the consistency was more like Rad Cat.
 

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Interesting, I really want to try Rad Cat, however, our cats are allergic to chicken and I'm pretty sure eggs as well - I wish RC didn't use eggs in their raw food, it's a pity b/c  RD gets great reviews.
 

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That's too bad, @LisaMarie12! Rad Cat is great food and lots of cats -- ours included -- just love it. If you're not sure about the egg, they do sell small containers so you could see how your cats react to the egg in their turkey or lamb food. (I realize that might be risky...)
 

lisamarie12

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Thanks LisaHE.

I'm not 100% sure about the egg allergy - their diet is about 75% commercial raw and I was feeding NV's Pride rabbit canned (the other 24% of their diet) which has both pork and eggs. I switched over to NV's rabbit (less pork but no eggs). Ideally I want both cats on frozen thawed raw but my female cat won't eat any frozen raw (even with freeze dried meat treats as "seasoning"), so she's holding us back, since Mikey wants what Molly is eating too (canned). Mikey eats the frozen raw rabbit and freeze dried turkey from Primal, Molly will only eat the freeze dried turkey Primal. I realize I need to diversify their meats but I don't want to do beef, lamb or pork.  After feeding the food with eggs and pork, Mikey scratched his neck and licked so badly, he ended up with a staph infection. Rad Cat ingredients are excellent - why do they have to add eggs - as a binder? They don't eat eggs in the wild.  Lisa Pierson DVM has a raw food recipe with and  without eggs. Wish RC didn't include eggs, I'll have to email RC about that.  My goal is to have the cats on a combo of homemade raw and commercial raw.  Thanks for your input.
 

ritz

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FWIW: The Furry Foodie has rabbit that has no vegetables--but does contain chicken. A local independent pet food store started carrying it and the rabbit was on sale for $9.99--which was cheaper than my buying frozen rabbit (from China maybe....) and breaking it down. I would say the consistency is like Primal.
The product has been around for about three years, it was one of the commercial raw foods I started Ritz off on. (I now fed prey model raw for the most part.)
 

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If your cats have allergies, it can be hard to sort out what they're allergic to if you're buying commercial food with lots of ingredients.   It might be the chicken, or it might be something else that's added to the chicken food you're giving them.

You might try the rabbit from Hare Today, which contains nothing apart from the rabbit.  The ground mix needs to be supplemented.  The chunks are hard to balance, but if you feed them as an occasional treat you don't need to worry about that.  They also have other foods, again all in single source proteins.

If I were you I'd feed them just the ground mix a few times, then start supplementing ONE ingredient at a time, making sure they're ok at each step.

Bonus:  This is so much cheaper!!  Rabbit at Hare Today is $5/lb plus shipping plus supplements which adds between $1 and $2 a pound.  Furry Foodie is over $9/lb before shipping - and remember their food is only part rabbit, the rest is chicken.   Rad Cat is even more expensive and we're talking chicken and turkey there.  OUCH.  I get so incensed at prices like these.  Pet owners are being completely taken advantage of by the industry, and I for one refuse to stand in line to be fleeced.
 

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Hi - I've ended up here many times after doing searches for all subjects cat and thought I'd chime in.  I also emailed Stella and Chewy's and got the same email, word for word.  I found an article this morning that was written in June 2014 saying they bought a lot and are building a new facility - if this is the reason there's no stock, wouldn't it be better to just say so? I'd be happier knowing there's a reason behind it other than they just quit making the cat food.  I've been feeding Stella for over a year and had no plans of switching but now I'm back to try this, try that, is it good for them and will they like it?  Hard on the pet, hard on the pet parent. 
 

karma2222

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The other problem may be that Stella and chewy have done a HUGE push in Canada for the food in the last year - and espeecially the freeze dried cat has done extremely well and every time I turn around more and more storess are carrying it. The brand just might be growing a bit faster than expected and they haven't quite been able to keep up with production.

Rabbit has been increasing exponentially in popularity in the past years .... There isn't quite enough suppliers yet to supply so anything that is rabbit based tends to regularly get back ordered. My company sells one brand of rabbit ear treats and it's about 50/50 if we get what we order. And NV is getting better but for a while it was regularly back ordered - so we just tried for every size and I bought what came in lol - before the store started carrying the brand ;)
 

kritterkat

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I did find out Stella & Chewy's is building a big new manufacturing plant, hopefully they'll be able to keep up when it's done this spring/summer.  Meanwhile when I see it's available I buy gobs, one of my cats has IBD and can't tolerate frequent changes of food.  Also a Stella rep came to a local store last month, she says it's okay to feed the freeze dried rabbit for dogs to your cat, I haven't checked out the ingredients but wonder if a dog food could possibly have everything in it that a cat needs (such as taurine, etc.)?  
 

karma2222

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I only use dog freeze dried food for my cat with full backing of my holistic vet .... As long as there is organ meat (especially heart) present in the food the levels of taurine should be adequate. I do also use duck hearts by 1 bite 2 bite as a treat to also help boost taurine levels. The only problem I have hit with dog versions is there tends to be more fruit and veggies which lowers the palability .... I have found only a couple that my kitty will eat constantly but he is superb fussy and only allowed duck, rabbit and pork (no grain, potato, or eggs) so I'm extremely limited.

There also might be problems with the potassium levels with him, some dog food is high in potassium and it seems to be a trigger for my guy and his bladder cystitis.

Stella and chewy rabbit dog is one he won't even touch at all :( and rabbit is his favourite. I can get him to eat the raw cat version better than the dog freeze dried and he hates raw with a passion.

Taurine is a little over rated with its importance, the amount that cats needs is so low that as long as there is some organ meat, you should be 100% fine.

Oh other point - cats need more calories per pound so be prepared to feed more than the direct comparison of a dog at the same weight ...
 
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lisamarie12

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Yowser - the S&C dog version for kitties?! I actually used it (rabbit) briefly to get the cats off of kibble, however, I remember calling S&C about this and they practically chewed (no pun intended, lol) me out on the phone for giving their dog version to the cats - way too many veggies plus the olive oil in the dog formula, they said, wasn't good for kitties.

I continued it for a bit but when I noticed my guy was having bloody stools, I stopped it immediately. 
 
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