At Global Pet Expo earlier this year, I had one of the most fascinating conversations I’ve ever had about pet food with a representative from Merrick Pet Care. I have long considered Merrick one of the better offerings in the pet food arena, and after my conversation with Mark, I like the brand even more, for a variety of reasons:
Sourced and manufactured in the USA, with no ingredients from China
All of Merrick’s diets are manufactured in the United States (in Hereford, TX.) The majority of ingredients are sourced from family farms across the country unless not regionally available. Merrick does not source any ingredients from China. Somehow, Merrick manages to do all this with fewer warehouses and distributors, so that the ingredients make it from farm to your cat’s bowl fresher and faster. It is difficult to find a food that meets all of these conditions.
Premium ingredients
All of Merrick’s formulas are free of corn, soy, wheat and gluten. They do not contain any by-products or artificial preservatives.
The taste test
But the real test of any food is whether your cats will eat it, right?
Allegra and Ruby were eager to test several formulas from Merrick’s Purrfect Bistro line. Since I don’t recommend dry food, and since Ruby has shown some sensitivity to certain proteins in the past, I asked for poultry flavors. We received the Chicken Paté, Turkey Paté, Duck Paté, Grammy’s Pot Pie, Thanksgiving Dinner and Turducken flavors. The latter three are minced in gravy.
Allegra liked all six of the flavors, but did have a slight preference for the paté style varieties. Ruby needed a little encouragement with the minced flavors before she started eating them. She preferred the chicken and turkey paté, and absolutely loved the duck paté (in her case, the difference between “like” and “love” means that while she happily ate both chicken and turkey, only the duck resulted in a completely clean plate.) The duck paté also seemed to be Allegra’s favorite – even though she pretty much inhaled all of the flavors, the duck disappeared even faster than the others.
My assessment
I love this line of food, with one exception: it does contain carrageenan. However, Merrick is coming out with a Limited Ingredient Diet later this spring/summer, which will not contain carrageenan. Look for a review here as soon as it becomes available. I’m hoping that eventually, Merrick will remove carrageenan from all of their formulas.
Please visit Merrickpetcare.com for more information.
*FTC Disclosure: I received this product for review at no charge. I also received a fee for writing this review. Receiving the free product and the fee did not influence my review. All reviews on The Conscious Cat will always reflect my honest and unbiased opinion. Or, as the case may be, Allegra and Ruby’s honest and unbiased opinion.
