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Creator (Definite): John W. PattonDate: Dec 1932
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Related toKen-L-Ration
Description:‘The conscientious dog food manufacturer and members of the veterinary profession together, can do much to eliminate many of the evils now prevalent. It is no selfish motive on the part of members of the veterinary profession. They have no monetary gain insight [sic]. Their motive is to better fulfil their obligations to their clients and to their patients. The conscientious manufacturer and members of the profession can do much by working in harmony to foster a more wholesome state of affairs. Veterinarians guide surely a million dog owners in the selection of food for their dogs. They will give preference to the products of worthwhile manufacturers when those manufacturers can and do show that their products are wholesome and adequate.
The History of Canned Dog Food
About ten years ago a group of individuals interested in the exportation of horse flesh for human food conceived of the idea of exporting some of their surplus and otherwise unexportable cuts into dog food. The cuts which went abroad constituted but a small part of the entire carcass of the animal. Here was a largely unusual situation for a dog food. A large part of the carcass all dressed up, as it were, and no place to go, except to the dogs.
There were two avenues of approach. One was to put something in a can that a dog would eat, the other to develop a scientific dog food. It would appear that they have chosen the latter; that they knew where the necessary scientific information that could be applied to the feeding of dogs was obtainable, and proceeded to get it. The response to their efforts was neither immediate nor great. There was, is, and probably always will be, sentimental objection in this country to the use of horse flesh for a food for man or dogs. I confess to having entertained it. So have others without number. A more timid group would have given up the idea. They persisted. Here was the genesis and idea of a product destined to revolutionize the feeding of dogs, stalled because of the need of a starter. The starter was forthcoming in the form of a man with a basket of canned dog food on his arm soliciting sales from the veterinarians in the city of Chicago. So far as I know, this was the first attempt ever made to sell a dog food put up in cans. If an earlier attempt was made, veterinary literature does not record it. The veterinarians, as well as all others approached, gave little encouragement at first. Nevertheless, the idea eventually caught and spread like wild fire. It grew into a business of amazing proportions. Millions of cans a month are now produced and sold.
Of course, the success of the original brands of canned dog food did not pass unnoticed. “There is gold in them thar cans,” visioned many. So great was the haste to make a strike when the gold rush started that there was little time or, on the part of many, little inclination to study the other fellow and his success. Some deemed unnecessary, equipment other than false claims, meaningless words and, from a nutritive standpoint, almost empty cans. It cost someof the “hitch-hikers” so little to get there that you can buy them cheap. Although the comparison to hitch-hikers who don’t even buy gas applies aptly to a large majority of those who rushed into this “get rich quick” field, fortunately there were some of ability and vision attracted to it. They realized that for enduring success their product must be builded [sic] upon [532-533] a solid foundation, sound scientifically. They enlisted the services of nutrition experts and set about the investigation of various meat and fish products and combinations of grains. They were not among the first or even the early followers of the pioneer into the canned dog field for nutritional studies and biological tests are time consuming. They are now in the enviable position of having foods that are adequate for the nutritional requirements of the dog and the scientific facts to prove it. In a later discussion, I shall point out these brands that have used brains to determine what should go into the can and not expended all their efforts in the production of the label.’ (533-534)
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Related to'The Dog Food Code Authority Acts', Veterinary Medicine 30 (2) (1935), pp. 54-56.
Description:'Readers of this magazine will not need to be told in detail that the dog food industry has been, and is, one of the most chaotic industries in which veterinarians, as such, are concerned, nor that no industry has more badly needed reorganization and revamping, or at least reforming and house cleaning than this one.'
Relevant passages from earlier article:
‘In my opinion (naturally I may be partial to my own statements) none of the charges of prejudiced statements in my former article, for or against the product of any commercial manufacturer of dog food will stand analysis. In any case, they must stand as written. I believed them to be true when I wrote them and I still believe them to be true, after making them dozens of chemical and biological analyses of commercial dog foods, personally visiting most of the dog food manufacturers from New York to Illinois and from the Great Lakes to the Mason-Dixon Line, and interviewing or corresponding with most of those in business outside the area.’ (530)
‘The writer frankly admits that the statement “Fit for Human Food” is one of the most difficult angles of canned dog food advertising for him to understand. It appears conspicuously on the labels of all sorts of canned dog food, the good and the bad impartially. Many of the cheapest and most worthless brands display it. We could overlook its irrelevancy were it not for the fact that it is plainly intended to convey to the dog owner an implied superiority. “Fit for Human Food” and its running mate, “Inspected and Passed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture,” are worked to the point that makes us skeptical. The regulations of the Bureau of Animal Industry and their rules which govern the use of “Fit for Human Food” have in mind at all times the food of man, which is far different from saying that it is fit for a dog. It means just what it says. Comparatively speaking as applied to canned dog food, it is meaningless.
We have in mind a can of dog food which would not appeal to us as a human food. It sells to the various so-called manufacturers [note: ‘Manufacturer as used here and throughout this article means the firm under whose label the product is sold. Only in a small minority of such cases are such firms actually manufacturers. A large majority of canned dog foods are put up by meat packers, sometimes as many as 20 brands by a single packer, and shipped to the “manufacturer,” labeled [sic] and ready for distribution. This business of canning dog foods for others is catered to largely by the small packers who have not an established trade for their tankage and other offal. One of the large packers does not engage in canning for others at all and the others engage in it to a limited extent only; probably for the reason that the price has been forced so low that there is more profit in marketing their surplus products elsewhere, where there is an established demand for it.’] at five cents a can. It costs about four-and-one-half cents to buy the empty can, fill it, and label it. There cannot be over one half of one cent’s worth of food in the can. It is compounded from the cheapest cereals procurable, namely rice-siftings. Rice-siftings have the property of absorbing a large percentage of water and swelling to gigantic proportions, as well as being cheap. The flesh which this particular brand contains is the so-called beef trimmings, lungs, weasand, and trimmings of the trimmings – much of which, no doubt, [534-535] went into the inedible department before the advent of canned dog food. It has no scientific or other regular formula. It contains what the canner has no other sale for on the day he cans it. It must be as variable in nutrients as the variability of in [sic] the ingredients would permit. At best, it can never be highly nutritious.
All this is no secret to the meat packer who admits this is not good dog food. It has complied with the regulations as to cleanliness, which make it “fit for human food” because it comes from the edible department and the rice is edible. The packer is not blamable [sic] for its inadequacy or its variability. He is merely supplying what the purchaser asked for – the cheapest can of stuff that a dog will eat.
When we go to the other extreme we have a can of dog food, which either cannot be classed as “fit for human food,” or must so qualify this statement as to lower our estimation of its sources. It is built to a scientific formula. It will adequately nourish every demand of the animal. It may be fed exclusively either as a single meal or for generations without a single deviation in any one of many pertinent considerations. There is not the slightest deviation in its scientific formula except it be as the result of newer knowledge in nutrition. Its formula is compounded with prescription-like precision. Though it may not be justified or advantageous to make the statement “fit for human food,” it can meet the most rigid and scientific interpretation of the statement “fit for dog food.” It is not intended to imply the meat packer cannot or does not put up this kind of dog food; but he does not and cannot fill a can with one-half cent’s worth of this food, nor not for four times this amount.
Fit for human food and adequacy are not identical terms. Materials which come from the edible department may be edible but not necessarily adequate. Our requirements from a nutritional point of view for a can of dog food must be met on the standard of adequacy.’ (534-535)
