Yes, there are some dogs who will eat just about anything. They didn`t need years of meticulous research to document this as true. Yapping frantically in a pen at the far end of this facility are some of the least disciminating of eaters, the droopy-eared Beagles who have been known to lick their chops approvingly no matter what the taste of their food.
But taste, of course, is not everything.
Certainly, of all places, not here.
For this is the facility where 27,000 dogs have been born, bred, fed, and scientifically scrutinized for what is not-so-modestly described as the greater benefit of canines everywhere for the last 60 years.
So here we are, at the top-secret Ralston Purina Research Farm, which turns out to be home for 1,091 dogs and an additional 864 cats who live, quite literally, to eat.
This is a place where every little morsel has its import, no matter if it is wet or dry. The way that Robert Mohrman, the dedicated Ralston executive who oversees this operation explains it, the credo here might very well be that nothing is pet food before its time.
”This company does nothing,” Mohrman emphasizes, ”without checking with our animals, first.”
Mohrman, who appears to have committed to memory the intricacies of each and every blend of Ralston dog and cat food, has a way of explaining this nutritional research operation as the largest such facility of its kind, most certainly in the Western Hemisphere.
As one might imagine in a place of this significance, dedication to the company is highly prized.
Hanging over the mantle in the posh conference room where executives assemble to discuss what animals eat is a rather dignified-looking
commissioned oil portrait of ”Checkerboard Sally,” a loyal English Setter whose contributions to Ralston Purina included 99 puppies, one of whom went on to give birth to another 101.
”Oh, I`m sure that if we looked back through everything we would find that many of her descendants are still serving us today,” Mohrman explains with the appropriate measure of excitement, going on to say that Checkerboard Sally and all her relatives have lived without so much as a whiff of table food.
Which brings us to the point of this research, why all of these dogs and cats eat thousands of pounds of secretly-blended food.
This is big business here.
Though it is true that many dog and cat owners still succumb to pangs of anthropomorphism and find a resolve in feeding their pets what they consider to be tasty little tidbits of `people food,` industry analysts determined last year that about 75 per cent of all pets in this country are fed a commercially prepared product.
What this means, translated into numbers, is that in 1985, humans spent some $5.4 billion on manufactured pet foods for the benefit of their 50 million dogs and 46 million cats.
It is a dog-eat-dog industry, the pet food business. Its products now take up more supermarket shelf space than any staple of human food. Ralston clearly dominates the market, last year snagging 26.9 per cent of the pet food market share. Though that represents more than twice the percentage of its nearest competitor, Carnation, a recent independent analysis of pet food industry figures showed that Ralston`s percentage slipped just a wee bit last year, which may serve to explain why the company is so intent on controlling the flow of information that trickles outside of the research farm.
Oh, sure. You can come to visit. Take a stroll through the buildings and watch how the Big Corporate Giant carefully and painstakingly tests its blends. Really, look at whatever you want.
What? Wait a minute. You want to ask questions?
Tours of the facility are strictly monitored; a reporter never once was allowed to venture beyond the visibility or earshot of Mohrman and Patrick Farrell, his one-man corporate relations crew. Ask to speak to an employee alone? ”Well,” Farrell explains, ”I`ll have to check if that is possible.” It is, as it turns out, but only if Farrell is allowed to listen in. ”I won`t get in the way!” he volunteers, and who in his position would want to interrupt the giddy enthusiasm of the designated company-minded supervisor who explains that she enjoys collecting doggie doo for testing purposes as much as she enjoys her many other chores.
Conversations on matters that Mohrman considers ”sensitive” often proceed like this:
Q: Just what shape of dry food does the dog prefer?
Mohrman: ”Well, um, I really don`t like to talk about those things. If we`d be real specific, then we`d be giving away what we know.”
Such conversations are truly an adventure, but eventually worth it because much can be learned here about a little-known science that is hard at work every day inside 11 neatly kept buildings nestled in the rolling countryside that marks the beginning of the Ozarks.
The daily ritual begins shortly after 8 a.m.
There are 54 uniformed Ralston employees who are trained to watch, clock, and monitor mealtime activities, with an eye for things like ”left eaters,” dogs who can skew test results because of their fondness of eating from the bowl on the left. All this in addition to the chore of actually serving the meal. Every morning, they dish out 2,000 pounds of dog and cat food. In all, they serve 4,000 shiny aluminum bowls of food. Many of the animals receive two dishes of food which will weigh the same, and maybe look the same, but will differ in such details as flavor, texture, and blends of the proteins or nutrients in the food.
All of the products are tested for at least a year and probably for two before they are released onto the market, Mohrman says, going on to add that one product had to be tested for five years before it was put on the market for consumer sales.
Q: Oh? What product was that?
Mohrman: ”Well, I would rather not say. It is on the market now, and it took us a little while longer to make sure it was right.”
What food the animals prefer is actually a mystery to those who do the robot-like feeding chores. Foods to be tested, manufactured in a special pilot plant, arrive at the research facility in plain brown wrappers and coded in a way that only the scientific gurus at the corporate headquarters in St. Louis can understand.
What is it that the animals are telling us?
Too bad they cannot talk.
Aside from the obvious answers about preferred textures and tastes, Mohrman explained that the test animals are giving researchers valuable information on nutrient, vitamin, mineral, and calorie blends that has led to a more sophisticated approach toward the whole business of how to feed a pet, not only for nourishment and enjoyment but for health-related reasons as well. One of the most important tests conducted at the facility, Mohrman says, were the 10 years of research that led to the announcement a year ago of a new nutrient blend in its Puppy Chow. It was over that period of time that researchers at the facility documented that nutrients in a puppy`s diet can help reduce the laxity in hip joints and therein reduce the severity of hip conditions common in certain dogs.
Research over a number of years has helped the company come up with the proper balance of calcium phosphorous in the dog foods, the studies documenting that too much or too little of it can cause abnormal bone problems. Not enough zinc in the canine diet, which has been linked to some generic dog foods, can lead to scaly skin conditions, the research here has shown, and inadequate protein levels can contribute to reproductive and growth problems. Vitamin A deficiencies have contributed to weight loss in some animals and in eye conditions that resemble night blindness as well.
What happens when problems show up in the dogs and cats? Though many of the animals are fed in a way that will encourage certain deficiencies, Mohrman says that once a problem has been documented and linked to the diet, the animal is quickly removed from that phase of the testing, given a
nutritrionally adequate diet that will work to correct the problem, and then moved on to a different area of testing.
”I want to make it clear,” Farrell interrupts, ”that it is understood that we correct problems when we see them. That we believe that there is no point in hurting the dogs.”
He goes on to explain that each animal is checked at least once a week by a veterinarian. Dogs are housed in pens and given the opportunity to exercise in dog runs. Cats are housed together in rooms with plenty of things to climb. All of which allows us to venture into what may be the most crucial area of all: What do these animals like to eat?
Dogs are fond of garlic and onion tastes. And they like cheese. Cats, somewhat predictably, like food that tastes of fish. ”Mouth feel” is important. Dogs prefer smooth to rough chunks when it comes to dry foods. Cats, who tend to have more delicate mouths, are not especially fond of foods that are exceedingly hard.
But despite what the animals tell us, they are not the ones plucking the packages off the supermarket shelves.
Yes, it is the owners for whom the marketing is tailored. And on this score, The Pet Food Giant is no different from any other business because sales, of course, are the ultimate goal.
What? You must be kidding. You want to know about dollars? About volume?
About how much dog food we sell? Predictably, this is another one of those sensitive topics that Mohrman declines to discuss, again, invoking his frequently used ”competition” defense. But even he will concede that research is sometimes tailored as much for the owner as it is for the animal he is going to feed.
”There are occasions when the marketing department will tell us what the consumer wants,” Mohrman explains, saying such revelations are sometimes followed with a new measure of nutrient or taste improvements so that packages can be emblazoned with the splashy logo ”New and Improved!”
Just as flavors were the rage in the late `60s, when pet owners let it be known that they wanted to broaden their horizons by adding a little zest in Fido`s dish–”Give me liver!” ”Give me bacon!” ”Give me beef!”–today, fitness is in. Pet owners, themselves preoccupied with reducing bodyfat and keeping trim, seem to be having the same kind of concerns for their dogs.
Thus came the introduction of Fit and Trim a blend of dry food that has almost three times as much fiber and 300 calories per pound less than the standard Dog Chow blend.
On front of its brightly colored package the words ”Fit and Trim” are spelled out in the yellow measuring tape that is one of the dieter`s most important tools. Also on the package is an artist`s rendition of a floppy-eared dog in a jogging suit. He appears happy, walking briskly or perhaps even running (it is difficult to tell) and his image is that of a dog who is exceedingly fit.
Whatever would Checkerboard Sally say?
