To the competitors of Nutro:
You're all aware of the controversies surrounding this company and its products, and you are all aware that whether your company was caught up in last year's recalls or not, all PFCs have difficulty restoring consumers' pre-recall trust--in both individual PFCs and the industry as a whole.
From Pet Food Industry-July, 2008-
Anyone read the July issue?
http://www.petfoodindustry-digital.com/petfoodindustry/200807/?u1=texterityPage 88 -
Is it really over?
Though the number and emotional intensity of blog posting and responses about the recalls and petfood in general have declined from their high this time last year, it is still not unusual to see consumer comments disparaging specific brands, companies or the industry overall. We still have a ways to go to regain the trust of many pet owners.
One possible way to regain consumer trust could be to try to determine what may be causing all of the reports of illnesses and deaths from your competitor's products and making that information available to the consumers who, at this point, have become jaded enough to see all of you as the "Pet Food Mafia", protecting your own when necessary.
Hill's was sufficiently motivated enough to attempt to disprove Nutro's ad claims last year This report doesn't indicate that there were any deaths or illnesses connected with the attempt to disprove the claim--just a business matter of attempting to keep a competitor honest.
http://www.adlawbyrequest.com/_db/_documents/NAD,_Nurtro_Products.pdfHills vs Nutro-Case #4714 August 21, 2007
Hills="challenger" Nutro="advertiser"
Page 3-
"The testing protocol that Nutro attached (to its submission) indicates, without support, that any product samples created at least twenty minutes apart constitute separate "production batches". This statement seems to suggest that the average MEC (Metabolizable Energy Content) for the individual samples from a SINGLE production run--such as the 3057 kcal/kg result Nutro obtained on June 21--could, by itself, substantiate Nutro's "Lite" claim, even though Nutro averages the results from THREE separate production runs and cites this as its support in its submission. Nutro's "20 minute" definition finds no support in AAFCO's guidelines, nor is there any authority to support it. In practice, samples from different production batches--as is required by AAFCO--are most easily identified on the retail shelf by looking for products that bear different date codes, as Hill's did in its testing. In fact, AAFCO has issued a guidance memorandum, which is available to the public at:
http://www.aafco.org/Portals/0/Public/Guidance%20DocFinal.pdf describing how animal feed manufacturers should identify different "production batches" (a term the document uses interchangably with "production lots") using such codes on the packaging.
According to the guidance memo, "All feed and feed ingredients should contain a code that links the individual production lot to production records so as to provide a history of such product. The code should be contained either on the product packaging, labeling or other distribution records..." In any event, Nutro itself cites the average MEC from THREE data points, one for each production run it tested--not the average from the individual samples within any single production run--as the relevant final "number" that it claims relates to AAFCO's "Lite" standard. Nutro's own method thus recognizes these three results as the relevant data.
Page 4-
"The challenger took issue with the advertiser's explanation that the high MEC values obtained by the challenger's testing might be linked to temporary product irregularities caused by Nutro's switchover from its Wilson Way production facility to new factories.
The challenger argued that it was unlikely that the samples it tested all came from the Victorville, CA plant, as opposed to Nutro's other production facility in Lebanon, TN, which, argued the challenger, the advertiser admitted has produced its "lite" dry products continuously since 1996. Moreover, argued the challenger, the advertiser had not provided evidence that there were, in fact, such temporary irregularities in its "lite" dry products' MEC levels at the Victorville facility.Second, argued the challenger, the
samples it tested came from products actually available to the public for purchase (which is how it acquired them). It selected the products to be tested based on the date codes printed on the bags, to ensure a range of unique production lots, argued the challenger, and reported these codes with the test results. On the other hand, contended the challenger, the advertiser apparently tested samples coming straight off the production line at one of its facilities (without specifying which one). Additionally, the advertiser did not state whether it tested samples of the same product formula that is now on store shelves and available to Page 5
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consumers. Based on such information, argued the challenger, it is impossible to know exactly what the advertiser tested, including whether the three production runs tested were of the same formula and, if so, whether this was the reformulation described by the advertiser.
Third, while the challenger submitted samples of the products to an independent laboratory for testing, the advertiser conducted its own in house testing. The challenger contended that "although in-house testing may be proper in some circumstances and it not per se less reliable, in light of the other deficiencies in Nutro's data and in light of the delays in Nutro's submissions and the shifting statements Nutro has made to NAD, this is an additional reason to credit Hill's results."Moreover, argued the challenger, of the three production runs tested by the advertiser, the results from two of them (May 17 and June 15) were over AAFCO's maximum allowable MEC of 3100 kcal/kg as was the average of all three (3118 kcal/kg). The advertiser had admitted, argued the challenger, that it thus did not meet AAFCO's standard, but contended that the 3100 kcal/kg limit was only suggested and not an absolute limit. The challenger stated that, to the contrary, the plain language of the Regulation indicated the 3100 kcal/kg was "a bright-line threshold".
Page 8
"In addition to its explanation that
the challenger's test evidence of caloric values exceeding AAFCO recommendations was a result of product reformulation, the advertiser contended that these high caloric results were partly due to manufacturing anomalies in either or both of Nutro's manufacturing plants. Specifically, explained the advertiser, certain employees at its production facilities were adding extra fat to the extruder to increase manufacturing through-put, and this practice affected Natural Choice Lite MEC values." Our trust in you as a company and in the industry might be able to begin to re-awaken if we were to learn the reason all of these reports are attributed to Nutro's products, when that company repeats over and over again that there's nothing wrong with them.
To Nutro:
Repeating the words "Everything's Fine" ad infinum has done nothing about stopping the reports of deaths and illnesses in conjunction with your name. The claim was even made by someone at Consumer Affairs that no product testing is done; you've continued to claim the contrary.
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/pets/nutro.htmlAdam of Knoxville TN (07/09/08)
As a pet supply store employee, we often have meetings with pet food reps to give them a chance to talk to us about their foods and why they want us to recommend their foods. Shortly after all of the Menu Foods recalls, we had an opportunity to talk with the local Nutro sales rep.
One of my co-workers asked the rep what is nutro doing to ensure that the foods being shipped out are free of melamine and other harmful chemicals? The response we got was astonishing.
We were told that Nutro does NOT quality test their foods. Instead they have a partnership with many kennels around their factory. They send samples from the batches of food to these kennels, free of charge, for the kennels to feed their dogs. The Rep said if there was anything wrong with the food, they would know within 3 days. If no dog got sick within those 3 days, the food is shipped. After hearing this, I immediately stopped feeding my pets nutro and switched to a more reputable brand that does extensive quality testing and cares about the well being of my pets. I NEVER recommend Nutro.
This person indicated that this was not long after the recalls and we are aware that Nutro was purchased by Mars in May of 2007; the situation may no longer apply.
The point being that if it doesn't, and you are making all of the checks and performing all of the tests you make claims for, it should not be so difficult for you to be able to post them on your website as proof.
The other side of the coin is that perhaps your competitors will once again be testing your food, but not this time to disprove one of your advertising claims.
Our trust in all of you might not be beyond hope if these reports were to stop because the cause of them has been found.
