Dog Community

Merrick

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:00:20 PM

Does anyone use Merrick dog food? I bought a can of the lamb (mediterranean banquet) and Jake absoulety loves it! Just wondering what you all think of Merrick canned dog food.

glenmar

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:12:30 PM

I think that there are far too many excellent quality foods to risk feeding Merrick. They have had MAJOR quality control issues that they don't seem to care to address. Stuff like shipping staples, chunks of blue plastic in food, stuff like the wing bands still being on the chicken wings......I wouldn't risk it.

Shelley75

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:16:36 PM

I didn't know that about Merrick. I thought it was a good quality food. I'm currently feeding natural balance duck and potato canned, but I'm having second thoughts about it.

glenmar

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:20:47 PM

MUCH of the time it is a good quality food. But, with the QC issues, I just wouldn't take a chance. NB is a great food with an excellent reputation to match.

jode88

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:25:57 PM

I like it. I used canned Merrick for about 6 months and just recently stopped. At 2 bucks a can I needed to cut back. I now use Nutro canned, sardines or tripe to mix in.
He liked the Merrick but likes the sardines and tripe even more.
I'll buy a can here and there but not that often anymore.

Shelley75

Posted : 2/7/2007 7:38:13 PM

Jode,

So the only reason you stopped the Merrick was because of coast? What flavored cans were you feeding? I'm currently feeding Jake natural balance duck and potato wet and nutro lamb and rice dry.

Luvntzus

Posted : 2/7/2007 8:06:42 PM

Check out the topic below "Rusty 3 inch nail found in Merrick Dog Treats"

http://forum.dog.com/asp/tm.asp?m=239836&mpage=1&key=merrick??

mudpuppy

Posted : 2/8/2007 9:41:33 AM

it's a shame because their ingredients in those canned foods are excellent.

Misskiwi67

Posted : 2/8/2007 1:50:06 PM

Their food sounds and looks dang near perfect, but my pup didn't do any better on it than he did on the Hills... It was sure fun to make him a gravy dinner every night though! As much as I hate gimmicks, I sure fell for that one... I sometimes wish all foods made gravy like that...

jode88

Posted : 2/8/2007 4:40:17 PM

Hi Shelley

Sampsons favorites are Working dog stew as it has tripe in it, Wingaling, Grammy's pot pie and Thanksgiving dinner.

Yes, the only reason I cut back on feeding was the cost. I really like the food but needed to try and cut costs for a few months. I'll be going
back to it here in a couple months.

Margaret Tyler

Posted : 2/8/2007 7:34:21 PM

Joey loves it and gets a can of it at least once a week.

I'm not down playing Merrick's quality control issues, but I work for a pet product distributor that sells Merrick. I have 20 or so accounts that sell Merrick cans in their stores, not one of them have complained that their customers have found wierd stuff and 7 out of these 20 are Pet Supplies Plus's, and they go through alot of Merrick cans. Our company has probably close to 200 accounts that sell Merrick cans, not one of them have complained of foriegn objects.

willowchow

Posted : 2/8/2007 8:07:57 PM

JoJo--You certainly do downplay them every post about this food. You say you've never heard of any issues. So, what? They do exist. And, your numbers of how many accounts carry it, ect. are really small compared to all the places that carry the food and people who buy it all over this country and possibly elsewhere.

Your posts regarding this food always seem to (for me at least) have an aire of "that's what they say but I don't believe it's true because I personally haven't experienced it".

Misskiwi67

Posted : 2/8/2007 8:52:14 PM

Is there more than one plant making Merricks? Is it possible that one plant has issues, and the plant distributing to Jojo does not? I know Merricks outsources their production, so it would make sense for them to have more than one plant making their food. The highest cost of producing food is actually the shipping.

sooner

Posted : 2/9/2007 11:21:12 AM

ORIGINAL: Misskiwi67

I know Merricks outsources their production

I don't think they do. They are one of the few that has their own facilities.

I know Go Natural outsourced to Merrick's facility and it resulted in a few dog deaths and a huge recall of the Go foods.

[linkhttp://www.fda.gov/cvm/Documents/HHEGoNatural.pdf]Health Hazard Evaluation[/link] PDF File

sooner

Posted : 2/9/2007 11:54:39 AM

Some further information about Merrick:

Garth Merrick owns Merrick Pet Care, Hereford Bi-Products, which is a dead stock removal company and Tejas Industries, which is a rendering plant. Mordanna learned, in her research, that the pet food company is located at the rendering plant.

[linkhttp://www.news-star.com/stories/032100/gov_whopay.shtml]This[/link] is an interesting report on a presentation Hereford Bi-Products made at a county commisioners meeting in 2000. They didn't charge for their dead cow removal services because, "if they retrieve a cow with good meat, that meat can be sent to a cannery for the production of pet food products" but their costs were getting too high and they asked for the county to subsidize them. Strange.

Knowing the other businesses involved in the complex make it crystal clear why Merrick has the market on 'body-part' treats.