Feeding Cats B.A.R.F.
Posted on | February 8, 2010 | No Comments
Author:
Jason Voiovich
Ecra Creative Group
Key Points:
1. Pet food product marketing mirrors human food product marketing almost one for one – just a bit delayed.
2. But cats don’t like “people food” – they like furry mice and pretty songbirds.
3. BARF – or Biologically Appropriate Raw Food – is a mirror of the “organic” trend in human food. It features the same value points and should follow the same market adoption curve.
How do you market mouse innards?
I enjoy a copywriting challenge, but this one might be a bit dicey.
Here’s the short story: In scientific study after scientific study, house cats have been tested on what specific foods they prefer. The test subjects are garden variety house cats and the stimuli are a variety of food options – many of which you would find featured on the front of cat food labels: Beef, chicken, lamb, rice, tuna, salmon, sardines, buffalo, gravies of various types.
What would you guess cats prefer?
If you believe the cat food commercials, you might be inclined to think your cat likes the same foods you do. Have a look at a brief survey of taste-tempting options I found in my local pet food aisle:
Chicken, Veal & Beef Tender Slices Canned Cat Food in Gravy
(Oooh, tender! With gravy!)
Wilderness Canned Cat Food
(Wilderness? Really?)
Natural Ultramix in Gravy Adult Feline Canned Formula
(Formula. That sounds scientific!)
Beef, Turkey & Chicken Feast Grilled Variety Pack Adult Canned Cat Food in Gravy
(Grilled? Are you kidding?)
Chicken, Beef & Turkey Feast Marinated Morsels Variety Pack Adult Canned Cat Food in Gravy
(What’s a mosel?)
Elegant Medleys Cheddar Cheese Souffle Adult Canned Cat Food
(Souffle! I don’t even get souffle!)
Tender Ocean Whitefish Feast Gourmet Canned Kitten Food
(Fish? Only a handful of cat species fish, and it’s not Felis domesticus)
Meaty Bits Senior Canned Cat Food
(Senior?)
Perhaps it would help if I mentioned the other two items on the taste test: Common field mouse and songbird innards.
Ask any cat owner whose kitty ventures outside: What does a cat like to eat? They’ll tell you. Cats eat mice and birds. And the scientific studies prove it time and time again. In fact, mouse innards beats out its nearest competitor nearly 10:1.
Okay, so we’ve established cat food (in fact, all pet food) is marketed more to you than it is to your cat. Product development and marketing also mirrors trends going on in the general food industry. As such, we shouldn’t be surprised to see more pork and more bacon on your pet’s menu. And that shouldn’t surprise anyone – you’re the one buying it. If you think it looks good, ergo, you pet will too.
Watch this commercial and tell me you’re not hungry!
Pet Food Industry News also identifies Hispanic outreach, green products, pet obesity solutions, and aging pet populations as key market drivers. I didn’t need to study the pet food industry to divine those trends.
Put simply: Pet food marketed to appeal to people is not news.
What is news, however, is a new trend – Biologically Appropriate Raw Food – “BARF” for short. (Acronyms do not get better than that.)
Here’s the “official” definition:
“The word BARF is an acronym for Biologically Appropriate Raw Food. Every living animal on earth requires a natural and healthy, biologically appropriate diet. And if you think about it, not one animal on earth, is adapted by evolution to eat a cooked food diet.”
In short, BARF advocates look at what you cat is designed to do – kill and eat live animals. Mice and songbird to be precise. And it is brilliantly adapted to do just that. Your cat is not adapted to eat cow, or pig, or fish, or chicken. All of the nutrients it has evolved to need can be found in the cute little animals it hunts, kills, and eats with impunity.
Of course, for those of us who dislike asking the cat to hunt mice in our home, or don’t like the dirty looks from your neighbors once kitty kat has ridded the neighborhood of little tweety birds, BARF is the next best thing.
But because there isn’t yet a BARF section in your local pet food aisle, dedicated evangelists have been taking matters into their own hands. There are websites on how to make it yourself. I’ll spare you the details, but suffice to say that it involves a meat grinder.
Is it a bit gross? Yes. Could you get over it? Maybe. Is it better for the cat? Probably, but debatable.
Is it a new market trend? No doubt.
And of course we have a market introduction model: Organic food. In fact, BARF has some of the same initial issues: Few suppliers, poor or inaccurate information, and dedicated zealots. To go further, as we’ve demonstrated already, pet food trends mirror human food trends. There already are a few “organic” pet food manufacturers (think AvoDerm, Blue Buffalo, and Castor and Pollux). The “Science” brands (Iams, Hills, and Purina One) likely will follow suit once there’s a decent market. Once the market expands to critical mass, expect “mouse” and “bird” in a can of 9 Lives or Fancy Feast. We should be able to track it just like we tracked the mainstream adoption of organic human foods.
It might take a while, and market growth likely will depend on more “palatable” packaging options, but BARF’s eventual success should come as no surprise.
We just need to come up with a better acronym.
BARFworld.com
Foodmaking Tips at CatNutrition.org
Need proof?
Pet Food Industry News – Trend Report
Tags: BARF > Biologically Appropriate Raw Food > pet food marketing
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About
Jason Voiovich
Ecra Creative Group
Phone: 651.209.2778
Principal and co-founder of Ecra Creative Group, a Minneapolis, MN based creative services firm specializing in brand development, reputation process management, naming/trademark, and product launches to drive measurable business results.
