- March 16, 2022
- No Comment
- 8 minutes read
Seeking Healthy, Sustainable Food Options for Pets, Owners Look Beyond Meat – ThomasNet News
Xometry (NASDAQ: XMTR), the global marketplace for on-demand manufacturing, announces the acquisition of Thomas
Industry Trends
Conor McGlade Dec 29, 2021
Welcome to Thomas Insights — every day, we publish the latest news and analysis to keep our readers up to date on what’s happening in industry. Sign up here to get the day’s top stories delivered straight to your inbox.
Beyond Meat, a company that specializes in substituting vegetable protein for meat, saw its stock soar 65.3% in 2020. Consumer tastes have undergone a massive shift — increased awareness concerning food’s impact on the environment and on one’s health has increased demand for more responsible food production.
This isn’t limited solely to humans — pet owners are also looking for healthier and more sustainable foods for their pets. Though companies have been quick to respond to a booming market, nutritionists have found that what’s best for owners’ diets isn’t the same for their pets.
There has never been a more profitable time for the pet market. For the first time ever, pet sales have gone past $100 billion. It seems that during the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers who were forced to stay home turned to pets to ease their anxiety. During 2020, there was a 700% increase in pet adoptions from 2019 along with a 9.7% increase in pet food sales.
The food demands of those pet owners are very similar to those who purchase Beyond Burgers. Since animals require food that is extremely rich in protein, and animal meat is very expensive, dog food manufacturers have constantly tried to find alternative protein-rich ingredients for their products. They were originally able to find that in grains but soon had to create “grain-free” food because dog owners thought their pets were eating a cheap and unhealthy product. Those “grain-free” foods are rich in pea protein, one of the first ingredients in Beyond Burgers.
However, recent evidence suggests that the emphasis on certain buzzwords and qualities of animal foods had more to do with marketing than actual health or sustainability.
In 2019, the FDA had to put out a warning that more than 500 dogs had been diagnosed with diet-related heart failure traced back to grain-free foods. Apparently, “current grain-free diet trends are about selling pet food, not about pet health, and can lead to less sustainable diets.”
By-products in pet food, like organs, have also been unfairly stigmatized. A recent article by the Clinical Nutrition Team at Tufts found that while ”many companies persist in telling pet owners that byproducts should be avoided to make their own diets more appealing … the best way to feed our pets meat-based diets with minimal footprints is to use every part of the animals we slaughter for human food.”
With examples like these and pet ownership on the rise, it seems that both the demand for sustainable foods and the need to navigate through marketing is only going to increase.
Image Credit: alexei_tm / Shutterstock.com
Industry Trends
Industry Trends
Industry Trends
Industry Trends
Industry Trends
Industry Trends
Business & Industry
Hydrogen Fuel Cell Company to Move Back to Ohio, Add 680 Jobs
AT&T Shuts Down Its 3G Network, Other Wireless Giants Follow Suit
Google’s Pixel Watch Rumored for 2022 Debut
Ammunition Manufacturer Plans $100 Million Northeast Texas Plant
How the International Space Station Will Spend Its Final Years
Business & Industry
Daily Bite
Business & Industry
Business & Industry
Business & Industry
Select From Over 500,000
Industrial Suppliers
Find and evaluate OEMs, Custom Manufacturers, Service Companies and Distributors.
Receive Daily
Industry Updates
Stay up to date on industry news and trends, product announcements and the latest innovations.
Search Over
6 Million Products
Find materials, components, equipment, MRO supplies and more.
Download 2D & 3D
CAD Models
10+ million models from leading OEMs, compatible with all major CAD software systems.
Copyright© 2022 Thomas Publishing Company. All Rights Reserved. See Terms and Conditions, Privacy Statement and California Do Not Track Notice. Website Last Modified March 15, 2022.
Thomas Register® and Thomas Regional® are part of Thomasnet.com. Thomasnet Is A Registered Trademark Of Thomas Publishing Company.