How Smack Wins The Hearts of Picky Pets
Your furry friend knows what they like… and what they don’t. Smack’s recipes are specially formulated to meet pets’ nutritional needs while providing an irresistible taste and aroma that appeals to their natural preferences. The results get even the pickiest pets excited for mealtimes again! Here’s how we do it:
Aroma is Key… At First
As you can imagine, smell is the biggest factor in appealing to pets. Studies have shown that dogs with known preferences between different meats no longer exhibit those preferences when food options are given without an aroma. Similar studies also found that when served two novel options, dogs will select the option with a more stimulating aroma. However, after sampling the novel foods several times, other factors like taste, texture, and appearance become more important in the dog’s preference (1). This tells us that aroma is the most important consideration when introducing a new food, though other factors become important as well after your pet has tried a specific food for the first time.
Pets Prioritize Protein
With that said, what goes into an appealing aroma? Meat! Studies have found that dogs will choose meals that primarily consist of protein and fat with as little as 7% carbohydrate, while typical kibble diets consist of 16%–38% protein, 6%–18% fat, and 40%–60% carbohydrate (2). With a ratio this far from what dogs would choose for themselves, it’s easy to see why so many pet parents struggle to appeal to picky pets with a conventional kibble diet. Smack, on the other hand, contains more of the meats that release highly stimulating odors (and nutrients!) in line with the diets pets are naturally drawn to.
Smack takes this one step further by using all-natural meats and wild-caught fish, prepared bone-in with organs. Based on Dr. Ian Billinghurst’s biologically appropriate raw food diet, whole-prey proteins like this emulate what pets’ early ancestors ate. By including all the tasty bits pets love, we can naturally maximize the health benefits of the food while enhancing the aroma and flavour. It’s not just more appealing, it’s also more nutritious!
Good Food Is More Than the Sum of Its Ingredients
Of course, more goes into a meal than just the ingredients. All of our recipes are prepared with a gentle dehydration process, which protects the beneficial enzymes of our superfood ingredients while killing harmful pathogens. Protecting these enzymes helps maximize the nutritional value of our food and preserves the irresistible aroma. By contrast, other foods that use harsher processes like freeze-drying or the extreme heat required to make most kibbles break down these enzymes. This compromises the aroma, the nutritional value, and the appeal to pets (3).
The benefits of dehydration don’t stop there. While not as impactful as aroma, colour and shape also affect palatability. Pets prefer foods with a lighter brown colour and irregular shapes — just like Smack — over the dark brown, homogenous shapes of the typical kibble (3).
To summarize, pets are drawn to smells, appearances, and textures that indicate fresh, highly nutritious food in line with their unique needs. Pets can sniff out the compromises in highly processed foods with carbohydrate-based fillers — and some will turn their noses up at it. When you’re trying to win over a picky eater, there’s no substitute for the smell of high-quality meats, though the natural appearance of nutrient-rich foods with an appealing texture certainly won’t hurt. If that’s a tall order, Smack makes it easy with picky pet-approved recipes formulated specifically for their needs and preferences that are ready to serve right out of the bag.
1. Nathaniel J. Hall, Franck Péron, Stéphanie Cambou, Laurence Callejon, Clive D.L. Wynne, Food and Food-Odor Preferences in Dogs: A Pilot Study, Chemical Senses, Volume 42, Issue 4, 1 May 2017, Pages 361–370.
2. Roberts, M. T., Bermingham, E. N., Cave, N. J., Young, W., McKenzie, C. M., & Thomas, D. G. (2018). Macronutrient intake of dogs, self-selecting diets varying in composition offered ad libitum. Journal of Animal Physiology and Animal Nutrition, 102(2), 568-575.
3. Calderón N, White BL, Seo HS. Measuring palatability of pet food products: Sensory components, evaluations, challenges, and opportunities. J Food Sci. 2024 Dec;89(12):8175-8196.
