Beneful Dog Food Review

Is Beneful a Good Dog Food?

This is the question which we certainly tend to answer here. Although first, you must ask yourself whether the choices above have ticked the appropriate boxes so that they will satisfy your dog’s taste buds and, more importantly, meet their nutritional needs. Other dog food reviews tend to blur the lines in order to push the products onto their reader. However, we intend to answer these questions honestly to promise you that we’ve done our research and can provide reliable information.

A Short History of The Beneful Company

Beneful is a product line under Nestle Purina PetCare based in St. Louis, Missouri. Beneful is produced alongside other notable product lines of the company like Pro Plan, Dog Chow, Friskies, and ONE. The brand is the largest pet food company in the US and is the second worldwide.

As a brand, Beneful is relatively new having been introduced in 2001. The product line was conceptualized to appeal to pet parents who are looking for a different kind of dog food than what they are already accustomed to. The first product resembled stew and actually contained real beef pieces.

The product line was embroiled in a class-action lawsuit in 2015. The complaint cited the presence of toxic ingredients, particularly mycotoxins, in a number of Beneful dog food products. Purina countered by saying that the ingredients are all duly-approved by the FDA.

In March 2016, the company voluntarily recalled affected lots of its Pro Plan and Beneful product lines because of insufficient amounts of minerals and vitamins

Take a look at our Purina Pro Plan Dog Food Review.

Where is Beneful Dog Food Made?

99% of Purina’s dog foods are made in their own facilities and factories in the USA. This way, Purina can carefully monitor the manufacturing of all its products and guarantee a safe dog food choice for its customers.

Where do they Source their Ingredients from?

Unlike other dog food brands, Purina primarily sources its ingredients from reliable providers here in the US. Purina also promises that 100% of its ingredients are traced back from trusted suppliers to bring peace of mind to customers.

Product Lines – Differences and Which One You Should Choose

Purina Beneful dog food comes in varieties so it’s always worth taking a look at your options before you make a final decision. Some of these options are available as singular products or can be found in a multipack to save you money.

Beneful Wet Food

• Purina Beneful Chopped Blends (available in multipacks)
• Incredibites Pate (available in a variety-flavor pack)
• Incredibites For Small Dogs (available in a multipack)
• Medleys (Available in a multipack)
• Prepared Meals (Available in a variety-flavor pack)
• Superfood Blend (Available in a variety-flavor pack)

Beneful Dry Dog Food

• Grain-free
• Healthy weight
• Healthy Puppy
• High-Protein
• Incredibites For Small Dogs
• Beneful Dry Dog Food Originals
• Playful Life
• Prime
• Protein Rich
• Superfood Blend

As you can see, Purina Beneful dog food comes in a variety of choices and even has options for puppies and smaller dog breeds too.

Let’s Take A Closer Look At The Ingredients

The true measure of a dog food brand’s effectiveness as a provider of high-quality dog food can be measured through the ingredients it uses. In this Beneful dog food review, we’re going to carefully analyze the ingredient mix of the brand as far as the 5 products that we’ve featured are concerned.

• Below average to average proteins

Based on the 3 dry dog food variants and the 2 variety packs of Beneful wet food in this review, we determined the protein content for the dry dog food was 24.67% while the wet variety had 10.33%. When the moisture content of the said products was taken into consideration, we came up with the following dry matter percentage of protein: 28.35% for dry dog food and 44.9% for the wet food variant.

While it is easy to say that 45% is high, it should be noted that other brands of wet food can have a protein content of as much as 55% for the wet version. For the dry version, most high-end, high-quality protein-rich dog foods come with at least 35% of dry matter equivalent. This puts the Beneful brand well behind these protein-rich dog food products.

A point we’d like to raise is that there are many questionable animal products on the ingredient list. We’ve noted the use of the term “meat byproducts” or “liver”. We’re not sure what animal they took the byproducts or the liver from. This runs against every rule that veterinary nutritionists espouse when listing ingredients. The ingredients should always be clearly identified.

The good news is that Beneful uses farm-raised animals in their formulations. We just don’t get why they don’t want to just write ‘chicken liver’ or ‘beef liver’ if that is where they sourced the liver from.

• Low to below-average fats

As far as the fat content is concerned, Nestle Purina’s Beneful brand comes with rather pleasing results. Its dry variants have an estimated dry matter fat content of 14.7% which is still a bit lower than other brands nearing the 20s. Its wet variant, however, is what is really surprising since it is only about a few percentage points from the minimum recommended fat intake for dogs by AAFCO. We computed the wet varieties of Beneful dog food to have a dry matter fat content of only 9.78%.

Not everything is good news, however. We couldn’t find any information about DHA and EPA in the products that we’ve reviewed. We did manage to note the presence of linoleic acid in a few products, but this is basically an omega-6 fatty acid. We’re more concerned about omega-3s especially when it comes to immune, nervous, cardiovascular, and integumentary system health.

• Average to above-average carbohydrates

While both NRC and AAFCO don’t provide guidelines about the correct proportion of carbs in dog food, we can only make an estimated guess based on the prevailing convention that the dog’s diet should consist primarily of proteins. When the protein and fat contents were computed in both the dry and wet versions of Beneful we arrived at the following results: 56.95% carbohydrates for the dry and 45.32% for the wet.

We’ve seen dog food products that fare way better with the dry dog food formulation containing no more than 40% carbs while the wet food variety is in the lower 30s. The implication is that, while Beneful promises to utilize premium animal ingredients in its formulas, it is nowhere near the expected proportion of animal proteins. One can safely say that Beneful retains the characteristic of its parent company – using more carbohydrates as fillers instead of using more premium quality animal ingredients. This is where most of the corn and wheat that are present in many formulations come in.

• Micronutrients

Beneful meets NRC and AAFCO recommendations for micronutrients, although we’d like to point out that we sorely miss the probiotics, chondroitin, and glucosamine in other brands. While these are not recognized by AAFCO and NRC as essential nutrients, they can help in promoting healthier digestion, immunity, and joints.

Other Ingredients:

One of the products in this review mentioned “artificial and natural flavors” as well as “added color”. We are not absolutely certain just what kind of “artificial” flavoring was used or what variant of “added color” was used in the formulation. Suffice it to say that these ‘ingredients’ are even listed underscores the brand’s continuing disregard for pet food product safety conventions.

Dog Food Recall History

Unfortunately, Beneful has voluntarily recalled selected wet foods in the past due to products not containing the recommended level of minerals and vitamins. This was discovered via Purina’s own testing regime to which they made the decision to recall the products.

Prices

Providing accurate prices for the Beneful range can be difficult. Prices can fluctuate depending on the product line, subscriptions, and deals provided by the individual websites. However, we can provide an average price

Beneful Originals With Real Beef Dry Dog Food (28lbs) – $25-$32

Beneful Grain-Free Dry Dog Food (23 lbs) – $24-$35

Beneful Incredibites Variety Pack Dog Foods (3oz can, case of 12) – $8-$12

Beneful Incredibites For Small Dogs Dog Food (14lbs) – $14.99-$20

Beneful Prepared Meals Variety Pack Dog Foods (10oz, case of 12) – $20 -$25

Beneful Adult Dry Dog Food (26lbs) – $38-$40

Beneful Healthy Weight Chicken Adult Dry Dog Foods (6.5lbs) – $10-$21

Beneful Medleys Wet Food Variety Pack (5.45lbs) – $8-$20

Beneful Simple Goodness Adult Dry Dog Foods – $17-$20

Where Can I Buy Beneful Dog Food?

Fortunately, you won’t have to look far to purchase Beneful dog food as our above products contain the necessary links to sources selling the dog foods. Browse the dog food reviews above to access Amazon, Chewy, and Petsmart.

In a Nutshell, is Beneful a Good Choice?

If you don’t mind feeding your pet wheat, corn, and soy or any of the ingredients many pet parents are quite wary of, then Beneful should be a great choice. Its use of farm-raised animals is always a welcome development from a company that is generally known for putting more fillers into their formulas rather than real meats.

Pet parents who want a reduced-fat alternative to their current dog food, the wet food formula of Beneful is a great choice since it has one of the lowest dry matter fat content one can get from the market. However, just don’t go asking about the levels of EPA or DHA from these products as there are none.

Individuals who would like to give their pets moderate amounts of calories and proteins just enough to meet their daily metabolic requirements can rest assured that Beneful will deliver such requirements to them. The calorie content of Beneful dog food is one of the lowest among the countless dog food brands. This should be perfect for dogs that are prone to obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular problems