Why Does Blue Buffalo Have So Many Recalls?
The reason why Blue Buffalo and other pet food brands have so many recalls lies mainly in the way the pet food is made.
The thing is that most brands don’t actually manufacture the food themselves. Instead, they create the formula for their pet food and give it to their partners responsible for mixing the ingredients.
In its turn, one manufacturing facility can work and make products for many different brands and will thus produce many kinds of pet food. This creates a risk for cross-contamination. Cross-contamination mainly occurs when the facilities aren’t cleaned well after processing one substance and it gets transferred onto the next food it processes.
This is what happened in October 2010, when some of the Blue Buffalo dog food products got recalled because of the elevated Vitamin D.
So while Blue Buffalo owns and operates two manufacturing facilities, they still cooperate with US-based partner factories and are dependent on their cleaning and quality standards.
Many Blue Buffalo recalls were also done voluntarily as a precautionary measure. As counterintuitive as it sounds, a voluntary recall can actually be a good thing. This means that a company often has quality procedures in place, testing for defects. And this isn’t what every brand is doing.
Is Blue Buffalo Making Dogs Sick?
Blue Buffalo is a famous US-based pet food brand that claims to use only all-natural finest ingredients. Instead of cheap corn fillers and meat meals, Blue Buffalo products derive their protein from quality meat sources and whole grains such as brown rice. Each product also contains trademarked “cold-formed” LifeSource Bits – a blend of nutrients, minerals, and antioxidants critical for a dog’s proper development and functioning.
Sounds too good to be true? Unfortunately, it might be.
Despite its advertised rigorous testing and premium quality, Blue Buffalo has been hit by several lawsuits and scandals over the recent years. The plaintiffs alleged the brand of bad ingredients quality and misleading marketing.
The most recent class-action lawsuit against Blue Buffalo was filed in 2020. The plaintiff Shannon Walton fed the dog BLUE Wilderness Rocky Mountain since it was advertised to be inspired by a natural wolf’s diet. Walton claimed that Blue Buffalo dog food caused her pet to gain significant weight and get diabetes. After the investigation, lawyers found that a plate of BLUE Wilderness kibble contained more carbohydrates than a meat-eating wolf would consume in a lifetime, thus accusing the brand of misleading marketing.
Three years earlier, in June 2017, Vladi Zakinov accused Blue Buffalo of selling foods that contain high levels of lead – a toxic chemical with multiple health hazards. The foods mentioned in the lawsuit included Blue Wilderness Chicken Recipe for Small Breed Adult Dogs; Blue Freedom GrainFree Chicken Recipe for Small Breed Adult Dogs; and Blue Basics Grain-Free Turkey & Potato Recipe for Adult Dogs. The lawsuit was dismissed a year later.
The biggest storm of lawsuits hit Blue Buffalo in 2014. Several dog owners carried out independent testing on some of the Blue Buffalo products and eventually filed a class-action lawsuit. The group accused Blue Buffalo of deceptive advertising and claimed that Blue Buffalo dog food ingredients do not conform to the brand’s True Blue Promise. For example, independent testing revealed that:
Blue Buffalo admitted working with a shady supplier who supposedly sent mislabeled ingredients to the manufacturing facility. They also filed a complaint against two of their suppliers in the next year. The lawsuit ended in a settlement, and the company paid $32 million to the plaintiffs.
Links found with Dogs dying or sicken after eating Pet Food.
Mycotoxicosis is a term used to denote poisoning by food products contaminated by fungi (mold).
FAQ
Is Blue Buffalo making dogs sick?
What is the controversial ingredient in Blue Wilderness dog food?
Are dogs allergic to Blue Buffalo dog food?