Recently, mom was invited to attend an influencer summit sponsored by Iams and Eukanuba in Dayton Ohio. Unfortunately, I was not invited (no dogs at hotel). But anyway, I decided to let my mom go on the one condition that she gets in inside scoop on Iams pet care and she gives us full reports for my readers here on prestonspeaks.com Over the next couple of weeks I will feature blogs my mom has written about her experiences at the behind the blog influencer summit. To catch up read these blogs : IAMS and Animal Testing, Behind the Paw 2011 – Manufacturing Tour, Behind the Paw – Day One ,and Behind the Paw 2011
Today, she is going to tell us about IAMS Research and Development Center
I always wondered how a pet care company developed and tested their product lines . IAMS gave me a unique behind the scene tour of their renounced P&G Pet health and Nutrition Center. This research center reminded me of a college campus. It has several modern buildings spread out among this many acre complex. There are approximately 700 cats and dogs housed there. Above is a photo of our group by the front door.
First, from this point out in this post these are photos provided to me by IAMS. Due to the competitive nature of the manufacturing world no photos were allowed to be taken in the complex.
IAMS stance on their dog and cats food is that every ingredient put in their product has a purpose and a benefit to the pets. They also require scientific evidence to back everything in that IAMS can or bag. So that is why is so important to to them to have an in house research center.
We first met with Angela Morris P&G Animal welfare manager. Her job includes handling the socialization, enrichment, education, and adoption program (yep you read that right..an adoption program!).
There is a whole army of animal welfare specialists on staff who provide daily animal care, reinforces training, does the health monitoring, provides exercise, and daily grooming. There are trainers as well who work with each and every cat and dog. You can’t forget about and vets and vet techs who take care of all the animals health needs. There are three on-site clinics and they have top of the line medical equipment on site such as MRIs.
Even the office staff takes an active role in the animals lives. They have a neat program calling “Taking the Lead” in which P&G employees can “check out” dogs to walk them on the campus during lunch and breaks. This program allows these animals to get use to different people and different environments. They also have a mock house set up where the animals go with a trainer and are exposed to TV, furniture, kid toys, and even house noises such as a vacuum, or a toilet flushing.
So your probably wondering where they get the animals? For the dogs they are all pure breed from respectable breeders. I asked why not get dogs from animal control and they did make a good point that they must know the history of each animal to do a scientific study (think back to high school science class..study controls, etc.). Many of these dogs come from show lines and are all AKC breeds. IAMS inspects each and every breeder’s facility regularly and has very strict guidelines and requirements before they will purchase a dog. For the cats they run their own breeding program. They are one of the few places in the country with a specific pathogen free colony. Again this is to ensure solid study results.
Check back tomorrow for part two where I talk about going inside the research center ‘s kennels and cat houses.
Disclosure- Iams did cover my travel expenses and hotel to attend the summit. However, Opinions are my own.
