To our extended furfam,
We are happy to announce that we are only a few weeks away from the launch of our enhanced Species Balanced family of products. We’ve been working hard to get everything lined up for a smooth launch.
On March 21st we announced some upcoming recipe enhancements and the renaming of our product family from Balanced Raw to Species Balanced™. Based on feedback to our previous ‘News from the Founders’ message, we’d like to make the following points clear:
1) The Species Balanced product family will have both the Enhanced Recipe raw and new steamed products. We updated the recipes based on customer feedback to make them more species appropriate. For your convenience we’ve included the new recipe details from our previous email below in the section titled “Enhanced Recipe”.
2) The original Balanced Raw recipes will be available until the end of June or when supplies run out. These products will be marked as “OLD” to make them easy to distinguish.
NEW Species Balanced Steamed Recipes
We are excited to announce that we are introducing a new line of products using the new enhanced raw recipes that are steam cooked in final packaging rather than high pressure processed (HPP).
This process is more time intensive than traditional high temperature, canning, or kettle cooking, but preserves the nutrients while still providing an USDA accepted pathogen kill step. In terms of appearance, the product has fine grind texture and the color of a "medium” cooked roast. All cats and dogs who’ve tried these recipes have been ecstatic!
Gently cooked products may be easier than a raw product for cats and dogs to digest.
NEW Variety Packs Replacing 2 lb cases
We are introducing a 5 lb variety pack with Chicken, Turkey, and Beef in place of our current 2 lb packs. Each variety pack will contain 2 lb of Chicken, 1.5 lb of Turkey, and 1.5 lb of Beef. There will be four variety packs: Raw Variety Pack for Cats, Steamed Variety Pack for Cats, Raw Variety Pack for Dogs, and Steamed Variety Pack for Dogs.
Please note that we are unable to offer alternative variety pack compositions.
UPDATE New Fulfillment Partner
We are changing our fulfillment partners to a larger and well-established firm who has a stellar track record who not only ships with recyclable eco-coolers, but also purchases carbon offsets for their shipping efforts and runs on renewable energy.
Given that they fulfill a substantially higher volume of orders than our current partner, changes to placed orders are disruptive to their process and unfortunately we need to introduce a $15 change fee for orders that have been placed but not shipped.
Subscription customers please please please watch out for your 3 day order warning and make any necessary changes, or reach out to us directly for assistance before your order is automatically placed.
Price Protection
The enhanced recipes and ingredient costs result in a superior product but require that we begin raising our prices for new customers.
NOTE: As a thank you, all of our existing customers will be locked into the current price for cat recipes for 12 months for both our enhanced raw and new steamed recipes. Existing customers of dog products will see a slight ($0.50/lb) increase over the current cat prices. This price lock-in reflects a savings of $.50/lb for all new customers to offset the enhanced recipe and packaging costs.
**Please note that only customers who have placed an order or registered an account by the launch of our Species Balanced product family will be eligible for this price protection.**
All customers will need to login to their balancedblends.com account to be able to add items to their carts and checkout. Guest checkouts will be disabled so that we can offer you the price lock-in. If you have never logged in, all you need to do is register an account with the email that you’ve previously used.
New Product Emails and Survey
All new Species Balanced orders will trigger a helpful set of emails including information on shipping, transitioning, and the like.
Please let us know via the Survey Form in the 4th informative email about your experience with our enhanced offerings. We love getting to know our extended furfam so the survey now includes a section where you can share a bit more :)
Enhanced Recipe
We are enhancing our feline and canine recipes to delight you and your families. These improvements will be available in the near future as part of our new Species Balanced™ Raw product line (previously named “Species Raw”).
Some key changes, and explanations for them:
- Improving the organ-muscle ratio
- Increasing the use of animal-based nutrients
- Increased use of Salmon Oil
- Updated our premixes to use chelated or proteinated trace minerals
- Improved palatability
We are improving the organ-muscle ratio in our new recipes to increase the quantity of micronutrients derived directly from organ meats.
We are increasing the use of animal-based nutrients and removing all the digestible plant matter from the new recipes because both cats and dogs are carnivores and a species appropriate diet should include as much nutrition as possible from wholesome animal ingredients. Specifically:
- We are removing both flaxseed oil and hempseed oil from all recipes as they are plant-based oils. Feel free to supplement your furfam’s meals with either oil as indicated by your trusted veterinarian.
- We are removing the fruits and vegetables in our dog dinners in favor of additional wholesome muscle meat and organs. This shift also addresses our discomfort with current agricultural practices that have led to numerous produce recalls including for products with supposedly “clean” labels such as “organic”.
We increased the use of Salmon Oil to add EPA and DHA omega-3 fatty acids for their health and anti-inflammatory properties. Please consult with a trusted veterinarian before supplementing our new recipes with additional EPA or DHA sources.
We have updated our premixes to use chelated or proteinated trace minerals to improve bioavailability. Chelated and proteinated trace minerals are bound to organic compounds rather than other inorganic elements making them more bioavailable.
We’ve improved palatability by modifying our production techniques to create a smoother product and by eliminating plant-based ingredients.
As always, please reach out to support@balancedblends.com with any questions, comments, or concerns.
Sincerely,
John and Christina,
The Balanced Blends Founders
=^..^=
Pets Are Family | Carnivores Hunt | We Choose To Feed Appropriately
