# Avoid Getting Your Animal in This Profit Machine



## Huly (Mar 5, 2012)

Avoid Getting Your Animal in This Profit Machine | Dogs Naturally Magazine

Here’s a great business model (but a good one to not be a part of!):

1.Sell a product, in fact, better yet, give it away in the package plan you sell so it looks like an amazing bargain. Brand the plan with the word “Wellness.”
2.Tie into a profession that’s widely looked up to as purveyors of animal health who fully buy in to this product. So much so, that they push it as well, and make their living by pushing it.
3.When that product creates long term health problems in those who partake, sell a specialized product that addresses them. Make it expensive, “scientific” and high tech, and have a line of that product sold by the animal health profession itself. Add to their bottom line. See #2.
4.Claim product #1 has nothing to do with creating disease, (and have the profession widely decry the very idea of it — “It prevents disease!”) but explain how #3 will cure the disease (that it’s created).
5.Smile all the way to the bank. You’ve made money creating a problem and “fixing” the same problem!
Variations of this business model live and thrive in many circles of society now, but one that affects you, dear pet owner, is purveyed by the Mars company. It sunk in over the past week, since I posted about their “fix” of selling chicken feathers as protein in their version of the best dog food: Royal Canin.

Oh, and product #1? Vaccinations. For everything imaginable.

Unraveling the Scheme
So, who’s the Mars Company? Purveyors of diabetes and cavities, through their Milky Way, Skittles, M & M’s and such. Yes, they are a candy company, at least that’s where they got their start. One famous for their secrecy.

Mars branched out in 2007 to own Banfield, The Pet Hospital. Who sells a “Wellness Plan” that includes “free vaccinations!” when you sign up. Often twice a year. Ahem.

You know that frequency of vaccination is excessive, unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past twenty years. And, you know it’s risky. But that the profession here, conventional veterinary medicine, runs on its profits and Dr. WhiteCoat isn’t going to stop pushing vaccinations if he has any say in the matter. Which he does. He can do anything he wishes in the name of “professional judgment.”

And Banfield is a collection of corporate Dr. WhiteCoats, who vaccinate repeatedly in the name of “wellness.”

Now, through Mars’ subsidiary, Royal Canin, they’ll sell you a high end, laboratory made diet with this “novel protein” source: chicken feathers. To cure the allergies they’ve created by repeatedly vaccinating every animal that comes through the doors of the Banfield machine.

Is your head starting to hurt, yet?

Drop Out, Quick!
You are the only one calling the shots (sorry, bad metaphor. Wait: maybe not) for your animal’s health. They don’t vote. They eat what you offer, go to the vet when you say they’re going, and take whatever you agree to in the name of “prevention” or treatment.

I submit that, unless you are keeping your eyes open and are willing to think outside the medicine box, your animals will become health statistics. If you follow this brand of “prevention,” it’s not a matter of “if my animals get sick” but rather, “when.”

I’d hate to see you visiting your vet because you’ve got an allergic pet, one of the top three reasons the average consumer brought their animal for veterinary services in 2012. Because that’s a long, suffering road, with no cure in sight, if you stick to what Dr. WhiteCoat recommends.

[There are better options, if you get stuck in this machine.]

Be smarter than that. Choose your natural path carefully, eyes wide open, ears wide open, and learning all you can before making health decisions for your animals.

Some Brilliant Words for Dr. WhiteCoat
When you are in for an exam, and something is recommended to you, especially more vaccinations in one already vaccinated, try these words out:

“Doctor, let me get back to you on that. I need to do my research before I decide.”

Wow. Did you see how you just took control of that situation? Powerful stuff.


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## zellko (Jul 3, 2013)

Wow! I bought into the Banfield thing because a friend of hubby's had it and so hubby thought it would be good. I was already thinking I wouldn't reup next year. I did think it weird that the vet recommended RC, when even Petsmart has some better options. To her credit, my vet did give me info on home cooked diets.


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## Evelyn (Oct 14, 2012)

When I took Ike to his vet, the first time, I told him right off what he was being fed, because I knew he sells this crap. When I told him fromm and ziwipeak, he looked shocked , and said he has a good home. 

Why would they sell crap?


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## Buildthemskywards (Jun 16, 2012)

zellko said:


> Wow! I bought into the Banfield thing because a friend of hubby's had it and so hubby thought it would be good. I was already thinking I wouldn't reup next year. I did think it weird that the vet recommended RC, when even Petsmart has some better options. To her credit, my vet did give me info on home cooked diets.


I'd be careful with home cooked diets too thought because often they are lacking in essential nutrients because the cooking kills them and it is difficult to get the right balance. A much better option for people who want to go down that route is a raw diet but at least she is letting people know that they do have different options


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## coco_little_bear (May 30, 2012)

Evelyn said:


> When I took Ike to his vet, the first time, I told him right off what he was being fed, because I knew he sells this crap. When I told him fromm and ziwipeak, he looked shocked , and said he has a good home.


I'm surprised he was able to recognise you feed a much better food, that's at least that. When I told my vet I feed ziwipeak, she basically told me I was harming Lilo and depriving her of a healthy puppy development. 

I was talking to the owner of my local pet shop the other day and she told me that some of the vets nearby shamelessly push science diet and royal canin at their vet practice, yet come to her shop to buy ziwipeak for their own dogs and admit they would never feed anything else.  And those are the people who supposedly take care of our pets health...


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## Angel1210 (Mar 14, 2011)

Wow! It kind of makes you wonder who can you trust? Oh wait, I know who! People on this forum!!  

If you have a question or need verification, come here first! You will not be disappointed!

Thanks Christie!


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## Huly (Mar 5, 2012)

Yeah I like to post articles like this as it makes you think. Most Vets can not keep up or do not know about proper nutrition. They are not trained in it. 

I never knew Banfield and RC was owned by Mars.


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## Buildthemskywards (Jun 16, 2012)

I didn't know that either but I didn't know half the things I know now before this forum. I would have trusted my vet and I'd probably be feeding Iams because it's the most expensive in the UK. I'm eternally grateful to this place, the support and all the knowledge it's given me.


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## Huly (Mar 5, 2012)

Buildthemskywards said:


> I didn't know that either but I didn't know half the things I know now before this forum. I would have trusted my vet and I'd probably be feeding Iams because it's the most expensive in the UK. I'm eternally grateful to this place, the support and all the knowledge it's given me.


I could not agree more!


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