Go to any pet food and supply store and it’s easy to feel like you’re suffering from sensory overload. With aisles upon aisles of food options, each touting its own tagline, it can be confusing to make any choice, let alone the one that’s best for your dog. If you find yourself mystified by the multitude of options, let us offer a little extra help.

A lot of shelf space in most stores is taken up either by kibble or canned food, and much of it these days boasts being all natural or holistic. But each of those can be problematic when it comes to delivering the real nutrition that your dog needs.

Dry kibble, even when it’s grain-free or all-natural, according to the label, is heavily processed – the very shape and color of it speaks volumes about all the grinding, cooking, extruding, sterilizing and more that it’s been through. All of those processes, put together, deplete the nutrients that would be present in ingredients like meat, carrots or apples. Some companies are introducing “baked” kibble to address this issue, but these recipes are still made using a cooking process. A lot of kibble also includes fillers that can add calories without providing any real nourishment. When all is said and done, the end product is very dry – much drier than the ideal food for your dog’s system – and that can lend itself to a lack of water intake.

Canned food, while it’s wet, still often suffers from the same problem of over-processing, leaving it lacking in nutritional value. It’s also packed with preservatives that keep it shelf-stable over long periods of time. In canned food as well as kibble, it’s common that mixes of vitamins have to be added after all the cooking, in order to restore some nutrients – anything that occurred naturally in the ingredients has been processed out.

Providing pets with real, whole-food ingredients that align with their natural digestive system is at the heart of the movement toward feeding raw dog food, and what we at Sojos believe in. Because our food features raw freeze-dried meats and gently air-dried fruits and vegetables, all of the naturally occurring nutrients in those ingredients stay put. That means more and better nutrition, and ultimately, healthier, happier dogs.