Last Updated on April 2, 2024 by Indy the Cat
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History
Leaps and Bounds (hereby referred to as L&B) is the house brand sold exclusively at Petbarn. While Petbarn is likely the name you come cross the most in the pet food space, its company technically falls under Greencross Limited. Greencross itself was originally founded as a veterinary company, which eventually merged with Petbarn in 2014. Their network continues to grow to this day and spans everything from pet shops to grooming and veterinary services.
Despite being technically owned by Petbarn, L&B is a separate brand and company and not manufactured by Petbarn itself. Its product lines span various types of pet food and as you would expect, both wet and dry cat and dog food. The brand has been around for at least 5+ years, but the history of the actual company is unclear.
When we reached out to L&B for more information on the company history, we were told the information is proprietary. Quite odd considering this should be public information that anyone is willing to share. Unfortunately, having a vague about page and not giving answers does not leave a positive first impression. Let’s keep digging.
Recalls
To date, L&B cat food has not been recalled. In Australia, pet food recalls are only mandatory for brands that have decided to work within the Australian Standard for Manufacturing and Marketing of Pet Food (Standard AS5812:2017). All members of the Pet Food Industry Association of Australia comply with these standards and at the time of publishing, L&B (nor Petbarn / Greencross) is not a member of the Association.
Product Line Commentary
Today, we are looking at the Leaps & Bounds Ocean Fish Topped with Mussel recipe. The L&B wet cat food line is quite interesting. Most of their flavours come in two textures (gravy or jelly) and a few of their formulas also come in mousse. We previously covered a gravy formula (chicken and duck).
It’s quite nice to have a choice of texture given essentially the same base ingredients and macro profile. If you’re looking to expose your cat to different textures, you can essentially do two textures with 1 flavour! This mousse formula is nice if your cat likes softer foods that they can lap up as it breaks up easily. It doesn’t have the exact formula in another form, but they do have a few variations (e.g. fish topped with Salmon or Fish topped with scallops).
Most of L&B’s wet cat food line is catered to adults except for their kitten formulas. They advertise all their wet foods as a grain free food with 100% real meat.
Topped with Whole Mussel
The main proteins here are ocean fish and chicken, with mussels as the secondary protein. If you ever see food labelled with the word with, it will comprise of a very small percentage of the food (under certain American standards, that is said to be less than 3%).
That being said, there are visible whole mussels on top of the cat food (seen to the left here), which is quite impressive!
With regards to ocean fish, it is a vague term which can mean many different types of fish. This vagueness can be used to describe fish that isn’t valued by humans or potentially lower quality fish. Feeding primarily fish is not nutritionally sufficient so this brings us to our next protein – chicken. It’s interesting to see this here but we suspect it was brought in as a secondary protein to round out the nutrition profile. As a fish based formula, we only tend to feed it every so often in Indy’s rotation diet.
A Generic Ingredient List
The total percentage of meat is said to be 90% according to the labelling, but the claim can be seen as confusing. Wet foods are typically 70+% moisture, so is 90% meat meant to be in terms of weight of ingredients? However, as cats are obligate carnivores, it is great that there are no vegetable sourced proteins in this recipe.
The full ingredient list is fairly short, opting not to get into specifics. For example, it lists essential vitamins rather than listing all the vitamins or including ingredients that are the source of specific vitamins. It would have been good to name the gelling agents since some cats may react to specific gelling agents. There have been some studies that suggest that these agents can cause inflammation and other issues, so if you are concerned about it, it’s best avoid these type of vague food labels.
Are House Brands any Good?
In terms of the space that they compete in, we would say this house brand is comparable to Fussy Cat. Both have simple, more generic ingredient lists, but L&B is a bit more pricey than the old Fussy Cat formula we previously reviewed.
Now, is it better than other house brands? To our knowledge, there are actually few house brand cat foods in Australia from online pet stores. As far the ingredients go, it’s more difficult to compare without specifics, but it falls comfortably in the budget category as the ingredient list is nothing special.
The packaging on this brand looks high end and sells its positives well, but we wouldn’t judge a product by its marketing. Some of the notable things include its 5% carbohydrate profile and mentioning fish oils used for omega oils. However, the ingredient list identifies them simply as omega oils. The 5% carbohydrate profile is also confusing as it is listed alongside the 90% meat percentage.
Despite this, there are some strong positives such as having no replacement fillers in their ingredients. They mention their product line having “no potatoes, no corn, no soy and no wheat gluten”. In addition, the formula does not include any colouring, flavouring or preservatives.
At 102kcal per 85g (listed as 120kcal per 100g) can, this recipe has an above average caloric count compared to typical wet foods in this size range. The breakdown shows it would be considered a balanced moderate protein, moderate fat and very low carbohydrate cat food.
Guaranteed analysis
Crude Protein (min) – 8%
Crude Fat (min) – 4%
Crude Fibre (max) – 0.5%
Dry Matter Basis
Unlike many other pet food brands, L&B does not provide a dry matter basis analysis. Their alternative nutritional profile lists the following: 90% meat, 5% carbohydrates and 5% vitamins, minerals and oils. Note this is not the equivalent to a typical analysis or dry matter basis and does not give a clear picture of the actual nutritional profile.
Where to Buy and Cost
Leaps and Bounds can be found exclusively at Petbarn and Cityfarmers pet stores. While the regular price is $19.99/12 cans ($1.67/can), Petbarn has frequent specials of 40% off that bring it down to less than $1.00/can.
As a cheaper food, this is a reasonable option to add into your cat’s diet in order to make their diet more budget friendly. Being able to have a budget food in their diet is one of the many benefits of building a rotation diet! You can still mix up their diet with cheaper foods, so you provide variety without constantly breaking the bank.
Ingredient List
Ocean Fish, Chicken, Mussel, Chelated Minerals, Omega Oils, Gelling Agents, Essential Vitamins
Nutritional Information
Ocean Fish – source of protein
Chicken – source of meat protein
Mussel – source of meat protein and omega 3’s
Chelated Minerals – essential minerals
Omega Oils – essential fatty acids
Gelling Agents – undisclosed binding agent
Essential Vitamins – essential vitamins
Indy’s Review
So does Indy the cat like it?
Yes, Indy is a fish lover so it is a food he naturally gravitates towards. He had no issues with palatability and finishing the food lightning quick. Unlike the chicken with duck recipe he didn’t seem to experience the gagging/burping after effects.
The only downside of course is that it is primarily a fish based recipe. While we don’t usually recommend feeding as a frequent wet food, we still include this every so often (e.g. once every 7-10 days) when we have it in stock.
The good
- Only meat/fish based proteins so fairly species appropriate although primarily fish based foods are a bit more controversial as to the frequency they should be fed
- Grain free without similar substitutes
- Easily adopted by Indy in terms of palatability
- Budget friendly price with an above average caloric count
The bad
- Vague ingredient list provides little insight into the quality and type of ingredients
- Gelling agents listed without specific ingredients
- Company did not reply to my questions about brand history and seemed disinterested in providing more information
Rating
- Species appropriate (weight 0.3) – 7 / 10
- Ingredients (weight 0.3) – 5 / 10
- Recall Track record (weight 0.2) – 10 / 10
- Price (weight 0.2) – 8 / 10
Average Score – 7.5 / 10
Weighted Score – 7.2 / 10
The Bottom Line: A budget friendly food that will please fish lovers. Worth a try, but prefer to only feed it on occasion.
If you spot an error in this article, please do not hesitate to let us know!
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