Scientific basis, nutritional validation and quality assurance
This describes the system as designed. Dispatch has not opened, and no commercial batch has been manufactured.
Our regulatory classification in each jurisdiction is set out separately on the regulatory and standards page.
1 · Scientific basis
Our formulations are built on published companion-animal nutrition science and recognised nutrient requirement frameworks — primarily NRC 2006 (Nutrient Requirements of Dogs and Cats), cross-referenced against AAFCO and FEDIAF profiles and published ingredient-composition data.
These are recognised bodies of evidence, not proprietary assumptions. Our bibliography is published, and every nutrient target we use can be traced to its source.
2 · How nutritional adequacy is substantiated
AAFCO recognises formulation against established nutrient profiles, and feeding trials, as methods of substantiating adequacy for complete pet foods. FEDIAF provides corresponding guidance for both complete and complementary feeds, with the validation approach determined by the product's intended role in the total diet.
Growlrr is a complementary feed. Adequacy is a property of the specified combination — the sachet together with its intended dietary base, at the dose the builder returns — not of the sachet in isolation. Our approach is formulation-based.
Conventional formulation substantiates one recipe. Because our product corrects a bowl the owner cooks, a single recipe would not represent what customers actually feed. We therefore ran over one million simulated bowls across the input space the BARC protocol permits.
What the simulation varies
- Species — dogs and cats are modelled separately.
- Body weight — across the full advertised range for each species.
- The activity and status multiplier — the energy requirement band each animal sits in.
- The nutrient content of the food itself — grocery composition varies lot to lot, the animal varies day to day, and cooking retention varies with method.
- Manufacturing variation — sachet fill and the potency of the purified actives.
The recipe is held constant within a run; what varies is what that recipe actually delivers. Those are different questions, and we model the second.
Each simulated combination was evaluated individually against NRC 2006 requirements and the applicable safe upper limits. A combination counts as passing where the lowest evaluated nutrient reaches at least 90% of its requirement and no nutrient exceeds its safe upper limit. The release gate is applied to the distribution, not to a single run: the Wilson lower confidence bound on the pass rate must clear the threshold, which is a deliberately harder test than reporting an average.
The 90% floor is the standard the formulation is held to because a daily-fed product is judged on the days it is weakest, not on its mean. We state the criterion rather than implying every nutrient always lands at or above 100% of requirement.
What this establishes, and what it does not
The simulation establishes that the nutrient arithmetic closes across the range of diets the protocol permits. It does not establish digestibility, bioavailability, palatability or long-term biological outcomes. Those are different questions, answered by different methods, and we do not claim them here.
3 · Verification and quality assurance
The scientific basis of a formulation and the verification of a manufactured batch are different things, each requiring its own evidence.
We have defined a product-specific quality control and batch-release programme. The applicable procedures will be executed and documented for commercial production batches, and commercial dispatch will be subject to their completion and review. The programme covers:
- Ingredient specifications and supplier documentation
- Defined formulation and manufacturing specifications
- Analytical verification against product specification, including heavy metals, microbiology and assay
- Blend uniformity testing, using a low-inclusion marker element across multiple sampling points
- Batch documentation, traceability and release records
- Stability testing and shelf-life controls
These procedures apply from the first commercial batch onward. Dispatch is not yet open, and we do not hold batch records for product that has not been made.
4 · Our position on animal feeding trials
Feeding trials evaluate a finished product for palatability, tolerance and biological performance. They are one method of establishing nutritional adequacy, not the only one.
The standard protocol does not fit this product. An AAFCO adult-maintenance feeding trial evaluates a defined food formulation, fed as the sole source of nutrition apart from water, over a minimum twenty-six weeks, with specified animal numbers, examinations and acceptance criteria. That protocol is designed to evaluate a manufactured food. We correct a variable dietary base that the owner selects and prepares — there is no single fixed formulation that represents the diets our product is intended to operate across.
This is a statement about the fit of that particular protocol, not about feeding studies in general. A purpose-designed study could evaluate a defined set of representative diets; it would not be the standard AAFCO complete-food trial, and we would not describe it as one.
We do not conduct laboratory feeding trials using colony animals, and do not intend to.
Where we undertake animal observations, they take place in the animals' existing homes or kennels, with owner or caretaker consent. They are non-invasive, involve no animals housed for research, and no diets the animals would not otherwise receive.
Such observations may inform palatability, acceptance and practical feeding behaviour. They are not feeding trials and are not offered as a substitute for formulation and analytical validation. Where feeding trials have not been conducted, we do not represent them as completed.
5 · Reproducibility and technical review
Formulation-based substantiation is independently reproducible from its inputs. The nutrient frameworks, targets, ingredient assumptions and formulation methodology can be examined against the published sources they rest on, and the simulation's constraints and evaluation criteria form part of the technical basis of the system.
A qualified reviewer can check our calculations against NRC 2006 and the specified dietary inputs without our cooperation. That is why we publish the framework rather than summarise it.