Muenster Milling launches kibble plus pet food

MUENSTER, TEXAS — Muenster Milling Company announced the launch of its new kibble plus pet food product on Aug. 20. According to the manufacturer, the new product format will enable leading brands and retailers to address consumer demand for high-nutrition pet food at an affordable price. 

The kibble plus product combines three manufacturing capabilities — extruded kibble, freeze-dried proteins and blending. According to Muenster, the freeze-dried and kibble-plus category of the pet food industry is rapidly growing with retail sales for the segment at $1.2 billion in the 52 weeks ending July 2024, up 17% over the prior-year period.

“Given our unique capabilities to produce and blend both extruded product and freeze-dried inclusions, kibble plus became an obvious platform for us to address the needs of pet owners in this fast-growing segment,” said Jim Holdrieth, chief executive officer of Muenster. “As the leading provider of co-manufacturing and privatedevelopment in the freeze-dried category, our capabilities offer leading brands the ability to mix and match kibble and freeze-dried in a logistically cost-effective manner.”

Freeze-dried meals are an affordability challenge for millions of pet owners, with a retail price per pound averaging $36, compared to $2.50 for conventional kibble, according to the company. Kibble plus products offer a more affordable way for pet parents to provide the nutritional benefits of freeze-dried food. 

“We are excited to be a one-stop partner that can produce and blend kibble with freeze-dried inclusions for our customers,” said Dave DeLorenzo, vice president of sales, marketing and commercialization for Muenster. “Our new freeze-dried facility has an advanced blending system that can combine multiple freeze-dried inclusions with various innovative shapes of kibble that ensures well-distributed, gently mixed food. Combined with our high-speed packaging solutions from 1-oz samples to large bags, our customers can deliver a freeze-dried feeding experience at an accessible price point, providing significant value to pet parents.”

Read more about product development, ingredients and formulation.