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Pet wellbeing, nutrition and health: superfoods for pets

Until a few years ago, the division was simple: dog food and cat food. At most, you could choose between dry and wet, kibble or pâté, chunks or mixes to cook in water. You found the right brand and, out of habit, you kept going with those three or four products.

Then things changed. Pets became part of the family. Attention grew, sometimes in an almost obsessive way. Consumers started to read more, get informed, compare. And producers, for their part, began to diversify their offering. Today the pet food shelf increasingly resembles a small atlas of animal wellbeing, where you can find everything and more: mono-protein recipes, grain-free foods, products for sterilised dogs, sensitive cats, puppies, seniors, delicate digestion, shiny coats, joints, weight control, functional snacks, toppings, creams, mousses, fresh foods, premium wet foods and enriched formulations.

Within this transformation, superfoods have gained more and more weight. A widely used word, sometimes pulled a bit too far in one direction or the other, but interesting if you look at it without emphasis, as a sign of a market that is changing its language. The Assalco-Zoomark Report 2026 confirms a sector that is now mature and central in consumption related to companion animals. Pet food continues to be one of the most relevant areas of the segment, within a market in which nutrition, care and wellbeing are increasingly intertwined. This is the point: pet food is no longer perceived only as nourishment. It has become a gesture of attention, an identity choice, a daily form of care.

What superfoods for pets really are

The word superfood does not refer to a precise scientific category. There is no official list of “super” ingredients, and adding a berry, a seed or a vegetable to a recipe is not enough to make it better. Superfood is generally used to refer to natural ingredients with a high nutrient density, chosen because they contain fibre, vitamins, minerals, fatty acids, antioxidants or other substances that can support an animal’s wellbeing.

These are ingredients used to orient a product towards a specific function. They can contribute to digestion, immune system support, skin and coat health, vitality, weight control or cellular protection from oxidative stress. Always, however, within a balanced recipe. On their own, of course, they do not perform miracles, they do not cure diseases and they do not replace proper nutrition.

Among the most common examples are pumpkin, appreciated for its fibre content and often associated with intestinal regularity; blueberries, rich in antioxidant compounds; carrots, a source of carotenoids; salmon and certain oils, linked to omega-3s and to skin and coat wellbeing; turmeric, used for its antioxidant profile; seaweeds, interesting for minerals and micronutrients; seeds, herbs, botanicals and functional mushrooms, increasingly present in more advanced formulations.

The point is that these ingredients have a dual nature. On the one hand, they have a nutritional role, more or less significant depending on the quantity and the recipe. On the other, they have a “reading” role: they help consumers understand the product more easily. A label that mentions pumpkin, blueberries, salmon, carrots or seaweeds is more immediate than a list made up only of abbreviations, additives and technical formulations. That does not mean it is automatically better, but it is more recognisable. This explains why superfoods have entered not only complete foods, but also snacks, toppings, creams and complementary products. A treat for a dog or a cat is no longer only a reward. More and more often it is presented as a small functional gesture: for digestion, for calm, for oral hygiene, for skin, for coat, for mobility.

Here, however, balance is needed. Pet food cannot simply borrow words from human nutrition. Dogs and cats have needs that are different from ours, and every ingredient must be evaluated based on species, age, dose, tolerability and the role it plays in the formula. Natural does not always mean suitable. Familiar does not always mean useful. Trendy does not always mean necessary. Superfoods, when used well, are ingredients that make a recipe richer, more readable and more function-oriented. Their value comes from the balance between nutrition, formulation and clarity: they must make sense for the animal, not only for those reading the label.

A market that is growing and also changing the way production works

The success of superfoods for pets does not come out of nowhere. It stems from a market that, in recent years, has changed pace and language. The relationship between owners and pets has become closer, and this closeness has also changed the way food is chosen. Dogs and cats are no longer only animals to look after: they are family presences, with habits, preferences and needs that receive increasing attention.

Consumers are not looking only for a product that “does the job”. They are looking for a product that feels right. They read the composition, recognise certain ingredients, are wary of overly opaque formulas, compare promises, look at the format, evaluate the consistency between price, recipe and declared benefit. In this evolution, the humanisation of pet food weighs heavily. It does not mean confusing animals’ needs with those of people, but bringing into the pet world some of the attention already present in human nutrition.

The vocabulary of products has also changed. Until not long ago, words such as complete, balanced, tasty were enough. Today, packs talk about digestion, immune system, vitality, skin, coat, joints, energy, calm, microbiome, natural ingredients, simple recipe, source of fibre, grain-free, with fruit and vegetables. Not all these words carry the same weight and not all are used with the same precision. But they describe a clear direction: pet food wants to be more specific, more readable, closer to the expectations of those who buy it.

This evolution does not stay on the surface of the label. When a recipe becomes richer, the work behind the scenes also changes pace. One thing is producing a standard food, always the same, with a predictable consistency. Another is working with creams, pastes, mousses, toppings, wet foods, soft snacks, or products with ingredients that differ in weight, density and behaviour. Some flow, others trap air, others change with temperature, others still require delicacy to avoid losing uniformity.

In superfood pet food, innovation does not stop at ingredient choice. It has to run through mixing, dosing, filling, closing, format, cleaning, storage. All silent steps, but decisive ones. It is a bit like moving from a shopping list to real cooking: on paper everything can work, but the result depends on timing, tools, precision and technique.

Because consumers see the packaging, read the label, open the product and pour it into the bowl. Everything that comes before remains invisible. But that is exactly where a good idea becomes reliable. For over 35 years, Tenco has been working on solutions to dose, fill, cap and label liquid, thick and semi-thick products, supporting sectors where quality also depends on process care. In next-generation pet food, this attention becomes even more important: because a recipe can start from an insight, but it has to reach the shelf precise, stable and consistent.

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