Raw pet mince vs supermarket mince

Plenty of people start raw feeding with a pack of supermarket mince. It’s a reasonable way to test the water. It just gets expensive quickly, and there are a few things it doesn’t cover.

What’s in supermarket mince

Supermarket mince is made for people, so it’s muscle meat and fat, sold by fat grade. There’s no bone and no organ in it.

It’s also not cheap. Beef mince passed $24 a kilo in 2026, according to 1News. For a 20 kg dog eating about 500 g a day, that’s over $12 a day on mince alone.

What pet mince is

Pet mince is raw minced meat sold for feeding pets, usually frozen and in bulk. Ours comes in 10 kg cartons, cut into blocks:

• Beef Mince, Veal Mince and Goat Mince: 100% NZ single proteins, the muscle-meat part of the diet
• Chicken Mince: 100% NZ chicken, minced with the bone, so some of the bone part is already in it

At the time of writing our chicken, beef and veal minces cost between $6.50 and $8.20 a kilo (goat, when we have it, is a little more), plus a delivery fee per order. That’s roughly a third of the supermarket price.

Mince on its own isn’t the whole diet

Whichever mince you use, the 80/10/10 rule of thumb still applies: about 80% muscle meat, 10% raw bone and 10% organ. Mince covers the muscle meat. You still need:

• Bone: a raw meaty bone a few times a week, or a mince with bone in it. Our guide to raw bones for dogs explains how to choose.
• Organ: liver and other offal. The easy option is Balance Mix, mixed one part to two parts mince, or a blend with offal already in it.

Plain mince only

Stick to plain raw mince. Seasoned or marinated mince and sausage meat are out, and so is anything with onion or garlic, which are toxic to dogs, or with cooked bone in it. Once mince has thawed, use it within two or three days.

Which to choose

If you’re trying raw for a week to see how your dog takes to it, a pack of plain supermarket mince is fine. Once you’re feeding raw every day, buying pet mince in bulk makes much more sense, both for the cost and because you can pick a mince that suits your dog’s diet. The raw dog food calculator tells you how much to order.

Mince questions

Is beef mince or chicken mince better for dogs?

Neither is better across the board. Our Chicken Mince costs less and has bone minced through it. Beef suits dogs that do better on red meat. Many owners rotate both, and some dogs need to stay away from one or the other.

How much mince does a dog need?

Most adult dogs eat about 2 to 3% of their body weight in raw food a day, with about 90% of that coming from mince or a blend. See how much raw food to feed a dog.