Issue with dry cat food expiration date !

2cats4me

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Last month I placed an order with Chewy.Com for a 5.5 lb bag of Natures Variety Instinct . 

When I received it , it had an exp date of April 1st , 2015 .  I contacted Chewy and was told they would replace it immediately because the date should be much further out .. Well a few days later I got the new bag . It had the  same exact date .  I contacted Chewy, they sent another replacement .  Exp. date July 1st 2015   . A little better but still not ideal  . As to the two April 1st bags  , my cats cannot eat all this by April 1st . 

Question :  How long past the Epx. date is it safe to feed ? 

I do not want my cats to get sick from old food ..
 
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2cats4me

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I contacted Chewy.Com again and they are going to refund me for my original purchase . 

Now I have 3 free bags of cat food .  Two April 1st , 2015  & one July 1st , 2015.. 

I am not going to take any chances..so I will feed one of the April bags to the birds, the Blue Jays & Crows love it.

My cats should be able to eat the other April bag as well as the July bag before the date runs out. 

This makes me very hesitant to order cat food online ..
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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even expired (well beyond expiration date) can be used by at least some shelters. they use the well past expired dry cat food for local wildlife.

@2Cats4Me -- i order all my cat food online, and i do order a good portion of it from chewy dot com. as long as they'll refund your money when you receive damaged (dented cans, etc) and too close to expiration date cat foods, i'd still order from them. but i'd make sure to always check the expiration dates when i receive new foods. i do that now, always check expiration dates on my newly received cat food orders.

i do understand how this would be really annoying though. it's just one more thing that needs doing, and i have more than enough to do already.
 
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2cats4me

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even expired (well beyond expiration date) can be used by at least some shelters. they use the well past expired dry cat food for local wildlife.

@2Cats4Me -- i order all my cat food online, and i do order a good portion of it from chewy dot com. as long as they'll refund your money when you receive damaged (dented cans, etc) and too close to expiration date cat foods, i'd still order from them. but i'd make sure to always check the expiration dates when i receive new foods. i do that now, always check expiration dates on my newly received cat food orders.

i do understand how this would be really annoying though. it's just one more thing that needs doing, and i have more than enough to do already.
 Yeah , I am feeding one of the April bags to the wild birds in our yard . The Blue Jays & Crows love it . We have a couple of stray cats that eat it as well ..

Yes it is annoying because the  used by date should be a lot better than just 2 months  in my opinion ..

I will still order from Chewy anyway because they are awesome when it comes to any issue you may have .
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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 Yeah , I am feeding one of the April bags to the wild birds in our yard . The Blue Jays & Crows love it . We have a couple of stray cats that eat it as well ..

Yes it is annoying because the  used by date should be a lot better than just 2 months  in my opinion ..

I will still order from Chewy anyway because they are awesome when it comes to any issue you may have .
i bet you're going to have some nice plump blue jays and crows!

i agree. i don't buy dry cat food often and only one or two small bags at a time, because it takes me months for my two cats to finish it all. so an expiration date just two months from when i bought the bag would mean most of it would go to waste here.

yes, chewy has really great customer service.
 
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2cats4me

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i bet you're going to have some nice plump blue jays and crows!

i agree. i don't buy dry cat food often and only one or two small bags at a time, because it takes me months for my two cats to finish it all. so an expiration date just two months from when i bought the bag would mean most of it would go to waste here.

yes, chewy has really great customer service.
Yep , they are all pretty fat & sassy . You should see our Squirrels  ..


Chewy. Com is awesome I have to say .. I have not complaints about their customer service .
 

micknsnicks2mom

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Yep , they are all pretty fat & sassy . You should see our Squirrels  ..


Chewy. Com is awesome I have to say .. I have not complaints about their customer service .
i don't see many squirrels in my immediate area. i think this is because i live in a rural area and the squirrels have so much more open wooded areas available to them, and they prefer the wooded areas here.

i've only ordered from chewy twice so far, but i was literally blown away by several things -- great customer service, best selection of canned cat foods, generally the best prices, no sales tax for orders to my state, and i loved that they shipped the cases of cat food with specially designed cardboard case covers/protectors (so no banged up, crushed, or popped open cans). btw, i save those case covers and use them for other things here.
 

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We used to live overseas. . .and thought the "expiration date" on the pet food was the manufacture date, that's how expired the pet food was :lol3:. So it shouldn't hurt your kitties to have food that's a few months past the date. It is a "best by" date, not a "it'll self-destruct!" date ;). If it doesn't smell rancid it should be fine.
 

stewball

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We used to live overseas. . .and thought the "expiration date" on the pet food was the manufacture date, that's how expired the pet food was :lol3:. So it shouldn't hurt your kitties to have food that's a few months past the date. It is a "best by" date, not a "it'll self-destruct!" date ;). If it doesn't smell rancid it should be fine.
After all what did our grandparents do when there was no expiration date on anything and nothing happened to them.
 

lynnster52

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It's Sept 2015 and I just received soon-to-expire kibble from Chewy too. Twice in past week the kibble had 12/13/15 exp dates. My other bags of this same kibble, ordered from another online site (Amazon) have 7/15/16 exp dates and those were ordered a month ago, so Chewy is obvioulsy offereing lower priced kibble because the companies are sending them short-dated kibble so they can get rid of it. I'm really pissed off by this. Of course Chewy is replacing or refunding, depending on what they find for dates in their warehouse. They promised not to send any bags that are dated to expire before July of 2016. I had become a very good customer, but now I'm rethinking as I'm wondering where they are getting their food from & under what circumstances….It might not be their fault, but they need to tell their shipping dept to check exp dates on all their stock and return ALL items that have less than a year left on them. This is a matter of customer confidence. I was actually not expecting to come up with anything on Chewy when I googled "chewy expiration dates" but lo and behold, I'm not the first having this issue!
 

lynnster52

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After all what did our grandparents do when there was no expiration date on anything and nothing happened to them.
Yes, the expiration date is usually one year from the date of manufacture, but I strongly disagree with the premise that it's ok to feed expired food. You need to realize that nutrients lose their potency beyond the exp dates which is the reason for having an expiration date in the first place. Companies should not be short-date selling kibble or any pet foods. And I tend to avoid comparing our grandparents era to this day and age. Pet food consisted of left-over human food back then! 
 

stewball

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I wouldn't feed the cats outdated food actually. I myself might eat it but it depends how out of date.
I just used my grandparents as an example. After all there was no expiration date when I was growing up.
 
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