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Exposing Another Food Storage Lie…

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Recently a customer called to ask us about a chart that they found online on a web site that purported to have an “objective” opinion on food storage companies.  They listed 10 food storage companies, 1 to 10.  Many companies use “charts” to show why their products are better, but this was on a website that didn't sell anything directly, and had the appearance of “objectivity”.  The chart containted companies that were rated according to things like shelf life, taste, value and serving size.  It looked quite “objective” and reliable, with a lot of good marketing terms, but the web site has some huge problems.  I will expose here these problems so that our readers can look past these deceptive websites that are not objective and are in fact only an opinion, controlled either by the company that is number one on the chart, or just someone behind a computer who has good marketing skills and uses links to amazon and other sites to get affiliate payouts all the while making up data that has no basis in fact.

Here is what we saw wrong with the chart:
1.  The chart has Mountain House as one of the companies near the top, but has Daily Bread and Food Insurance near the bottom of the chart.  Daily Bread and Food Insurance private label Mountain House Food, which means they are the same food.  These companies should be right next to eachother on the chart, not at the opposite side of the chart.  The chart fails to let the consumer know that the food is all the same, while giving different percentages and information with no links to back up data.

2.  Links to “Read More” will lead you to amazon so that you can buy the products.  What is not revealed is that they make money for up to 30 days on amazon for clicking through their “affiliate” links.  This is a classic trick, which looks objective, but digging deeper, you will find that the links only serve as money generating links.

3.  The chart also contains “rating systems” with up to a 5 star rating per product.  None of the ratings have any actual links to see objective independant testing, and I wouldn't be suprised if there is zero research to back up their claims.  Currently the percentages are just made up, considering there isn't further information to back up the claims made.

Don't buy food storage based on a chart, they are easily manipulated.

Be cautious of any chart you see online, they can be deceptive or even lie to you directly.

If you would like to see the actual site & chart, feel free to email us.

The Berkey Guy

9 Responses to Exposing Another Food Storage Lie…

  1. Peter Anderson September 22, 2015 at 5:30 am #

    Thank you for this info.
    I WOULD like the actual site and charts on this list.

    I purchased my Big Berkey prior to Y2K and have been using it to filter out
    the trash ( brain eating amoebas) that manages to bypass our local river-water filtering system.

    I am getting ready to purchase the Black Berkey ‘candles’ to filter out the toxins
    that didn’t seem to exist 20 years ago.

    Thanks for the update on long term storage foods.
    Peter

    • jeff September 22, 2015 at 6:20 am #

      Thanks for your comment, please email us for a link to the food storage chart.

  2. Denise September 22, 2015 at 8:08 am #

    Thanks for the information. I also wanted to mention Survival Cave Foods. I bought a sampler a couple of years
    ago to try. I am very impressed by this canned meat. I was surprised to see these being dissed by someone selling another brand of food. ANY meat will have a fat content. When you can meat, you will see this. These meats are lean and tasty, and when meat was so priced so high, these canned meats were a great alternative. The chicken tastes and looks like any canned chicken, as does the turkey. The beef is lean and I use it when I am in a hurry to cook something tasty. I LIKE these meats and would recommend them to anyone. Don’t just assume a review is right until you try something. I am not sure I would trust the “other guy” now.

  3. Andy September 22, 2015 at 9:35 am #

    Food Insurance/Daily Bread only has Mountain House private label 9-10 of their pre-packaged meals. The rest come from other brands.

    Many of their products contain TVP instead of real meat, which is where you can tell the difference between real MH licensed meals and the others. MH doesn’t use TVP for anything.

    Check the ingredients list of the stuff from FI&DB and you will see TVP in many, if not most, either completely replacing real meat or being served along side it.

    When you want to compare apples to apples for pricing, always remember TVP is cheaper than real meat and makes a protien rich filler that takes on the flavor of whatever it’s cooked with (just like Tofu).

    Always check the labels, because it’s not all mountain house inside those boxes.

    • jeff September 22, 2015 at 9:37 am #

      Thanks for your comment, I have already talked with Daily Bread reps many times, verifying that it is Mountain House food private labeled. We agree on TVP, it is a cheap product, and something we do not have in any of our food storage.

      • Andy September 22, 2015 at 9:54 am #

        Just wanted to make sure! You can go read the labels at dailybread and foodinsurance and not all of them line up with MH – some don’t have any meat of any kind, just TVP. Some have 3x the sodium of the MH product as well, bringing it in-line with WISE and other brands.

        Not sure who they would get it from since MH doesn’t use TVO in any of their products on the market today. Unless MH is making stuff to order with TVP exclusively for DB/FI, I would question the people from DB saying all their stuff is MH.

        It would benefit them if it was, but I don’t see how it could be. Maybe asking MH for the exact list of what they private label for DB/FI would be the thing to do.

        • jeff September 22, 2015 at 9:57 am #

          I just personally talked with a rep that I know, and Daily Bread has been purchased by Freeze Dried Foods, which is in New York. Daily Breads Food Storage has 2 suppliers. The one for their Cans is Mountain House, No TVP. The Buckets have TVP and are made by Freeze Dried Foods.

  4. Gary McGhee September 22, 2015 at 5:04 pm #

    So many of these different freeze dried food storage companies put so much sodium in their products that they are almost impossible to eat. Which company would you recommend to get away from so much salt?

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