Purina Farms

Purina owns a farm in Gray Summit, MO, where it does things like product testing, but it also has event space for holding event competitions and dog shows. They have a petting zoo and they hold several short shows a day where you can see dogs doing stunts. This short video shows some of the fun we had there this last Saturday.

On a side note, I found it interesting to note how many businesses Purina has been involved with. It was originally Purina, then it joined with Ralston, the maker of Post cereals. It makes sense that a company that started out manufacturing grain products as animal feed would want to get into the cereal business. It eventually spun off Ralston into a company called Ralcorp (which, interestingly enough, I have done work for), and just last year they announced that they're going to be spinning Post off into its own company to stave off a hostile takeover by ConAgra. It's kind of funny, though, that a company that started off making cattle feed has nothing to do with animal feed anymore.

Another few interesting notes: Purina acquired the Everready company in the 80's, which got spun off into Energzier, which is now one of the biggest employers in St. Louis. (Ironically enough, their sales of beauty products like razors is now bigger than their battery sales, since everyone plugs in their electronic devices nowadays.) Another random fact: they owned Jack in the Box in the 80's. Who knew?