Victor Dog Food vs. Diamond: How Do They Compare?

If you’re weighing your options between Victor Dog Food vs. Diamond Pet Food, you might
need that final push of information to make an informed decision. We’ve found the details for you, comparing each brand’s products so you can make the best choice for your dog.

Victor Dog Food and Diamond Pet Food are pretty close in their quality of food and the range of formulas they offer for dogs in each life stage. Because they are so close, we have to take certain things into account to choose a final winner.

We understand that it is a long, complicated process to locate the perfect food for your dog’s individual needs. But we are confident that most can focus their search on these highly regarded brands. We highlight the ingredients used for each brand, the range of formulas offered, and some of our favorite products for dry food and wet food for all ages.

Note: Clicking the above links takes you to Chewy.com or Amazon.com, where you can get additional product information and customer reviews. If you make a purchase, we earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

Brand History

A brand isn’t just what they provide. It’s also who the company is, where they’re from, and what they say. While a brand’s history doesn’t wholly determine its products’ quality, it’s still helpful to understand a company’s identity and past. So, let’s examine each brand’s history for some enlightenment.

Victor

Victor Dog Food started as a feed business and store in the early 1950s but has since grown into a well-respected pet food brand since 2007. They are a family-owned company based in Texas, and they pride themselves on their nutritionally-dense dog food.

Victor doesn’t only have longevity to its name. Its pet food has garnered high accolades since 2007. These accolades include national recognition from NBC News for having some of the best dry food in the nation. One of the company’s distinctive features is that it acquires nearly all of its products from ranches. Many of the farms are near the company’s headquarters.

The company’s motto is “Always By Your Side.” It reflects the brand’s belief that in the same way, a dog is a person’s loyal companion, the company desires dedication to a dog’s health and happiness.

Diamond

Brothers-in-law Gary Schell and Richard Kampeter established Diamond Pet Food in 1970. The brand aims to balance high-quality pet food with affordability for dogs and cats, no matter their life status.

They manufacture their products in five state-of-the-art facilities across the United States. Their headquarters is in Meta, Missouri. Their manufacturing facilities employ a complex process of food development. This includes water purification and on-site product testing. They choose their meat supplies from a select set of providers who must meet their standards first.

As a family-owned business, Diamond promotes giving attention to your pet’s health and nutritional intake. It regards them as members of the family. They focus on long-term relationships both with vendors and customers. They believe every pet deserves the best.

Recalls

Victor Dog Food

Victor has had one recall in its history, and it is fairly recent. In cooperation with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Mid America Pet Food, the parent company of Victor, issued a voluntary recall of several brands due to potential Salmonella contamination in October of 2023. Salmonella affects dogs when they eat it and can affect humans when they come into contact with it and do not thoroughly wash their hands. Salmonella can also spread to surfaces and other people.

This recall affects 20 of Victor’s dog food products. The products affected all have a Best By date before 10/31/2024. For a complete list of affected products, see the company’s information on this recall. They include product pictures to see if your food matches any affected products. You can also learn more from the FDA and CDC investigations.

If you have any of these products, throw them away in a sealed container. Keep them away from any pets, and avoid handling them directly if you can. Be sure to clean and disinfect any bowls, utensils, or areas in the home where food may have been stored.

The recall affects some cat products and select other pet foods sold under the brand names of Wayne Feeds Dog Food, Eagle Mountain Pet Foods, and Member’s Mark Dog Food.

Diamond

Diamond Pet Foods has dealt with four recalls since 2005, with its most recent incident in 2013. Two of these recalls were for cat food, but they are listed as they provide insight into the company’s overall history. The American Veterinary Medical Association lists Diamond Pet Foods’ product recalls as follows:

December 2005: At the end of 2005 and in early 2006, dozens of cases of ill or deceased dogs came through as a result of aflatoxin contamination. Aflatoxin is a by-product of fungal growth that can occur in corn and related crops. The aflatoxin contamination caused symptoms such as vomiting, jaundice, and death.

For this recall, the issue occurred at the company’s plant in Gaston, South Carolina. Ultimately, an investigation by the FDA found the culprit to be inconsistent testing practices. Even the tests themselves were not always accurate.

Diamond Pet Food responded by adding a step to its testing procedure concerning all incoming shipments of corn in the future.

October 2009: Although not a dog food recall, Diamond Pet Food still had to recall several lots of cat food in October of 2009. The reason behind the recall was the food’s deficiency in thiamine. Cat food requires thiamine because it aids in cats’ organ functions, including the brain. They deemed the deficiency a serious issue, and lots of cat food were called back.

April 2012: Diamond’s dog food recall in April of 2012 didn’t affect dogs. Instead, the canines served as carriers of Salmonella that infected humans. The culprit of the outbreak stemmed once again from Diamond’s South Carolina facility in Gaston.

Diamond ended up having to recall several products, including their Naturals Lamb & Rice and Puppy formulas. No canine or human fatalities occurred due to the outbreak, but the Salmonella outbreak potentially killed two cats through dogs who had consumed affected food.

March 2013: Diamond Pet Food again recalled cat food for low levels of Thiamine in March of 2013. The company recalled Diamond Naturals Kitten Formula dry cat food in both 6oz samples and 6lb bags for their deficiency in the vital Thiamine nutrient.

Food Ingredients

Ingredients are a fundamental part of any dog food recipe. Dog food should contain certain ingredients that are vital to a dog’s health, like real meat and various vitamins and minerals. At the same time, healthy dog food avoids questionable ingredients like gluten and corn syrup.

The following is a breakdown of each brand’s commonly used ingredients.

Victor

Victor aspires to pack its food with vastly assorted nutrients to promote a healthy immune system and boost energy. The company touts its VPRO™ blend, which contains selenium yeast, mineral complexes, prebiotics, and probiotics.

Each of Victor’s dry food mixes on their website shows a breakdown of the food’s sources. The percentage of protein from meat sources ranges from 68% to 92%. While the company has many grain-free options, the grain that any mixes use is all gluten-free.

Victor uses meat meal as its protein source instead of strict meat, including processed mammal tissue. Pure meat means it is the pure muscle of an animal, which Victor does not use. However, meat meal such as beef or chicken, which Victor does specify that it uses, is often a protein concentrate.

When an ingredient list uses terms like “animal meal” or “meat meal,” it indicates that the brand uses a low-quality meal grade. Victor does not do this. It states that they use beef, chicken, and pork meal, ensuring that it’s higher quality and contains a hefty amount of protein.

Common vegetable incorporations are peas and sweet potatoes. Peas add some extra protein to the mix. Victor also adds fiber and a variety of helpful vitamins. The sweet potatoes match up with the gluten-free source of carbohydrates and provide a dog with dietary fiber.

Several of their mixes contain blood meal, which is generally not considered good for dogs to consume. Another few lesser-regarded ingredients, such as seaweed meal and brewers yeast, do not appear in large quantities in any of the mixes.

Diamond

Diamond Pet Food lists all of its ingredients in an Ingredient Glossary. This feature is not something that all companies provide. However, it is only a list of all the ingredients they use in alphabetical order, which does little to illuminate in what capacity each ingredient is used.

Diamond Pet Food lists various meat meals as a primary protein source, which isn’t detrimental to a dog and is a concentrated form of protein. They also use specific meat, like lamb and chicken, and do not include generic “meat meal” or “animal meal” in their ingredient list. However, they occasionally use chicken by-product meal, which isn’t as nutritious.

While it depends on the formula line, Diamond sometimes uses ingredients like wheat flour or ground corn in their mixes. Highly refined products like flour are glutenous, which isn’t something dogs generally need. It also adds little nutritional value and mostly serves as a filler. Diamond does provide some grain-free formulas, though, which helps with this issue.

Many of Diamond’s standard lines of formulas skip any substantial vegetable integration, but their Naturals line incorporates many non-meat or vegetable “superfoods.” Ingredients such as quinoa, chia seed, spinach, and carrots add extra nutrition from an organic and harmless source.

Diamond also provides a line of dog food that caters to dogs with certain conditions. These formulas utilize ingredients that are appropriate for the designated problem. For example, although protein is a prime necessity in a dog’s diet, their renal care formula avoids high-protein sources and opts for a brown rice foundation with an easy-to-digest egg product as the main protein source.

Range Of Formulas

Both Diamond Pet Food and Victor Dog Food provide different lines of recipes. These mixes cater to a dog’s different needs or may better suit an owner’s price range.

Victor

Victor Dog Food has a total of four dry food ranges, as well as treats and canned food. They provide a Classic, Select, Purpose, and a Realtree line. They manufacture three different flavors of treats and five canned food options. Across each of their dry food lines, they have a total of nineteen different products.

Diamond

Diamond Pet Food has a total of six dry food ranges, with treats and canned food included as part of one of the ranges. They provide a standard Diamond line, a CARE line, a CARE Rx line, a Naturals line, a Naturals Grain-Free line, and a Pro89 line. The canned food and treats are a part of the Naturals line.

Puppy Formulas

Growing pups have different nutritional needs than adults or seniors. Selecting the proper food for a puppy is vital to their growth. Victor Dog Food and Diamond each provide food that’s suitable for puppies, but let’s see who does it better.

Victor

Something that jumps out right away about Victor’s puppy formulas is that, technically, there aren’t any. Victor’s website allows you to search for puppy mixes, but you’ll find that none of them are explicitly designated for young dogs. They’ve only marked one as “dog & puppy,” but there are no exclusive options.

Instead, Victor eliminates certain mixes based on them being less suitable for puppies. Taking this into account, the brand shows fourteen different products that are okay for young dogs. This includes three formulas, each from the Classic, Select, and Purpose lines. There are also three treat packs available and two flavors of canned food.

The formula labeled for both dogs and puppies is the Grain-Free Active Dog & Puppy mix. All but one of the grain-free formulas have been approved for adult and young dogs.

Diamond

Like Victor, Diamond has several formulas that work well for all stages of life. However, Diamond has some products that are made exclusively for puppies. For products available to all life stages and puppies, they have thirteen options. These include two Diamond formulas, four Naturals formulas, three Naturals Grain-Free formulas, two canned products, and two treat packages.

Within that set, the products not exclusive to puppies are one Diamond, two Naturals, the Naturals Grain-Free options, the canned food, and one of the treat packages.

Diamond’s puppy formulas aren’t just for that stage of life. They even have formulas for small breeds and large breeds. These are part of their Naturals line, which overall provides better nutrition than their Diamond line.

Puppy Winner: Diamond

Both brands include All Stages of Life formulas, which is where each brand’s grain-free options fall. However, since Victor Dog Food doesn’t even have puppy-specific products, Diamond is the winner in this category. While Victor still provides excellent mixes, Diamond also gets extra points for catering to large and small breeds separately.

Adult Formulas

As expected, both brands provide an extensive range of formula options for adult dogs. Adult formulas are often the primary focus of pet food brands, so let’s compare Victor Dog Food and Diamond Pet Food’s offerings.

Victor

Victor Dog Food has 24 products across all six of its different lines, including canned food and treats. Their four Classic line products have somewhat generic themes, but each is still designated to help with various aspects of a dog’s health.

Most of the Classic products use beef meal as the primary ingredient and protein source. Even though these formulas contain grain, all of them are gluten-free. If dog food contains grain, being gluten-free is much more appropriate for a dog’s diet.

The Select line provides dogs with various needs or allergies to avoid anything their bodies don’t like. Three of the products are grain-free options, with the remaining four being different combinations of specific meat and neutral counterparts, usually brown rice.

The Select line allows dogs to avoid undesirable ingredients. The Purpose line addresses dogs’ needs in terms of what they should have more of. Packed with extra nutrients, they designed the Purpose products to afford a dog more vitamins and minerals.

Mostly all of Victor’s adult dry foods are high in protein and do not contain many filler products. They also address the specific needs of different dogs, so there’s something for everyone.

Diamond

Diamond offers 31 adult food options, including three canned foods and four treat packs. The dry kibble options span a range of six formula types.

Their everyday Diamond formulas mostly use chicken by-product meal as their primary protein source. Still, their Classic formula uses the questionable “meat meal” ingredient, which implies it’s a lower-quality source. All of them use wheat flour, which isn’t a preferable choice for a dog’s diet.

Fortunately, their Naturals line uses specific meat meals, like lamb meal, and eliminates wheat flour from all products within this line. They replace wheat flour with rice flour or similar products, getting rid of the gluten content. The Naturals line is also their most extensive, with ten options for adults.

Their Grain-Free line bypasses all flour concerns entirely, though these three options are a little short on protein or average at best. To balance this, their Pro89 line contains one product, and it’s very high in protein, using beef, pork, and beef meal as its main product.

Each of the four formulas in the Care line is specific to certain ailments. Especially their Care Rx formula for renal conditions. This unique product is the single prescription-only food they provide.

Adult Winner: Victor

While Diamond gets points for its Care line that helps dogs with specific needs, they lose out on their standard line of kibble. Each of their Diamond line products contains more gluten than a dog should ingest. Victor Dog Food wins due to its well-rounded choices of formulas without incorporating many undesirable ingredients.

Senior Formulas

In the same way that puppies have certain nutritional needs, dogs who are advancing in years also require a change in their diet once they pass their peak adult years. Let’s examine what each brand has to offer for senior pups.

Victor

Victor Dog Food only has one formula that they have catered explicitly to senior dogs, which is their Senior Healthy Weight mix from their Purpose line. The ingredients glucosamine and chondroitin promote joint health and are present in many of Victor’s formulas, but their presence in a senior formula is vital.

The main feature of the Senior Healthy Weight formula is that it’s low in fat and has L-Carnitine, which helps the body convert fat to energy. This product is aimed at seniors but can also be of help for any dog that needs to lose weight.

The remaining selections from Victor’s standard array of food are lower in fat and aimed at less active dogs. The Multi-Pro formula is the only Classic one they recommend for seniors. They recommend only four of the seven Select products and two Purpose formulas besides the Senior Healthy Weight Option.

Victor also offers their two Realtree formulas for more active seniors. Their canned pâté formulas are easy on a senior dog’s teeth, and the company approves all three of Victor’s treat mixes for older dogs.

Diamond

According to Diamond, all of their adult formulas are suitable for senior dogs. The only exception is the Premium Adult blend from their Classic line. Instead of this, they offer one product for seniors: their Senior Dog Chicken, Egg & Oatmeal Formula.

The likely reason they don’t advertise the Premium Adult for seniors is that it’s aimed at active, athletic dogs to support their strong muscles. Since older dogs are less prone to be in this condition, the blend wouldn’t provide them with the features that suit them best.

Their senior formula doesn’t include wheat flour or ground corn. Its main ingredients are chicken, chicken meal, whole grain brown rice, ground white rice, and egg. The rice products are not glutenous, and the egg serves as an easy-to-digest protein.

Like Victor’s senior blend, Diamond’s mix also includes glucosamine and chondroitin to help alleviate joint pain often caused by arthritis. This mix also incorporates their choice of superfoods: kale, chia seed, pumpkin, blueberries, etc.

Diamond’s canned foods are all pâtés, making them easy on senior dogs’ teeth. They list all of the treat flavors for seniors, except for the puppy biscuits, which simply aren’t designed with seniors in mind.

Senior Winner: Diamond

These senior formulas from both brands are neck-and-neck for which is best. Their approach to senior food is similar: they each designate that most of their adult foods are also fit for seniors. Victor narrows the selection down much more than Diamond does, a feature for which they deserve credit.

Both only have one senior-specific mix. They both add supplements to support joint health. Victor’s mix doubles as a weight-loss option, while Diamond packs in superfoods to increase nutritional intake.

Even though Diamond recommends its flour-containing standard items for seniors, which isn’t a great practice, its senior formula is an excellent one. Although both brands are close, Diamond wins for its senior formula.

Wet Food

Some dogs prefer wet food, or it’s easier for them to eat and digest. Both Victor Dog Food and Diamond have a selection of wet canned foods, so let’s see how they compare to each other.

Victor

Victor offers five canned wet food selections. Three of them are grain-free mixes of various meat cuts. The other two are pâté blends, which, as mentioned before, are good options for older dogs with weaker teeth.

All of Victor’s wet foods are high in protein. The first ingredient of each flavor is named meat, meaning that they incorporate higher-quality protein sources into their recipe. Besides that, there is a notable lack of undesirable ingredients and fillers. They use other healthy sources like dried egg whites to up the protein amount.

Having a grain-free option in wet food is a plus. Grains are not necessarily bad for dogs, but some have sensitivity issues, and Victor kindly accounts for this. Each wet food option is an excellent product.

Diamond

Diamond provides three canned wet food options. Each option features beef, dinner, or lamb. The food is a part of their Naturals line, which is a drastic improvement from any product from their regular Diamond selection.

Bit for bit, Victor and Diamond’s wet foods are very similar. They prioritize using named meats as their first ingredient and have few fillers or undesirable ingredients. Diamond includes its superfood mix of chia seeds, blueberries, pumpkin, etc.

Each of Diamond’s dinners is a pâté that makes them easily consumable for dogs of all ages, though the lamb option is not for puppies.

Wet Food Winner: Victor

Both of these brands’ canned food options are top-of-the-line wet food. The only main distinction is that Victor has more options, including their grain-free selection that considers dogs with sensitivities. Because Victor has more flavors to choose from and has grain-free formulas for dogs in need, Victor wins over Diamond in this category.

Our Final Verdict

Neither choice is a bad one. Diamond aims to be affordable and manages to do so without adding excess fillers or other unwanted ingredients. They lose some points for using wheat flour and ground corn in their standard mixes, which dogs do not need. However, their Naturals products are all excellent for dry foods. Another point to consider is the history of recalls. Diamond has had four recalls, and Victor has had one. While two of these recalls were for cat food, the same issue happened twice a few years apart. It’s worth noting that Diamond seemed to make the same mistake again even after the first recall. For more affordable but still respectable-quality food, Diamond could be the brand for you. Otherwise, Victor Dog Food fits the bill for a brand that uses excellent ingredients, has fewer recalls, and has well-regarded products nationally.

Are You Still Looking For More Healthy Dog Food Options?

While both these brands have some good qualities, you may still want to look at other options. For some owners, freeze-dried dog food can help add meaty flavor and extra nutrition to a dog’s diet. Other owners are picking fresh dog food. Many companies give owners the option of a subscription delivery customized to their pup’s needs. We review and have personally tried several of these companies, including Ollie, Spot & Tango, and The Farmer’s Dog, to name a few. Remember that changing food is a delicate process and should not be done suddenly. If you have any questions about changing your pup’s dog food, check in with your veterinarian first.