Celebrating its 25^th anniversary, Petfood Forum, scheduled for April 3-5 in Kansas City, Missouri, USA, will feature the most recent research on pet food nutrition, ingredients, marketing, safety and processing. In addition, keynotes Randi Zuckerberg and Temple Grandin, PhD, will open and close the conference with unique and inspirational insights.

Pet food professionals can learn from many experts during Petfood Forum, which takes places at the Kansas City Convention Center in the heart of the Animal Health Corridor. New to the conference for 2017, a track on hot topics offers in-depth discussions of key areas such as biologically appropriate raw pet food, answering both marketing and regulatory needs while considering novel ingredients, and dealing with upset “pet parents.” Other concurrent tracks will cover specific novel ingredients, nutrition research, the pet food market and marketing topics, and processing, safety and packaging.

The conference portion of Petfood Forum 2017 will open on April 4 with a keynote by Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Zuckerberg Media and former director of market development for Facebook, on how to use social media and other marketing platforms to reach today’s consumers. Grandin, professor of animal science at Colorado State University, livestock-welfare consultant and best-selling author, will deliver the closing keynote on April 5 with insights on animal behavior to help pet food professionals better understand their end customers.

Petfood Forum will also feature an update on the US pet food specialty market by Maria Lange of GfK, a town hall discussion on the need to fund and share pet food research, and informal roundtable discussions during lunch on April 5. The conference includes several meals, receptions and other networking opportunities, a large exhibit hall with the industry’s leading suppliers, a student program with opportunities to connect with students about job and internship openings, a scientific poster display, a product and service demonstration area, and visits from pet charities.

Petfood Forum conference highlights

Sessions at Petfood Forum 2017 will include:

• What’s next for pet specialty? Staying a step ahead of tomorrow’s trends
• The rise of biologically appropriate pet foods: what does the science say?
• Activating the new psychology of pet food marketing: millennials leading the pack in pet parent shopping behaviors
• Fresh meat inclusions for dry pet food: what can you accomplish with existing solutions?
• The aging brain: what can we learn from, and for, our best friend?
• Beyond retail: how social media can drive offline and online sales
• Futuristic concepts for the design of pet food facilities
• Recipe for success: opportunities and challenges of introducing novel ingredients into pet food formulations
• Market data, trends and predictions for ingredient usage and extrusion manufacturing capacity
• Updated strategies for managing contamination, recall and litigation risks under FSMA
• You killed my dog! Dealing with distraught customers in the age of pets as people
• Applying and integrating omics technology to advance companion animal nutrition
• Extracting protein from pulses as sustainable pet food ingredients
• The implications of vitamin product forms in pet foods
• The FDA GRAS final rule: impacts on getting safe feed ingredients into pet food

For the full agenda, visit https://goo.gl/laLIYD.