Raw Freeze-Dried and Biologically Appropriate Pet Food: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Orijen (Champion Petfoods) remained the category leader in valid recommendation coverage at 69.1% in October 2026, up from 65.7% in July 2026. Second-place Acana (Champion Petfoods) reached 50.0% in October 2026, narrowing the leader's advantage to 19.1 percentage points from 28.4 points in July 2026.

Acana (Champion Petfoods) recorded the largest coverage increase, rising to 50.0% in October 2026 from 37.3% in July 2026 and from 39.5% in September 2026, a move beyond normal month-to-month variation. No tracked brand registered a coverage decline beyond normal variation over the full series. Champion Petfoods declined for a second consecutive month, to 1.2% in October 2026 from 1.5% in September 2026, within normal variation.

The benchmark began with 800 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 418 qualified observations in October 2026 after qualification.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Recommendation-shaped answer share moved from 54.7% in July 2026 to 55.9% in August 2026 and 50.6% in September 2026, before reaching 69.6% in October 2026. Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI surface families with at least one qualified observation: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode. All six families were represented in both July 2026 and October 2026.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending Raw Freeze-Dried and Biologically Appropriate Pet Food

Research Scope and Qualification

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design. The following table shows how observations moved from the raw prompt-level collection to the qualified benchmark denominator.

Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology.

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which raw freeze-dried pet food brands lead in AI recommendation coverage?
• How do presence rate and top-three rate differ between Orijen and Acana?
• What does net sentiment look like across the tracked brands?

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate: The share of qualified observations in which the brand was mentioned at all.
• Valid recommendation coverage: The share of qualified observations in which the brand received a valid recommendation.
• Top-three rate: The share of qualified observations in which the brand appeared in the first three recommended positions.
• Rank-one rate: The share of qualified observations in which the brand was the first recommendation.
• Net sentiment: A score from 0 to 1 reflecting the tone of mentions, where higher is more positive.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brand recorded the largest increase in valid recommendation coverage since July 2026?
• How did the gap between Acana and lower-coverage raw pet food brands change over the series?

Largest Increase: Acana (Champion Petfoods)

Acana (Champion Petfoods) is classified as the series' only significant riser, reaching 50.0% valid recommendation coverage in October 2026 from 39.5% in September 2026 and 37.3% in July 2026. Its rank-one rate rose to 2.1% in October 2026 from 0.5% in July 2026, while its top-three rate held near its baseline at 15.3% in October 2026 from 16.9% in July 2026. The brand recorded 209 valid recommendations from 418 qualified observations in October 2026.

The widening gap between Acana and lower-coverage brands increased in each month of the series. Against Instinct Pet Food the coverage difference reached 38.8 percentage points in October 2026 from 23.6 points in July 2026, and against Primal Pet Foods it reached 38.3 points from 24.9 points.

Category Leader: Orijen (Champion Petfoods)

Orijen (Champion Petfoods) held the top valid recommendation coverage at 69.1% in October 2026, up from 65.7% in July 2026 and up from 59.8% in September 2026, a rebound beyond normal variation from the prior month. Its top-three rate was 25.8% in October 2026, down from 37.6% in July 2026, and its rank-one rate was 16.0% in October 2026, down from 25.4% in July 2026. The brand recorded 289 valid recommendations from 418 qualified observations.

The remaining brands moved within normal month-to-month variation. Champion Petfoods declined for a second consecutive month, to 1.2% in October 2026 from 1.5% in September 2026 and 3.4% in August 2026. Instinct Pet Food, Primal Pet Foods, and Smallbatch Pets each changed by less than two points from the prior month, while Stella & Chewy's rose 5.0 points from the prior month to 46.9%, within normal variation for the brand.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How does Acana's rank-one rate compare with its overall coverage?
• Which brand converts coverage into first-position recommendations most effectively?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. The following table shows how often the leading brands appeared in the top three and first positions.

Close coverage can still hide different first-position rates. Acana (Champion Petfoods) reached 50.0% valid recommendation coverage but only a 2.1% rank-one rate in October 2026, while Orijen (Champion Petfoods) translated 69.1% coverage into a 16.0% rank-one rate.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• What buyer-intent classes appear in the current raw pet food benchmark?
• Why are Pricing & Value and Multi-Brand Comparison observations absent from this series?

All 418 qualified observations in October 2026 fell into the Brand Recommendation class, as did all 402 qualified observations in July 2026.

The current public series measures Brand Recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the Pricing & Value or Multi-Brand Comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

Questions This Section Answers

• Has Orijen remained the coverage leader across every measurement period?
• Which months saw the largest single-brand coverage movements?

This is an evergreen benchmark URL. New measurements are added to the same report.

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and, where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure:

• Market share or attributable sales
• Every possible AI response or surface beyond the six tracked families
• Organic-search ranking positions outside AI surfaces
• Social mention volume or sentiment beyond the analyzed responses
• Private or sponsored channels, such as paid placements or brand-managed assistants
• Causality from a metric movement alone; the benchmark records the change, not the underlying cause

Top 10 Cited Domains

Questions This Section Answers

• Which domains are most frequently cited across AI platform responses?
• Are citations concentrated among a few sources or distributed across many?
• Do any tracked brand-owned domains appear in the top 10 cited sources?

Across all AI platform responses in this measurement period, 7,039 citations were observed across 1,313 unique domains.

The top 10 domains together account for a limited share of 7,039 citations, indicating that citations are broadly distributed across the 1,313 unique domains found rather than concentrated in a few sources. No tracked brand's own domain appears in the top 10. Retail and community sources feature prominently, with chewy.com, petco.com, and amazon.com appearing alongside review and advisory sites such as dogfoodadvisor.com and petmd.com, and large general-interest platforms such as google.com, reddit.com, youtube.com, forbes.com, and facebook.com.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index is a neutral industry benchmark tracking how often brands appear and are recommended across major AI chat and search surfaces. It is built from a defined, reproducible research protocol applied consistently each month.

• AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Visibility Authority Value

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