Our dogs aren’t just our pets – they are part of our family, so we were pretty excited to try out BarkBox. Jack has some food allergies & Jinger has a sensitive stomach. Barkbox would allow me to find out what all they will eat without paying for a lot of full-sized items.  There is nothing worse than spending $30 on dog food, only to find out they won’t eat it!

Because I know my children, I hid the boxes when they arrived until I would be able to look through them & take a few pictures. After the boys were in bed, I let the dogs out to run in the yard and opened the boxes. When I spread everything out, Cali (our cat) decided she needed to investigate.  I moved her back a few times and said something about it being for the puppies.  I swear, she looked right at me and glared. After awhile, she gave up and went upstairs.

Jack got a box designed for large dogs, with a mix of toys, food, and treats. His favorite is the freeze-dried Sweet Potatoes from Whole Life Pet. Jinger wouldn’t eat hers, so he traded hers for his Crinket toy from Zigoo Pets. It’s a nifty hollow toy designed to hold a plastic  bottle for them to play with while preventing the dogs from destroying it completely and leaving all those sharp plastic pieces for me to step on.  Jinger loves it, but Jack still prefers to put his teeth on a bottle. They both got pet wipes from LA Fresh, that we luckily haven’t needed to try out yet but I’m sure they will get into something smelly soon. They also got goodies from Barkworthies and dental bones from Zukes.

BarkBox also has a great referral program: For every person you refer, you get a FREE MONTH & they get $5 off their first bark box!

One reason to pick BarkBox over another monthly subscription box for your furry friend – they donate 10% of all proceeds to a local shelter or rescue! You can find out about the shelter of the month in their newsletter.  Have a shelter you’d like to see them support?  Email donations@barkbox.com with the info.

BarkBoxes are $25/month or you can grab yours for as low as $17/month when you buy an annual plan. Shipping is FREE for US customers and only $5 for those in Canada. When you sign up, you pay for the length of your plan upfront (whether its one month, 3, 6, or 12) and it will automatically renew, unless you call OR log into your account. We cancelled Jinger’s “small” box online in just a couple clicks and then set up a medium box for her.  I can’t believe how big she is getting and think they may have understated how large Boxer/German Shepherds get when we adopted her….

Update: After I had given Jack & Jinger a few treats, I discovered where Cali had disappeared to. She, who NEVER does so, hacked up a hair ball on my sheets. As I was changing my bedding, she sat on my bed SMIRKING at me. If you know of a similar program for cats – leave a link in the comments below.  Cali has made it very clear the dogs have had enough special attention & it is HER turn now.