Black Hawk

Black Hawk is not an independent operation. Our ownership record places it with EBOS Group, which runs the brand through Masterpet across Australia and New Zealand, and the food itself is made in Australia. That pairing, a corporate group behind an Australian-made product, sets the character of the brand: our entry notes that its strength is reach rather than ingredients, and that part of what you pay for is shelf presence and marketing. In practice the owner's scale works for you on the shelf and against you on the price tag.

Transparency scores 74 out of 100 in our pillars, level with value as the brand's equal-lowest mark while ingredients and nutrition both sit at 76. The number describes a brand that discloses enough to be judged recipe by recipe but not enough to be trusted range wide. Our entry records named meat first on the better formulas and rice and grain bulking out the cheaper lines, so the brand name tells you almost nothing about the bag in your hand. Treat each Black Hawk label as its own disclosure document, because that is how the company effectively publishes them.

The range spans dry and wet formats in our records, but the spine of it is dry kibble for adult dogs, and both bags we price lead with chicken. The anchor is Adult Chicken and Rice in a 20kg sack, listed at $169, or $8.45 per kg, with 26 per cent protein and 16 per cent fat. Beside it sits Grain Free Adult Chicken in a 15kg bag at $159, where the recipe steps up to 30 per cent protein and 18 per cent fat. One grain-inclusive workhorse, one grain-free step-up: that is the whole priced range.

Across those two SKUs the list price per kilogram runs from $8.45 to $10.60, so choosing grain-free costs roughly a quarter more for every kilo before any discount applies. Pack sizes work the other way: the 20kg bag is the format our brand entry points large-dog owners toward, and big bags are where the brand's everyday case is strongest. There is no puppy, senior or prescription line in our product data, and our entry says to look elsewhere if your dog needs a therapeutic diet. All prices are editorial estimates, and none of this is veterinary advice.

Nine of the ten retailers in our index carry Black Hawk, and Aldi is the only shelf in our records without it. The specialist side covers the store chains Petbarn, Petstock and PETO along with the online sellers Pet Circle, Budget Pet Products and Habitat. The grocery side is unusually deep: at Coles and Woolworths it is one of only two national dog food brands in the aisle records, alongside Ivory Coat, and at IGA it is the only national brand listed at all, next to the Black and Gold house label. That reach is what the availability score of 83 is measuring.

How you pay depends on the door. In our pricing records the chains discount through membership, PETO and Pet Circle discount through repeat-order programs, and Budget Pet Products lists its Black Hawk bags at a flat everyday price with no member or repeat-order figure attached; the cheapest per-kilogram figure we hold is PETO's repeat-order price on the 20kg bag. We list no Black Hawk prices for Habitat or the three supermarkets, and none of the grocers runs a pet autoship, while IGA's independently owned stores make its range vary by suburb. Practically, restocking is never the problem with this brand: choosing your discount mechanic is. All prices are editorial estimates.