Best food for lab and border collie

[atcdoglover]

First post here, I will try to be brief and to the point

I have two dogs
-6 year old border collie, very healthy, not a very picky eater.
-2 year old lab, minor health problems, and surprisingly a bit of a picky eater

So, heres the story.

I fed my border collie a pretty cheap dog food (I thought it was decent, but I was 20 at the time i started) for 4 years, then when I got the lab, the breeder insisted that we feel a brand called "TLC", so we decided to switch the border collie as well. They refused to warranty the health of the dog if we didn't. That frustrated me a lot, because they were getting money from TLC for us buying the food, so they were basically manipulating us to buy TLC by using the health guarantee as bait. Not cool. As soon as I figured out what was going on I started looking into alternatives. I was also pretty unhappy that they were claiming it was a 'local' product (and it was shipped from a local address) but all the information I was able to obtain was that it was being imported.

At this time we started to notice that the lab was developing some flaky skin, and shedding a lot.

So, I decided to try Royal Canin, I put the collie on an 'active' blend, and the lab on their breed specific. That was a cost increase for me of about 30% over the TLC. My lab HATED the RC, to the point of not being very interested in eating it! the collie was fine with it. There was no change in my labs skin/coat issue. Around this time I started at this time supplementing the labs diet with some salmon oil, because I thought it was nutritional issue. I also started looking more a the ingredients, and started to realize that I was paying a fair bit for food that might not have the best ingredients. To RC's credit, I live about 10 minutes from their 'factory', so they are local.

I then decided to try something called 'Holeistic Select' for them, with the oil supplement for the lab. I believe that this was probably the best quality food I have ever fed them. They both seemed to like it, but there was no change in the labs skin/coat.

I took my lab in to the vet for her yearly checkup, and he jumped down my throat about her 'nutritional deficiencies' and wanted me to give her his oil supplements (look identical to mine, but no label, so no idea what they are) and his food (turns out its RC's vet blend). I was a little offended that he didn't talk to me about this, but basically accused me of feeding them crap, however, if the best interest of my dogs, I took the advice. There was no change (except to my bank account)

I took her back for a booster shot, and the vet was surprised to see no difference (I guess if he would have listened to me he would have known) and then wondered if she had a yeast bloom on her skin. Slides confirmed that she has 10X the normal count, so he put her on a medication (as 3$/ pill 2x daily for 30 days... you do the math) Happily, this has seemed to cure the problem. Her skin/coat are 75% better at the 15 day mark... Don't want to think about what its doing to her liver

Soooo, sorry for the life story, but I need to know where I should go from here. I have read that grain free might help prevent this problem from occurring again? I have been recommended to try ACANA grain free, since it seem to satisfy my 'local' requirements, and they have a grain free line. Does anyone have any opinions on that?

A side issue is the ethics of the food. Acana claims that they use 'free-run' chickens, etc, but we all know how much BS those claims usually are. How transparent are these companies? I spend a great deal of time ensuring that the meat I eat is ethical, is there any way I can do that for my dogs, without putting my costs through the roof?

I'm not afraid to pay a premium price, but it chaps me pretty hard when I pay a premium price for a sub-premium product.

Thanks so much.