Answer
Simoriah:
First of all, I'm a pet nutrition consultant. Educating people on what they should feed their pets to keep them healthy is literally what I do for a living.
With that said, NO, Special Kitty is not a good brand of cat food. If you simply look at the ingredients list, you'll quickly see why... animal by products (which means heads, beaks, feet, intestines, possibly some excrement, etc. etc. etc.), "filler" grains like corn and wheat (which are extremely hard for cats and dogs to digest, and they often cause stomach sensitivities and allergies in pets), harmful artificial preservatives and colorings and flavorings, etc. etc. etc. Basically, it's full of a bunch of junk that does absolutely nothing to benefit the health of your cats... it's edible, but it's not really "food".
You need to feed your cat an all natural pet food, such as BLUE BUFFALO or Innova. When you look at the ingredients list of all natural food brands, you'll see that the ingredients are actually "human grade", meaning that they're good enough for people to eat!
You should look for healthy ingredients such as real meat (not meat by products, but real cuts of chicken or lamb or fish, which should "always" be the first ingredient on the list), fruits and vegetables, "whole" grains like oatmeal and barley and brown rice (which are easily digestible and actually provide pets with healthy energy), and chelated vitamins and minerals.
I'm sure your cats like the taste of Special Kitty, because that's all they have ever had. Many animals like the taste of processed foods that are terrible for them, just like many humans like the taste of double bacon cheeseburgers and large chocolate milkshakes. Just because it's yummy doesn't mean it's even remotely good for us!
But if you switch your cats over to an all natural food, they'll like the taste just as much as they like Special Kitty, as soon as they get used to it! You just have to switch them over "gradually", because changing a pet's diet too suddenly often leads to diarrhea and other digestive issues.
But if you mix the new, all natural food with the old, processed food for a while (10 days is a good amount of time, and make sure to gradually increase the amount of new food until you're at 100%, starting out with 25% new food and 75% old), your cats will get used to the flavor easily, and they probably won't have any digestive issues from it. :)
Kent:
Cats are obligate carnivores, which means they need meat to live a healthy life. Special Kitty is full of corn and other filler junk that they can't digest. Check out the feeding guide on the Special Kitty bag. Then go and find a real cat food (Taste of the Wild for example).
You'll notice that you have to feed MUCH LESS of the TOTW vs Special Kitty. That's because TOTW doesn't have all that junk in it. It'd be like if you ate McDonald's every single day for the rest of your life. It's crap, so it doesn't fill you up, and you have to eat three or four times as much as if you'd just sat down and ate three balanced meals a day.
Jack:
Special Kitty is about one of the cheapest and worst foods you can buy. It's got no real meat in it, and is nothing but cheap fillers that barely meet your cat's nutritional requirements.
They might like it, but that sure doesn't mean it's healthy for them to eat. I'm sure you like potato chips, french fries, and donuts - does that mean they are good for you to eat?
The money you save on buying food now will cost you eventually in vet bills.
Proper nutrition is as important for cats as it is for people. Nature created cats to be carnivores - and there isn't even real meat in this brand of food. The first two ingredients are corn - and cats actually derive very little nutrition from corn.
The only meat source is by-products - that is all the bits and parts that have been deemed unfit for human consumption. It's heads, feet, hides, intestines, spleens, spinal chords, and even diseased and spoiled meat. Not exactly a high quality protein source for your cat.
The best foods contain no corn, and no by-products. Yes, they cost more, but even for people, nutritious and health foods cost more than junk foods.
