Which Dog Subscription Box Will Win? Bark Box, Bullymake, and Kong Comparison 2020!

This post contains affiliate links. These won’t cost you anything, but the commissions we may earn through them help offset the cost of chew toys. Thanks for your support!

Today we put three of the most popular monthly boxes head-to-head to see who comes out on top. So which box gives you the most bang for your buck? The answer is coming up!

As always, we’ll have notes, links, and resources at the end of this post.

The three contenders today are:

• BarkBox, Super Chewer edition
• Bullymake
• And Kong’s new subscription box

Judging Criteria

Before we dive into the boxes, I want to set the criteria I’m using to evaluate them. 

I’ve previously talked about the importance of good toy organization. In my professional opinion, you should organize dog toys into categories:

• Chew toys, which are available 24/7
• Interactive toys, which are restricted access
• And work-to-eat toys, which can sometimes do double duty as chew toys but are mainly for canine enrichment and are only available while they’re actively being used for enrichment.

I’m always a little cautious about plush toys. Stuffed toys can either be a nice toy for a dog or a disaster. It depends on the dog, how we’ve taught them to interact with these toys and their breed and level of drive. 

So when I look at a monthly subscription box, I don’t want a bunch of new, brainless toys. I like functional things that I can use for physical, mental, and emotional stimulation. I like the items I purchase to give them some variety in their recreational chewing and to give us some creative options. I feel like folks often tend to get these boxes and then go, “Here ya go,” and good ownership and good training have to go a little deeper.

Another thing to note is that each of these three boxes is customizable at the time of your subscription based on your wants and needs and your dog’s size and age. I set it up for the chewing and activity I just discussed. If you were to select different things when you subscribed, you would get slightly different boxes, although in talking to other subscribers, I feel the differences are minimal. As always, your mileage may vary. 

So, we’ll talk about some of that as we go. But now, let’s open each box and see what’s inside.

BULLYMAKE

I currently have a subscription to Bullymake, so I was pretty psyched to get into the new Halloween edition. We’ve got the following:

• A Theme card with content info
• A Cauldron Work-to-Eat toy—food and treats are placed in the hole for canine enrichment.
• One package of Peanut Butter Bars.
• A package of Tricky Treats.
• Candy Corn shaped treats.
• And a Witch Hat chew toy.

Interesting stuff!

Let’s look at the BarkBox and see what’s inside. I’ve looked at Bark Boxes before, and they’ve generally left me pretty unimpressed. However, this Super Chewer edition is new to me, so I ordered their Robot-themed box to see what that’s all about.

BARK BOX

• A content info booklet
• One Chicken stick consumable chew treat
• One “Thinkers” stick treat (Duck)
• A blue robot chew toy (vanilla-scented)
• A black robot toy (smoked)
• A green robot puzzle toy?
• One package of Microchicks treats (Chicken)
• One package of Duck data treats (Duck)

That was actually pretty fun, I have to say.

But we need to explore our last contender, Kong. The Kong company is a staple in the pet industry, and they’ve only JUST entered the monthly box arena, so let’s see what their first effort is all about:

KONG

• One package of Kong bites treats
• One Kong Marathon Work-to-Eat treat
• One tube of Sweet potato spread
• One Medium Stuff-a-Ball
• One Kong Squeaker ball, large, 2-pack
• And one Large Kong

I must say, at first blush, the Kong box is disappointing. There’s no creativity; it’s just a discounted shopping cart of the usual stuff you can get in the stores.

However, as I said, my goal with boxes like these is to contribute meaningfully to my household and my developmental training, so let’s get a little granular and put the categories toe-to-toe and see how things add up.

ROUND 1—CHEW TOYS

Long-time followers of the Simpawtico channel know I’m a huge proponent of chew toy training a dog. Chewing is emotionally satisfying and an excellent recreational activity to help dogs relax, unwind, and learn to spend time alone. So, figuring out the best dog box for chewers is a priority for me!

Even though I think the materials in Bullymake’s chew toy are pretty great, I’m pleased with the BarkBox toys. 

One thing I’ve noticed over the years is that many, many dogs prefer to chew toys with protrusions. This allows them to manipulate it with their front paws and get parts of the toy into their back teeth. So if you observe dogs chewing, this is how it usually looks. 

Well, even though I love Bullymake’s quality and creativity, they tend to send out too many chew toys without these. So you can see on these chew toys from previous boxes that they’re too flat, and my dogs haven’t interacted with them much. This waffle and steering wheel have NO engagement with them. This film reel and the show toy only have wear on the pointy bits.

And the flute and antlers have a lot of wear because they have several pointy bits.

This is why other toys like the Benebone and the Nylabone Dura-Chew are typically a lot more popular because they’re easier to manipulate and get into the back teeth. This is also one of the reasons why dogs tend to like antlers a lot, too.

Similarly, the Bark Box’s black robot has protruding elements and has serious engagement from the first 24 hours in the house.

The Kong Box didn’t even come with a dedicated chew toy. Some dogs will chew on a Kong after they’ve finished extracting food, but this isn’t what I recommend for the long term, as something available 24/7 for them to settle down with.

Your results will vary, of course, but based on my experience in thousands of consultations, Bullymake and Bark Box will yield better results in the Chew Toy category, and the winner today is Bark Box.

Round 1 Results

WINNER: Bark Box (3 pts) with premium toys

2nd: BULLYMAKE (2 pts)

3rd: KONG (1 pt)

ROUND 2—WORK-to-EAT TOYS

Work-to-Eat toys are a big part of my training philosophy. By allowing a dog to functionally engage in parts of the prey drive sequence like foraging and dissecting, we can create a lot of mental and emotional stimulation that contributes to a healthy, behaviorally centered dog. I recommend work-to-eat projects in place of meals as much as you can manage, and I have resources on the website you can refer to for more.

For this reason, I’m super interested in what kinds of novel experiences these boxes can provide my dogs in this category.

Bullymake consistently provides a work-to-eat toy in their boxes. Every month it’s a different shape to fit the theme. They’re very resilient and resistant to destruction. However, in my opinion, the holes are small. That’s fine for pinning a treat but no good for a Work-to-Eat project where you may want to fill the toy with kibble or meat. It makes it very hard to get the food. We’ve worked around this by making the holes wider on some of them, but that tough, chew-resistant rubber also makes this hard to do, so be careful if you try this.

The Bark Box toy was neat. The variable opening made for the ability to make it more or less challenging. Even so, this is entry-level stuff that might be good for some of you but would be a no-brainer for my dogs. 

Kong, of course, has made their name almost entirely on its flagship Work-to-Eat toy. So, because the box comes with not only one but TWO work-to-eat toys, they beat out both Bark Box and Bullymake. 

The only downside here is that Kong tends to undersize its recommendations. I mentioned in the Kong video a few years ago that I recommend a size larger than they do, and the toy they sent along is an excellent example of that principle. When I ordered the box, I put down my largest dog, Dexter, at 55 pounds, and they sent a large Kong. The large is listed as appropriate for 30-65 pounds. But the large only holds about half a cup of food.

We already had an extra large on hand, which holds just under a cup, about 7/8.

So, what they sent will work, but I prefer one larger size. For most dogs, you’ll do better if you pick one size up from what Kong recommends. That makes choosing your box a little tricky.

The Kong Box also came with the Stuff-a-Ball. It’s not as useful as the Kong, but it’s a good one to have around anyways. 

Round 2 Results

WINNER: KONG (3 pts)

2nd: BULLYMAKE (2 pts)

3rd: BARK BOX (1 pt)

ROUND 3—TREATS

While the chew toys and Work-to-Eat toys are the main things I want from the boxes, the variety of treats is fun too. 

Our Bullymake box routinely comes with three packages of treats: two different small varieties and one larger one. I wouldn’t use these for training since I already have my favorites. But, for around the house here and there for things, they’re great.

Bark Box came with two small to medium packages of treats. It also came with two stick treats.

The Kong Box only came with one package of small treats. You could probably use these as training treats since they’re small enough. I know the Kong box comes with the Marathon add-on for the Kong Toy, but I view this as a Work-to-Eat project; it’s kind of a one-trick pony, whereas a package of treats will last a while and serve you in many different ways. 

This box also came with the Sweet Potato spread. In our Kong video, we recommended using toppers when you prep your Work-to-Eat projects; some of our viewers didn’t want to use peanut butter. This would be a good substitute for something like that, but that puts this in the work-to-eat category for us, and Kong already won that round. 

Round 3 Results

WINNER: BULLYMAKE (3 pts)

2nd BARK BOX (2 pts)

3rd KONG (1 pts)

ROUND 4—VALUE

Here are the stats for how much you’ll spend on each box (as of the making of this post):

• • ANNUALLYBark Box: $29 USD (3 points)
  • Kong: $29.95 USD (2 points)
  • Bullymake: $31 USD (1 point)
  • 6-MONTHBark Box and Bullymake: $34 USD (2 points each)
  • Kong: $34.95 USD (1 point)
  • SINGLE BOXBullymake: $39 USD (3 points)
  • Kong: $39.95 USD (2 points)
  • Bark Box: $45 USD (1 point)

Round 4 Results

WINNER: DRAW BETWEEN BARK BOX AND BULLYMAKE

As of the making of this video, Bark Box is the cheapest for a single box and the cheapest for an annual subscription. On the flip side, Bullymake was the cheapest for a single box and the most expensive for an annual. And Kong seemed to be straight up the middle. But we’re talking about differences of just a few bucks or even pennies. Plus, all three companies offer a six-month option too, which seems to be a good compromise if you can’t decide.

FINAL SCORE

It comes down to Bark Box vs. Bullymake. According to the scoring, Bullymake wins by a hair (13 points). Bark Box comes in just behind (12 points), and Kong was a little lackluster (10 points).

All three boxes include durable dog toys. Both Bullymake and Bark Box have excellent pros and some minor cons, but overall I like what I get out of each box. So even though I’m subscribed to Bullymake already, I will keep my Bark Box subscription for a little bit and see what other fun things come. 

Are bark boxes worth the money? In the Bark Box vs. Super Chewer decision, I believe the Super Chewer box is superior for most mid-size and large dogs. The regular Bark Box may be more appropriate for small dogs, although I have two smaller dogs, a Jack Russell and a Boston Terrier, and they have no problem going through the Super Chewer toys. Even though Super Chewer is advertised as the “aggressive chewer box,” it’s suitable for just about any dog with a well-developed chew toy habit.

The Kong Box has promise but hasn’t quite caught up to these other guys yet as they’re so far just stuffing it full of the same bright red stuff you see at the pet stores. However, Bullymake and Bark Box at least have something novel and fun you can’t get elsewhere, and that fun enthusiasm from getting the box each month will carry over to your dog.

As I said before, each box is customizable, and your experiences may vary based on what each company decides to put in your box based on your initial survey responses when you sign up.

QUESTIONS AND CLOSING

In the meantime, take a look at some of our other related videos/posts, such as our Chew Toy Training post and our Kong Toy post that you can honestly apply to ANY brand of similar hollow toy (so, all you trolls who think Kong sponsors me can go back under your bridges).

Now, questions for you: what have your experiences been with subscription boxes? Are there other services like this I should know about? And what are YOUR experiences with any of these boxes? Let’s connect in those YouTube comments. 

If you got some value from the video, please make sure you are subscribed to our YouTube channel so you never miss any new videos (and make sure to pop that thumbs-up button, too). As always: keep learning, keep practicing, and we’ll see you next time. Thanks for looking!

RESOURCES

Some of the links below are affiliate links. These won’t cost you anything, but the commissions we may earn through them help offset the cost of dog treats. Thanks for your support!

Subscribe to the Bullymake Box

Subscribe to the Super Chewer Bark Box

Subscribe to the Kong Box

Get Kong’s Sweet Potato Spread (an excellent substitute for peanut butter)

SHARE IT: