Potbelly: End Extreme Animal Suffering!

On Potbelly’s Corporate Responsibility section of their website, there is zero mention of animal welfare. While hundreds of restaurants and other food industry companies have pledged to make meaningful improvements for animals in their supply chains, Potbelly falls behind in this positive initiative.

Potbelly Corporation is a publicly traded American fast-casual restaurant chain that focuses on sub sandwiches and milkshakes. Potbelly claims to be “committed to improving the communities [they] serve,” and “respecting our our planet’s resources.” But have they forgotten about the animals in their supply chain?

Companies have a choice at what they they buy. Without a public animal welfare policy, Potbelly may be purchasing from farms that use cruel practices, like the use of cages, causing unnecessary suffering to animals.

Dane Charbeneau
Campaigns Manager, Animal Equality

According to experts, gestation crates, where pregnant pigs are kept for nearly their entire lives, are widely considered one of the worst forms of cruelty to animals. Pigs are kept inside these incredibly small metal cages—only 7 feet by 2 feet in size—preventing them from walking, turning around, or engaging in natural behaviors like foraging and nesting.

Pigs are intelligent and social animals, and being trapped in these crates causes them a lot of stress and frustration. Some pigs even resort to biting the metal bars of the crates or banging their heads against them in agony.

Physically, the pigs suffer from weak bones and muscles. They also develop problems like abrasions, heart issues, overgrown hooves, digestion problems, and urinary tract issues due to their extremely limited movement.

Experts agree: Gestation Crates Are Animal Abuse

Gestation crates for pigs are a real problem….Basically, you’re asking a sow to live in an airline seat…I think it’s something that needs to be phased out.

Temple Grandin
Associate Professor, Department of Animal Science, Colorado State University

…the close confinement of sows in stalls or tethers is one of the most extreme examples of cruelty to an animal. It continues throughout much of life and is much worse than severely beating an animal or most laboratory experiments.

Donald Broom
Professor of Animal Welfare, University of Cambridge

Confinement of sows during pregnancy, especially in individual stalls or on tethers, can be cold, uncomfortable and injurious, and imposes severe restrictions on natural behaviour.

John Webster
Senior Research Fellow and Emeritus Professor of Animal Husbandry, University of Bristol, Creator of The Five Freedoms