Why do we purchase bully sticks from South America, rather than the USA?

Three major things: diet, hormones, and age of slaughter of the cattle.

In Brazil, cattle are slaughtered at 40 months of age, they are left intact longer, and they are grass fed, which is a natural diet for cattle.

In the USA, cattle are slaughtered at under 36 months of age, they are castrated early so they don’t have the hormones to develop the way that an intact bull can develop.  They are also grain fed. When a cow is fed primarily corn, rather than grass, they have a lot more fat deposited in their tissue. This means that a bully stick from a grain fed steer will be a lot more greasy than a bully stick from a grass fed bull. Steer sticks are about 11% fat, whereas a bully stick from grassfed cattle is 0.5% fat - so there’s a significant difference! Bully sticks from steer will also be a lot skinnier and “wrinkly” compared to a bully stick from an intact bull, which will be much thicker and overall much more appealing to consumers.

There are suppliers who are producing USA sourced grass fed bully sticks (not steer sticks) but the price point is much higher, often 2-3x the retail price of a bully stick sourced from South America.