How are supplements manufactured?

As you walk up to a bottle of nutritional supplements in your local grocery store, do you ever wonder how that little bottle was produced?

Our team has been involved in manufacturing and I will try my best here to describe the complicated process that is involved in nutritional manufacturing so that you can understand why not everyone or anyone can just start producing supplements.

The First step is determining the formula, Any good manufacturing plant will have access to a food scientist, food scientists review and create formulas to ensure they are safe and within the FDA's requirements for supplements. Although the FDA does not regulate supplements they do have rules about the PH of liquids and the size of capsules that can be produced.

After the formula is set and it has been determined by the food scientist to be effective, then it is time to acquire the raw materials. Raw Material vendors scout the world to find great sources for fruits, vegetables, conventional ingredients, as well as running agents. They buy these raw materials in workable forms, namely liquids or powders.

Raw Material suppliers pricing is based around quantity, so it is common that a supplier will send .3 kg to a manufacturing plant for them to sample the quality and composition. After that though they will have minimums that can range from 5kg to 100kg per raw material.

If you have ever tried to have a manufacturing plant run a custom for you, they will have a minmum order, this is largely caused by the raw material vendor, if you order calls for only 3 kg of a raw at 2500 units, they will require you to run 5000 bottles so they can order 6kg from the raw material supplier.

After the raw material supplier has confirmed the raw is available, then the manufacturing plant will negotiate a price and get the raw in stock. Once the raw materials arrive, any good manufacturing plant will test a sample of the raw material to ensure two things:

1- The microbial count of the raw material is well within safety limits

2- The raw material is the actual material in question

It seems strange that a test would be needed to ensure a raw material is what is claims to be, however many raw materials have the same characteristics and consistency.

After the raw are deemed acceptable, then production starts, the raw materials will be mixed and blended until they are at a consistant workable form. Powders will be mixed by using a large blender or sifter, this can take 10 minutes or 10 hours depending on the amount of powders being used.

Liquids will be put into huge tanks and the a massive blender will inserted to ensure the product is blended to a consistent viscosity.

After this samples will be taken, in liquids to ensure taste and PH, with capsules to ensure a proper mixture.

Then the packaging will begin. For liquids this is simple, the liquid manufacturing plant has two options, hot fill or cold fil.

Hot fill means the end product will be in a HDPE (heat resistant plastic) or glass bottle. The liquid will go through a pasteurization process that will take the liquid to around 200 degrees Fahrenheit, This will kill any potentially harmful microbial growth, and ensure that when the liquid hits the glass or thick plastic that it will instantly sanitize any threats in the bottles. Then the liquid is one by one filled into their predetermined bottles, the bottle then moves to a capper and a machine will tighten a cap on the bottle.

Cold fill is becoming more and more popular, cold filled bottles will be in thing clear plastic, or even card board or foil tubes or pouches. This is a popular technique however it is more dangerous, Cold fill entails never heating the liquids up to kill the bacteria that can grow in liquids, so special precautions must be taken. For example a cold fill facility must have a bottle washer, This machine will take each bottle before it is filled and flip it upside down to blow hot steam into the bottle, killing any potential bacterial threats. The product also must be filled in a pharmaceutical style clean room to ensure no foreign materials enter the product during production. But the question still remains, how do you clean any bacterial growth without a heating element? This was solved by Dimethyl dicarbonate, which is a chemical (duh). This chemical is sprayed into the product after it has been filled, it is then quickly bottled. The chemical kills any bacteria in the bottle within 15 minutes (roughly) and then breaks down to trace amounts of methanol and carbon dioxide. The FDA accepts this as an acceptable way to clean beverages (1)This is also called Velcorin which is a trademarked product and dosing mechanism. This chemical enables a product to be filled using cold liquid and still be safe for a 1-2 year shelf life.

For capsules to be filled, a large machine will compress down the powder into two halves of a capsule.then the machine much like a waffle iron will smash the two ends together and twist once to attache the capsule and cause an enclosed capsule. Testing is done through the run to ensure a constant weight and capsule closure is obtained. These machines are called encapsulators and can range from a 1000 capsules an hour capacity up to 500,000 capsules an hour depending on their size and power capabilities. The capsules are then sent to a filling machine that will count out a precise number of capsules and put them into the chosen container. The most common by far in the US market is a 60 capsules per bottle. This is usually a one month supply for most products and fits best (depending on the size ) in a 200 cc bottle. Below are a few common sizes of capsules, The most commonly used size are 00 called "double ought" or 0 "single ought".

No matter if the product is liquid or capsules, the bottles must have a proper lot code (this small code will show the manufacturing facility when it was manufactured and will match up to the batch record) It should also let the consumer know its expiration date. Foods do not have to have an expiration date, just a best by date, however supplements must have an expiration date according to FTC and FDA regulations for labeling.

After the product is finished samples will be pulled for retention, every manufacturing plant that is GMP certified must keep accurate batch records (consider this like the recipe showing exactly what went in and where it was sourced from) as well as retention samples. These samples are kept in case an issue is reported with the product.

Then the bottles now sealed and ready to be labeled will be labeled as the manufacturing plants customers request. today the most common labels are sticker type labels or shrink sleeves.

Then final tests are done, these tests will yield a Certificate of Analysis. The certificate of analysis will certify what the product has in it, the weight and type of packaging as well as the microbial count.

AND THAT IS HOW NUTRITIONAL MANUFACTURING IS DONE!