28 Questions Buyers Ask Before Placing a Supplement Order

Yukang Medicine (Guangzhou) Co., Ltd. is a dietary supplement contract manufacturer founded in 2015, operating a 10,000 m² cGMP cleanroom in Guangzhou, China, with a US subsidiary and warehouse since 2025. We run three commercial models: private label from our 10,000+ stock formulas, OEM manufacturing to your ingredient list and dosage strength, and ODM development where our R&D team builds the formula, format and packaging with you. Label compliance, packaging and DDP freight sit inside the same purchase order.

Our manufacturing base is Building 2, No. 43, Lixin 9th Road, Zengcheng District, Guangzhou, China. In 2025 we established a US subsidiary and a warehouse in California, which lets us ship DDP into the United States, hold stock closer to North American buyers and answer enquiries in your time zone. Manufacturing stays in Guangzhou — the US operation is fulfilment and commercial support, not a second production site.

Send your product idea, target market and rough volume by email, WhatsApp or the form on our contact page. Within 24 hours you get a feasibility reply: which stock formulas fit, whether a custom formula is needed, indicative MOQ and the documents we would need next. From there it runs quote → specification sign-off → samples in 7–10 days → bulk production. An NDA is signed before any proprietary formula is discussed.

Six things move a quote more than anything else: the formula or the effect you are targeting; the dosage form and fill weight or count; your destination market, because labelling and testing limits follow it; the number of SKUs and units per SKU; the packaging format — bottle, jar, pouch, stick pack, sachet or dropper; and your target launch window. If you have reference artwork or a competitor product you are benchmarking against, send it. Quotes are itemized into formula, unit cost, packaging, labelling, testing and freight so you can see what each decision costs.

Yes, and we prefer to. A mutual non-disclosure agreement is standard before any custom formulation discussion. Formulas, artwork and ingredient lists you bring stay yours — we do not reuse or resell a customer-owned formula, and we do not show your brand to other buyers.

MOQ depends on the model and the format. Private label from our stock formulas starts at 500–1,000 units. OEM manufacturing to your own specification typically starts at 3,000–5,000 units. ODM development starts at 5,000 units. Hard capsules are the lowest-friction entry point because stock shells need no tooling — see our hard capsule fast-track guide for the timeline behind that number.

We do not publish a price list, because a per-unit figure without context is misleading. Cost is driven by fill weight and actives, dosage form, unit count, packaging format and decoration, label complexity, testing scope for your market, and freight mode. Two products that look identical on a shelf can differ by a factor of three on unit cost. Send the six inputs listed above and you get an itemized quote where formula, component, filling, testing and freight are visible line by line.

Samples take 7–10 days from specification sign-off. Private label bulk production runs about 15 days; hard capsules can compress to 10–15 days of production because there is no tooling or drying step. OEM with new ingredient procurement runs 20–25 days, ODM development 25–35 days including bench work. Ocean freight to North America adds 18–25 days, air 5–8 days, and domestic DDP from our California warehouse 2–5 business days.

Often yes, and the honest answer is that it depends on which stage is compressible. Shells, bottles and labels are long-lead items that cannot be pulled forward once ordered; filling and packing can usually be scheduled into a tighter window. Tell us the date you actually need it in the warehouse, not the date you would like to order, and we will tell you what is achievable before you commit.

Bank transfer is the standard route, and US clients can pay into our local US account, which usually settles within 24 hours and avoids international wire fees. Third-party payment channels are available where a buyer needs them. Terms are agreed in the quotation and confirmed in the proforma invoice before production starts.

Roughly 2 million units per month, or about 12 million units a year, across ten automated lines covering softgels, hard capsules, tablets, gummies, powders, oral liquids and drops. Capacity matters less than slot availability — if you have a fixed launch window, ask us for the production slot at quotation stage, not after the artwork is approved.

Our Guangzhou facility is registered with the FDA as a food facility and operates to cGMP (21 CFR part 111), supported by ISO 22000 and HACCP food safety systems, with a BRCGS-audited site within our group. FDA facility registration is not an approval, certification or endorsement of any product — it applies to the facility, not the product. The current certificate set, with issuing bodies and validity dates, is released to brand partners on request.

Every production batch is tested and released against the specification agreed with you, and every batch ships with its own Certificate of Analysis covering identity, assay, microbiological limits and heavy metals. There is no representative-batch arrangement: if your batch number is on the carton, that batch has its own result. You can also nominate your own laboratory and test retained samples independently.

Failed material never reaches the finished-goods store. Raw material that fails identity or specification is rejected and quarantined. A finished batch that fails release testing is held, then either reworked against an approved deviation or destroyed — the decision, the investigation and the corrective action are all recorded. The five-step corrective-action process we follow is published in our Trust Center rather than described only in a sales call.

Allergens are controlled through supplier declarations, line clearance procedures and segregation between production runs, and allergens are declared on the label as your market requires. If your product must be free from a specific allergen, say so at formulation stage — the raw material selection and the line plan are built around it, and retrofitting a free-from claim after the formula is fixed is far more expensive.

We source certified raw materials and manufacture organic, non-GMO, vegan and gluten-free formulations, including gelatin-free gummies and vegetarian capsule shells. Where a claim needs third-party certification of the finished product, we work with the relevant certification body and support the audit for your product rather than relying on a blanket certificate of our own — and we write the claim on the label only to the extent the evidence supports it.

Most formulas carry a 24–36 month shelf life, supported by accelerated and real-time stability data rather than a convention. The date printed on your label is the date the stability data supports for that formula and that packaging — changing the container or the flavour system can change it, which is why stability is re-run on change rather than assumed.

Seven: softgels, hard capsules, tablets and chewables, gummies, powders and stick packs, oral liquids, and oral drops. Running all seven under one roof matters more than it sounds — a brand launching a capsule and a stick pack in the same range keeps one quality system, one batch-documentation standard and one supplier instead of coordinating two factories with different release criteria.

Yes, at every level: actives and potency, flavour and sweetener system, colour and shell, fill weight, count, bottle or pouch, closure, carton and artwork. The one hard boundary is intellectual property — a customized formula or label must not infringe a third party's patent, trademark or trade dress, and structure/function claims have to be ones your market permits with the evidence you hold.

We can develop a formula to a target profile — same actives, similar potency, comparable sensory result — using our library and legally available ingredients. We will not reproduce a protected formula or copy another brand's trade dress. If the product you are benchmarking is yours, send the specification and we will match it exactly; if it belongs to someone else, we will build a legally distinct alternative and tell you where it differs.

Clean-label is the default: natural colours, naturally derived flavours, and preservation systems chosen for the format and pH rather than added by habit. Where a formula genuinely needs a synthetic component to be stable or palatable, we say so at development stage so the ingredient declaration on your label is a decision you made, not a surprise at artwork review.

Yes. Our team reviews Supplement Facts panels, ingredient declarations, allergen statements, warning and direction text for the US, EU and UK, Canada, Australia and the GCC before production. The review exists to catch the things that stop shipments: a claim the market does not permit, a missing allergen, a net-quantity format the retailer rejects. It is a compliance review, not a legal opinion, and the brand remains the label owner.

Bench development typically runs two to four weeks depending on how far the concept is from an existing formula, followed by a confirmation batch and stability work before commercial production. Formulas that stay close to our library move much faster than a genuinely new delivery system. If speed is the priority, start from a stock formula and change the things that do not affect stability — flavour, colour, count, packaging.

Yes. We ship DDP (Delivered Duty Paid) to North America, the UK and EU, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific and Africa — the buyer receives the goods with duties, taxes and customs clearance handled on our side. We also quote FOB and EXW where your freight forwarder is better placed. The right choice usually depends on whether you already have a customs broker and a duty deferment account.

Yes. We handle FBA prep including poly-bagging, FNSKU labelling, expiry-date labelling, bundling and palletisation for US and EU marketplaces, and we ship DDP to any 3PL or distribution centre. Getting FBA prep wrong is one of the most common causes of a shipment being refused at the fulfilment centre, so it is worth confirming the labelling standard before production rather than after.

Sea freight, rail and air, chosen against your timeline and cost tolerance. Sea is the default for full-container private label orders; rail is a middle option into Europe; air is used for samples, launches and replenishment. We quote the freight separately from the goods so you can see what expediting actually costs.

On DDP terms we arrange clearance and the associated filings. Where you are the importer of record, we provide the documents your broker needs: commercial invoice, packing list, Certificate of Analysis, specification sheet, label artwork and the facility registration details for the manufacturing site. Prior Notice for US food imports is filed by the importer or their broker — we supply the data, but the filing obligation sits with the importer of record.

We manufacture for brands selling into the US, Canada, the UK, the EU, Australia, the GCC and Southeast Asia, and our US subsidiary handles North American fulfilment. What that means in practice: we know which label formats and claim restrictions apply in each market, and we will tell you when a positioning that works in one country cannot be shipped into another without changing the label.