How to buy supplements and not get scammed - Post your ideas/sources here

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Excel-Mates please post your favorite suppliers here along with your comments on quality, price , delivery and customer service.

Let's start by example with L-Glutamine which is one of the most highly recommended aminos regardless of your age or goal. It is typically consumed by the teaspoon.

The first thing to consider is the recommended daily dose. At 2-8 grams per day you do not want to purchase this mild tasting readily dissolving powder in capsules mixed with stearate. Yet people do. Nuts. Instead buy -pure- powder from a reputable distributor.

O.K. lets look at a Costco offering for today.
How about we call our L-Glut powder something else, say "GLUTAMIMMUNE"?
COOL! Let's put it in a tiny tub then charge TEN times (10x) market price to warehouse members who've had to buy a membership first.

Ajinomoto Glutamimmune
★★★★★ ★★★★★ 5 out of 5 stars. Read reviews.
Item #1071936

400g of "pharmaceutical grade" for only $30 ($75 per kilo where fair market price is about $7.50/kilo).
Do you buy "pharmaceutical grade" food of any kind?

This folks is the most common supplement scam around. Gross over-pricing of small quantities.

Compare:
KILO (1000g) of pure micro crystalline powder at $5 from MyProtein ( IF you luck out, check frequently. )
KILO at Powder City $25

MRM mini tub, 1/2 Kilo (500g) $21 to $60 in health food stores.

Capsules at CVS: Do you REALLY want to know the per kilo price you paid there!

While MyProtein looks good BEWARE! MyProtein marketing is every bit as unethical with wildly gyrating prices. One moment the site price is $5/kilo the next its $7 for 225 grams. Avoid sites with wildly gyrating prices that require coupons unless you have lots and lots of time on your hands to grab the occasional great deals. At least you can trust the quality.

So that's LESSON ONE: Buy in a quantity that you will use up within 90 days perhaps with extra to share with a friend.
Be SURE to check price on larger bags.
200g / $5
1000g /$7. Five times as much! You see folks the packaging costs way more than the powder.
Buy Large and share with buddies if you can. Use that drop box! I see this on MyProtein all the time.

Convert all prices to Dollars per Kilo (1000 grams). Certain powders which are very expensive and/or consumed in small doses are sold by 50, 100, or 250 gram packets.

If your time is valuable then choose a distributor with consistently fair pricing and reputable quality like PowderCity.

LESSON TWO: Compare apples to apples- PURITY
Most of the time we want -100-per-cent-pure powders. Check the nutrition labeling. ASK ABOUT EXPIRATION DATE! Should be at least one year out.

If you are buying ALCR, acetyl L carnitine then do not compare it to "L-carnitine" they are not the same. You pay more for the bio-available product.

LESSON THREE: Call the customer service line before you order. How easy is it to reach someone? Product guarantee and refund policy? Who pays return shipping?

LESSON FOUR: Site integrity
Compare the claims made to what you see on Examine.com. If a site consistently over-states the known benefit of a supplement or tries to get you to purchase supplements inappropriate for you then walk.
I give Powder City high marks for citations of studies.
Beware of "Sales". "$28 OFF now only $5" is typical at MyProtein, don't fall for it.


LESSON FIVE: Inspect your purchase!
Your tongue is an incredibly sensitive analytical tool. Taste and smell the product. Check the color. Is it clumpy? (normal for some aminos)
How well does it dissolve in spring water?
Packaging: Your product needs to arrive in clean moisture and air-resistant packaging. Reject any shipment with compromised packing.
Many will transfer product to an airtight screw jar. MyProtein supplies high quality free standing resealable pouches. Nice but you are paying for the packaging.
 
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Ravings from Cosco customers re: Ajinomoto Glutamine:
[ "You will find many versions of glutamine on the internet, but this is fermented glutamine which makes it far superior to other brands"]

However,
[ "l-Glutamine is manufactured by several manufacturers throughout the world, all using fermentation."]
I. Kusumoto The industrial production of L Glutamine , Journal of Nutriton Sept 2001

customer WODmaster goes on to rave:
[ "For this price and the quality of the product, you really can't beat it. Plus, they do not use animal products, so NO duck feathers or human hair! (Shockingly, that is what many amino acid supplements are made with.)]

Perhaps the WOD should read Kusumoto

http://jn.nutrition.org/content/131/9/2552S.long

_____

Before we all run out and buy that kilo bag of L-Glutamine for $5-10 because it's very likely produced by the same manufacturer that fills various branded mini-jars:

Side Effects of Long-Term Glutamine Supplementation Milan Holecek, MD, PhD, DSc 2016
http://pen.sagepub.com/content/37/5/607.abstract
 

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Here's Labdoor's picks. Scroll down and read the comments. Note that Jarrow tested at 66.3% pure whereas BodyFortress, their No.1 pic tested at 99.8% pure.

[" Tablet and capsule products recorded the lowest glutamine concentrations in this batch, with as little as 0.663 g of glutamine per 1 g of product. "]

Too bad Labdoor hasn't tested my $5/kilo find at MyProtein.
https://labdoor.com/rankings/glutamine
 
BulkSupplements or Hard Rhino off Amazon, as a Prime member I've never found anything or anywhere else to be the prices and/or service and delivery.
 

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BulkSupplements or Hard Rhino off Amazon, as a Prime member I've never found anything or anywhere else to be the prices and/or service and delivery.
Thanks Vince! Here's a comparison from an order I placed on myprotein yesterday:

MP: AAKG 0.5lbs (226g) $10 "sale" 50% OFF reg $20. Who sells anything in tenths of a pound? Lame. $0.044/g

Hard Rhino Amazon everyday: 500g (1.1 lbs) $19.75 Prime $0.04/g

PowderCity : $12/250g pouch 500g $0.048/g

Amazon calculates price per gram for you! MyProtein's 50% OFF , ha!
__

TAURINE
MP: 2.2lbs , 1 kilo, $6.22/kilo
Ha Rh: $29.50/kilo (sold in 500g packets)
PowCty: $13.79/kilo

12 hours later and MP is up to $25/Kilo "regular price" They did better, 75% OFF, on TAURINE than their advertised "up to 70% OFF" Halloween sale
___


N Acetyl L Tyrosine NALT
MP: 1.1lb 500g $16.44 sale $32.88/kilo Best Deal
HA RY: not avail on Amazon, Direct, $38.53/500g or $52 by the kilo
Po Cty: $7/100g (max supplied) $70/kilo (10x 100g pouches)
___

L Theanine
MP:7 oz pouch $13.68sale 198g(today they're back to selling tenths of a pound) $0.07/g best price sale only
Ha Ry: 125g $17.49 $0.14/gPo Cty: 10,20,100 or 500g pouches $3-$38 $0.30 to .076 per gram
__

Acety L Carnitine
MP: $35.83/kilo pouch sale
Ha Ry: $17.75 for two 250g pouches $35.50/kilo best deal
PoCty: 50,100,250,500 and kilo pouches, $4.49ea to $42/kilo
___
For this order anyhow;

MP totaled $82, no tax, with a mystery gift bag and shaker thrown in, free sh

Amazon Prime: $141 + tax, but you get 275g more of AAKG, but 75g less L-Theanine if I've done my arithmatic correctly.

On the other hand that's a lot of price checking to insure one does not get reamed at MP.


 
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I use ConsumerLabs.com to see what they have tested

https://www.consumerlab.com/

I read Amazon reviews and try to spot the paid reviews that are fake.

I trust these brands: Jarrow, Super Nutrition, and Source Naturals.

Thanks for your input Nelson. Yes, of course, independent testing is the only real assurance of quality we have for many substances. I too purchase and trust Jarrow. I have on my shelf at the moment their PQQ, N-A-C timed release, PS100, Magnesium Optimizer, Sleep Optimizer and MK-7. Early on I was buying their tiny jars of generic powders.

I was surprised to see that Labdoor reported Jarrow with the lowest active content on L-Glutamine (caps?).

It's worth considering that for the most part we are buying re-packaged substances many of which are made by only a handful of large corporations. IMO it makes little sense to pay a premium price for Glutamine, most aminos, most anti-oxidents. What Jarrow purportedly does is: (1) custom formulations i.e. "optimizer" , and,
(2) QC each batch of raw material (as do P Cty, MyProtein and others).

As you've said elsewhere, when Medium Chain Triglycerides, olive oil, natural color, and sunflower lecithin are used instead of soybean oil, soy lecithin, FD&C food color then it's likely the main ingredients are quality as well but we really can't be sure. For best value each supplement requires its own consideration.

Owing to competition ALL of the recognized brands are introducing economy formulations alongside their star premium products. For this reason and also because I'm not wiling to overpay for generic substances I'm reluctant to simply buy by brand until such time as the Fed includes me in their free money scheme.
 
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