When an ingredient creates a formulation or manufacturing problem, the answer doesn’t always have to be finding another ingredient or supplier.
The supplement industry has no shortage of ingredient distributors.
For many brands and contract manufacturers, the traditional model works well: a manufacturer produces an ingredient, a distributor represents or warehouses it, and the customer purchases the material needed for a formula.
The difference becomes important when something doesn’t work.
Maybe an ingredient tastes terrible. Maybe it absorbs moisture and clumps. Maybe its particle size creates problems filling capsules. Maybe it works in a tablet but won’t disperse in water. Maybe its color makes it unsuitable for a clear beverage. Or perhaps the formula itself has become unnecessarily complicated or expensive to manufacture.
Traditionally, the answer may be to find another ingredient, which can also mean finding another supplier.
But there is another option: work with a vertically integrated ingredient manufacturer capable of changing the characteristics of the ingredient or improving how the formula is manufactured.
NNB Nutrition is one example. In addition to discovering and supplying novel ingredients, NNB combines R&D, application development, and manufacturing capabilities that allow it to work directly on customer problems.
That creates an important distinction between a company that can supply an ingredient and a company that can potentially change it.
Distribution vs. problem solving
A traditional distributor plays an important role in connecting ingredient manufacturers with finished-product companies. But because the distributor generally sells materials manufactured by someone else, its options can become limited when the problem is the ingredient itself.
If a material is too bitter, too hygroscopic, difficult to manufacture with, or poorly suited to the desired format, the distributor can look for an alternative.
A vertically integrated manufacturer can potentially take a different approach: keep the ingredient and solve the problem.
NNB’s model combines ingredient distribution with internal R&D and manufacturing capabilities. The company can modify characteristics such as solubility, particle size, organoleptics, and bioavailability using technologies that include synthesis, fermentation, enzymatic processes, and plant extraction.
Instead of asking, “What else can you sell us?” the conversation can become, “This is the ingredient we want. This is the problem we’re having. Can you fix it?”.
What can a vertically integrated ingredient manufacturer change?
NNB’s technical platform provides a good example of how broad that problem-solving capability can become.
Its capabilities include:
- Flavor masking technology
- Granulation technology
- Moisture-proof technology
- Decolorization technology
- Sustained-release technology
- Ingredient content adjustment
- Microencapsulation and powdered-oil embedding
- Solubility and dispersibility optimization
- Pre-blend services
- Clear/neutral flavor adjustment
- Taste optimization
- Liposomal and beadlet delivery
Each technology addresses a practical problem brands and manufacturers regularly encounter.
When the ingredient tastes or smells terrible
Taste can determine whether an effective ingredient ever makes it into a successful product, particularly as supplements expand into powders, stick packs, gummies, and beverages.
NNB uses flavor-masking technology to reduce undesirable tastes and odors at the raw-material level. Existing applications include tributyrin, grains of paradise, and dihydroberberine.
For one customer, NNB developed a flavor-masked tributyrin powder specifically for stick-pack applications. The distinction is important. Instead of relying entirely on the finished flavor system to cover a difficult ingredient, there may be an opportunity to improve the raw material first.
When the ingredient clumps
Hygroscopic ingredients can absorb moisture, resulting in caking, poor flowability, stability problems, and manufacturing inefficiencies.
NNB’s moisture-proof technology is designed to improve anti-caking properties, flowability, and shelf stability. Its existing applications include the FlowTech series, moisture-proof BAIBA, and glycerol powder.
In one customer application, NNB addressed Alpha-GPC caking by developing a moisture-proof version and creating its FlowTech™ technology.
Rather than removing a desirable ingredient because it creates production problems, the ingredient itself can potentially be redesigned to behave better.
When capsule filling or production becomes difficult
Particle size, powder density, and flowability can significantly affect capsule filling, blending, and tableting.
NNB uses granulation technology to increase particle size and improve flowability and anti-caking properties. Existing applications include berberine, dihydroberberine, di-leucine, and amino acid blends.
The company has applied this commercially by changing the particle size of a critical ingredient in an existing product to improve capsule filling. In another case, its granulation expertise helped make amino acid tablet production more cost-effective.
Consumers may never see this type of innovation, but manufacturers experience its impact directly.
When an ingredient won’t work in a beverage
An ingredient that performs well in a capsule doesn’t necessarily work in an RTD.
Poor solubility can affect appearance and taste. Poor dispersion can create inconsistencies. Natural pigments can make otherwise desirable ingredients unsuitable for transparent beverages.
NNB uses solubility and dispersibility optimization to improve difficult raw materials for liquid applications. It also uses decolorization technology to address pigments that can limit applications or create manufacturing issues.
One example involved a global beverage company facing poor solubility and taste with plant proteins. NNB developed a transparent, tasteless, and fully water-soluble plant protein to address those limitations.
Instead of asking whether an ingredient naturally works in a beverage, vertical integration allows developers to ask whether the ingredient can be modified so that it does.
When the delivery format needs to change
Some problems require changing how an ingredient is delivered.
NNB’s sustained-release technology can control the release rate of raw materials and has been developed for applications including powders, granules, capsules, and tablets. One customer project involved developing a proprietary sustained-release melatonin formulation for gradual release over one to two hours.
Microencapsulation and powdered-oil embedding offer another example. These technologies can convert liquid oils into powders, helping address oil-water separation, oxidation, flowability, and application limitations. Existing applications include MCT, palm, sunflower, and avocado oil powders as well as tributyrin.
Again, changing the ingredient’s physical characteristics can open applications that previously weren’t practical.
When the formula itself is the problem
Vertical integration can also extend beyond individual ingredients. A manufacturer managing numerous raw materials may face unnecessary sourcing complexity, inventory requirements, quality-control responsibilities, and production steps.
NNB’s pre-blend services allow core components of customer formulations to be combined before final manufacturing. The goal is to reduce sourcing time and production costs, simplify raw-material management, and improve production efficiency and consistency.
For one nutrition brand, NNB used pre-blending to optimize supply chain and costs while also co-developing a pre-workout product.
At that point, the ingredient company is no longer simply supplying another line item on the bill of materials. It is helping improve how the finished product gets manufactured.
And sometimes the solution really is a new ingredient
Problem-solving doesn’t replace ingredient innovation. The advantage of vertical integration is the ability to potentially do both.
NNB has developed more than 30 globally original ingredients and has been responsible for innovations including dihydroberberine, functional di-peptides, ketone/BHB salts, non-staining curcumin, clinically researched L-BAIBA, clear pea protein, and C8 on tapioca fiber.
That creates two distinct paths:
- Need an ingredient that doesn’t exist? Develop it.
- Already have the ingredient you want, but it doesn’t perform the way you need? Improve it.
NNB supports that model with infrastructure spanning biosynthesis, chemical synthesis, analytical and formulation R&D, application development, and preclinical research.
Maybe you don’t need another supplier. You need a different kind of supplier
Traditional ingredient distribution remains an important part of the supplement industry’s supply chain. But when the problem goes beyond sourcing, brands and manufacturers should understand that another level of capability exists.
When an ingredient tastes bad, it may be possible to mask it. When it clumps, it may be possible to moisture-proof it. When it doesn’t fill efficiently, particle size can be changed. When it won’t dissolve, solubility can be improved.
When its color creates problems, it can potentially be decolorized. When an oil needs to become a powder, microencapsulation may provide the answer. And when the formula itself is inefficient, pre-blending can simplify manufacturing.
NNB is one example of what this vertically integrated model can look like: ingredient discovery combined with the technical ability to solve problems involving existing ingredients and formulations.
So, the next time an ingredient creates a problem, the first question doesn’t necessarily have to be: “What else can we use?”, it may be: “Can we make what we already want to use work better?”.
