Consumers, historically, have struggled to determine how pure, effective, and transparently-produced their dietary supplements are; in recent years, several third-party platforms have come into the fold to offer independent guidance to inform purchase decisions.

Many supplement companies and groups have commissioned tests on some of the most popular dietary supplements, in order to highlight quality issues in certain categories. This testing has garnered significant interest among consumers and the media.

At the Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN)’s Convergence ’25 event, leaders of several third-party platforms discussed their approaches to helping consumers evaluate the quality of a product, with user-friendly platforms.

Panelists included Leena Pradhan-Nabzdyk, CEO of Canomiks, Inc.; Nick Michlewicz, co-founder and COO of SuppCo; Lisa K. Sabin, vice president of business development at ConsumerLab.com; and Neil Thanedar, founder and chairman of Labdoor.

Trustworthiness on a Scale

Michlewicz said SuppCo’s goal is to create an all-in-one resource with its mobile app. The platform features a digital tracker for supplement intake, tailored recommendations based on personal attributes and goals, and independent evaluations of product trustworthiness via a system called TrustScore which relies on publicly-available data.

The company’s database now features more than 37,000 products from over 17,000 brands, all of which are crowd-sourced based on what users report taking. 

The company also conducts independent testing of products that are the most popular among its users, and publishes the results.

“We’re heartened by the fact that TrustScore has reliably been predicting which products pass our quality and purity tests, and can help users make better decisions in the supplements space,” Michelwicz said. “TrustScore has been improving brand practices,” helping reputable companies to distinguish themselves further from “fly-by-night” actors.

Calling Out Borrowed Science

Pradhan-Nabzdyk noted Canomiks’ recently-launched site, WhatToTrust.com, which provides an independent evaluation of ingredients and products, scoring them on a 1-10 scale, based on the quality of clinical studies.

Companies can submit their products to be evaluated and certified by Canomiks, which scores products based on the quality of clinical studies specific to all ingredients within the formula; multi-ingredient formulations receive a composite score based on the research done on each individual ingredient.

“We don’t charge companies, in order to be as unbiased as possible,” Pradhan-Nabzdyk noted, and brands can appeal their rating. “We’re doing this not to make a quick buck, but to elevate the science,” she said, and to acknowledge the brands that invest in their own clinical research rather than simply relying on “borrowed science” conducted on a different product.

Setting the Standard

Sabin discussed ConsumerLab.com’s 26-year history of running test panels on popular products within categories. The organization has conducted 7,000 product testing panels, covering products from 1,000 brands in 200 health categories, and maintains its independence in large part from its subscription-based model; it receives no revenue from sales or advertisements.

Further, while certain testers don’t offer full disclosure, ConsumerLab.com said it has consistently been transparent about testing methodologies, and the criteria by which it determines if a product passes or fails, Sabin noted.

ConsumerLab.com has a membership of 100,000 subscribers, while 300,000 more receive the company’s free newsletter. Its group subscription program, used by universities and others, has 2.4 million members.

Beyond listing results, “we have a consumer tip section where we’ll have everything from the food sources for a given ingredient, to potential drug interactions, products you shouldn’t take while breastfeeding, recalls, warnings, and more,” Sabin noted.

Cutting Through the Noise

Thanedar noted that many brands still struggle to convey their quality metrics to the end user. Labdoor allows companies to submit products to be tested independently, and then ranked on its site, helping the highest-quality brands cut through the noise.

“It’s so hard for consumers to find safe and effective products,” he said. “User reviews still don’t work, they’re subjective and are often paid-for … Beyond recalls, FDA doesn’t conduct or report on its market surveillance, and so we still have a lot of transparency issues,” he said, noting that consumers struggle to understand testing results where they are shared without additional guidance.

“A lot of companies, for instance, have a fear of publishing their heavy metal data in case they scare their audience, without context about upper limits or how dangerous a product might actually be. But through rankings across a global marketplace, and working with retailers and more directly with brands through certifications,” brands can establish substantially more trust than that created through user reviews.

Built for Unique Purposes

As more third-party quality platforms come online, could several competing voices muddy the waters? According to the panelists, all hands on deck are still needed, and differentiation across groups adds value.

“We all have very valid differences, and I don’t think four great sources is too many,” said Michlewicz, noting that the growth of brands and products clearly outpaces that of third-party testing organizations. “Brands are also partners in this, and building a system like TrustScore requires so much data.”

“I’m a consumer, too, and I want quick, easy information from someone credible. As a scientist, I’m a cynic, too,” said Pradhan-Nabzdyk. “Information overload and analysis paralysis are very real, so we need groups to give out curated information and provide more if a consumer wants it. Credibility gets through the noise, and at the end of the day, we’re just three scientists and this is something we want to do to make things easier for non-science people.”

“We should be thought of as complementary to one another rather than just as competitors,” said Sabin. “We all have lots of good information and differentiate in multiple ways. ConsumerLab is unique in its certification program, for instance, which often gets compared to those of NSF or USP.”

Diversification can also help to appeal to different consumer bases with varying levels of knowledge, noted Thanedar. “For us, it’s always about being consumer-driven, and having the simplest answers via grades and rankings. But for any question, there can be a 30-second answer, a five-minute answer, or a 30-minute answer.”

Getting Brand Buy-In

While some brands may push back against claims made of their products from third-party organizations, or express skepticism about an organization’s independence, most ingredient suppliers and product manufacturers realize they’ll be left in the dust if they don’t adapt to a new paradigm in which leading products are likely to be evaluated by evaluators at some point.

In the early aughts, “our testing service program initially caused some friction with the industry,” Sabin said. “When we switched to a paid subscription base, and named brands that failed our tests, that was just as much of an issue as when we didn’t name products, so it was a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ situation. But as we built out our reputation and people talked about us for years, things settled down.”

Maintaining Independence

It will be important for third-party evaluators to be able to maintain their independence, especially if they also offer paid certification and testing services to brands.

Pradhan-Nabzdyk said that, for brands which offer both testing services and product rankings, it’s important to disclose these brand relationships and build a system which prevents conflict of interest. “Our lab-based services for the industry don’t test for potency, they test for efficacy and mechanism of action related to biomarkers … If a company does research with us, it doesn’t modify a score in a different way than other preclinical research; human clinical trials are weighted much more strongly.”

While in an ideal world, there could be separation between paid testing services and independent product rankings, without an on-label seal of some kind, it’s difficult to package both types of information together in a place where consumers will actually see it.

“Especially offline in a retail setting, it’s difficult to get a consumer to scan a barcode. Certifications are an easier way to get information out to people offline, and offer a degree of transparency that most contract labs don’t offer,” said Thanedar.