Where are your minerals sourced from?

That entirely depends on the specific product. We source our ingredients from all over the world. Wherever we can get quality ingredients, that's where we go. Magnesium glycinate is from China. Magnesium L-threonate is from the US. The magnesium used in our Micromag is from Italy. That's where the patent holder for the sucrosomial technology is. We are using India a lot for the Ayurvedic extracts. That's where they originated, after all. We have suppliers in the US, Australia, Canada, the UK, Italy, France, Norway, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Denmark, South Africa, and Argentina. These are generally extracts. However, we are very close to moving some of our synthesis to the EU and India, too. That's been a project we have been working on for a while. We are also in the initial stages of setting up some of our own grow operations in the United States. So that's super exciting! The more I can directly oversee, the better.

As for testing, nobody does as much as we do. Period. It's not even close. We even test all the patented products in the lab every single batch. We actually argue with the patent holders of some of these products when the numbers don't make sense to us. Nobody out there is taking an already tested and patented product, then doing their own testing on top if it to verify. Companies want plausible deniability. They want to get a document that says things are good to sell. They don't want to look under all the rocks to see what they find first. We pick up all the rocks and investigate what is under them. This makes it take longer to get things out sometimes, but that's the standard I hold us to. We are releasing a really cool new patented ashwagandha soon. However, it's on hold because my team did an investigation into the methods and labs they were using, and things raised red flags to us. So we have a conference call with the higher ups at this company Wednesday to figure out what is going on. We do not release things until we have tested to such a level that I would be willing to risk my name and reputation on it. This means asking the hard questions that most people really don't want the answers to.

For heavy metals specifically, we test every single batch of every single product via ICP-MS, every time. This includes patented products. Not only that, but we have set EXTREMELY stringent heavy metals specs for each product individually. We look at the available research, daily intakes, and form our specs scientifically based on that data. It's not just about picking a number. It's about determining how prevalent certain metals are naturally in each product, what forms they are in, what dose a customer will use daily, and what concentration is a reasonable limit. I set these limits in such a way that I would be comfortable personally taking any of our products, or giving it to my own family. Not only that, but we look at what that ingredient might be used in. We use many of our ingredients in Natrium Health stacks. Setting a heavy metal limit for one of the 8 ingredients in a stack on its own is one thing. When you combine them all together, you have to account for the daily intake of them all. This means the raw material used in those stacks needs to have MUCH LOWER limits than if it was a single ingredient. My team and I do this analysis on every single ingredient that comes through our doors. We have packets with sign-offs for every ingredient we use. Everything is analyzed, discussed, documented, and approved in a scientific manner. We do more enhanced tests on things that need it, like arsenic speciation analysis on krill oil. Krill oil is naturally higher in arsenic, due to its environment in the ocean. However, those forms are organic forms. Organic arsenic is not harmful to humans. Those forms are arsenobetaine and arsenocholine, which are totally safe. It's inorganic arsenic that is harmful and want to avoid. Those inorganic forms are arsenite and arsenate. The normal heavy metals testing that companies do cannot tell the difference. They only tell you total arsenic levels. We do a much more expensive speciation analysis that uses more complex HPLC/GC separation to ICP-MS methods. You have to use some chromatographic separation to really know the difference. That way we can ensure that the levels of the dangerous forms of arsenic are at safe levels. We do all this research, and not only intelligently set our specs using that, but set our testing methodologies to ensure the numbers are telling what we think they are. We analyze the water going into our formulations. We analyze the air coming from the compressors going to our production equipment. Yes, we have specs for the air that can be used in the production equipment, and do lab tests to ensure the air is in-spec. We can tell you the particulate stats for the air going to the machine packing your bottles. That's the level we take QA/QC to.

Even for patented products we hold the manufacturer to our specs, not theirs. So these patent holders actually have special batches just for us, usually because of our tighter heavy metals specs. So often times the things we sell that are patented are special batches they make for us to meet our specs, which are different than they sell the other companies out there. We can and do reject patented batches for not meeting our more stringent heavy metals specs. That's not just uncommon in this industry, it's unheard of. Ultimately you are OUR customer, not theirs. You trust us to ensure what we are selling you meets our specs, that those specs have been set intelligently, and that things are safe. This means the onus is on us to ensure we are thinking about all these things, and doing what we need to do to prove it. I take that responsibility very seriously. When you buy a product from us, it's not just encapsulated magnesium in a bottle. It's the culmination of years of work by myself and my team to ensure we fully understand what needs to happen to ensure things are exactly as they should be. I take many of our products myself, as do many people on my team. I don't just make sure things are correct for our customers. I do it for myself, my employees, and my family as well. If I am personally taking something, I am choosing our product every time. No question. Because I know what goes into doing things right, and I know very few other companies out there are even getting anywhere close.