Comment · Mon, September 21, 2020 · ND Owner
Essential Amino Acids
Original post in this thread
TheOptimizzzer · 7 points
Is an essential amino acid product something you guys have ever considered? Seems like a base of a stack supplement that many can benefit from especially if old, naturally low protein diet, super active lifestyle, focus on muscle building, etc. Appropriate amino acid status also closely related mood, cognition, etc. Maybe it’s not quite in the ND product wheelhouse but they’re aren’t a lot of quality providers with a plain, clean EAA (especially in capsules or tabs) product. I had been consistently using NOW Amino-9 (which seems to be one of the only decent ones out there) but its hard to find and sparsely stocked at many vendors and still don’t trust it as much as I would one from you guys.
Thoughts?
Thanks
What they were answering
Direct reply to the original post — see the thread post above.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb · ND Owner
There are two issues with amino acids. One, everyone out there is selling untested garbage. So it is hard to compete on price. Two, testing amino acids properly is difficult. You need pre-column derivatization to attach functional groups to them to get them to separate from each other in the column. Amino acids usually all come through together, and some of them don't have chromophores, so the UV detector can't "see" them. This is why attaching other groups to them in a pre-column derivatization scheme is done. It allows for both more chromatographic separation and the ability for the UV detector to see them. It's difficult chemistry that is VERY dependent on how well the sample prep is done. It would be easy as hell for me to go out and source aminos, then just trust the manufacturer COA like everyone else is doing. However, to do things to our standard, it would take a lot of lab work. This costs money, which will drive the price up a lot. We run into this a lot on products like this. The current market is just so shitty, and the bar is so low, trying to convince people they need to pay 2-3X for properly tested stuff is difficult. Then we just come across as overcharging, when in fact it is everyone else that is screwing you with untested garbage. So these are difficult things for us to do. We would spend a lot of money getting things done right, then risk nobody buying from us because of the price.