7 Secrets to Select your Glass Bottle Vendor
Selecting the right glass bottle vendor is not only important but critical. This is because a vendor can affect several aspects of your business such as brand image, bottom line, quality of product, and reliability. A good vendor can help you build a brand in the market and instil customer confidence in the product, while a bad one can cost your business considerably in terms of reputation, time and money.
The decision to select the vendor can be a challenging task, however, once you reach the end of this article you will be fully aware of all important parameters to keep in mind while selecting a glass bottle vendor.
To select the right glass bottle vendor, listed below are 7 factors that you should consider:
Food Safety System Certification 22000 (FSSC 22000): You should ask for the food safety certificate from the vendor to ensure that the product packaging complies with food safety norms. FSSC 22000 provides complete certification scheme for auditing and certification of Food Safety Management Systems (FSMS).
Heavy Metal Testing Certificate: This certificate ensures that Lead is not added in the glass to make the glass appear bright and clear. All the big and reputed manufacturer gets the heavy metal analysis done at frequent intervals. Many small, unorganized manufacturers add Lead to the glass, which is harmful for human consumption. Lead can leach into the product, and can thus put your brand image at stake.
Certificate of Analysis (COA) and USP Classification: The vendor should provide a COA clearly mentioning the chemical properties of the glass along with USP classification of the glass. The parameters in a typical glass bottle COA includes a chemical parameter, mould no. or cavity number used in production, physical parameters (according to the drawing), quality compliance, packing type and sign of the competent quality person. Further, the vendor should clearly identify and inform the type of glass. Glass is classified as Type I, Type II, and Type III which are all considered to be food-safe, or in the terms of the FDA, GRAS (generally regarded as safe). For this reason, glass bottles are often chosen as packaging for most food and beverage products.
Ask for Assured Quality Level (AQL): Ask about AQL from the glass bottle vendor to establish common acceptable quality parameters between you and your glass bottle supplier.
Audit the Glass Bottle Manufacturing Plant: A visit is an effective way to examine potential service capabilities of the manufacturer/vendor, quality of the product, etc. If you are unable to visit the plant, you can ask for third party certification which is globally recognized.
Multi Geography Supply Capability: If you have manufacturing spread across the country, it makes sense to partner with a vendor who has the manufacturing locations closest to your filling plant. This can prove to be highly economical and cost-effective with a total saving of 12-13% in the landed cost of the bottle.
Manufacturer Symbol: Be sure the bottle you buy has a manufacturer symbol. Many unorganized or low-quality manufacturers don't put their symbols to avoid getting tracked in case of problems related to bottle strength, quality, performance, etc., that can arise later on. All reputed and quality manufacturers put their symbol on the bottle for sure.
