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The fierce rivalry these days in the vitamin supplement business is a war between retailers who struggle to differentiate themselves through style rather than substance. Mainstream brand name vitamin supplement companies usually assert that their products are vastly superior to their competition, with superior ingredients used to manufacture their products.

But in reality, these mainstream vitamin supplement companies all purchase their essential ingredients from a core group of wholesale sources that operate behind the scenes and are generally unknown to the public. So while there may be hundreds of vitamin and supplement companies, there is really a relatively small number of primary sources manufacturing the critical nutritional ingredients. In short, most vitamin and supplement companies purchase from the same source. They amount to the same product in different packaging.

This is common in the retail industry. General Motors, the once great American car company, has subdivisions like Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac, and used to have Oldsmobile (not your parents Oldsmobile). Many people who drive Chevys don’t know that the guy driving the Cadillac next to them is driving a car made by the same company. These private label manufacturing companies often supply the packaging and [...]