Every claim, traced back to its source.
At a glance
The desk decides
Coverage is never bought, and drafts are never shown to brands.
Follow the money
Sponsorships, affiliate links and samples are disclosed wherever they apply.
Documents over adjectives
Clean, pure and natural need a document behind them.
The record, corrected
Errors are fixed openly, dated and explained.
- Editorial independence
- Reporting with care
- Access, gifts and samples
- Partner and sponsored content
- Reviews and recommendations
- Corrections and updates
- Conflicts of interest
- Tools and transparency
Editorial independence
Seed to Capsule decides what to trace on editorial grounds alone: a supply chain worth following, a founder who can show the paperwork, a question a careful buyer would ask. Money cannot put a brand into a sourcing guide or Behind the Label, and money cannot keep one out of our pages. Drafts, questions and headlines stay with the editors until a story is published.
Commercial conversations happen away from the editorial desk. Whoever handles partnerships can set out our formats and rates for a brand, but cannot promise coverage or influence what the editors find.
- No commercial arrangement includes coverage.
- Brands do not sign off on copy, quotes or headlines.
- Advertisers are traced as closely as everyone else.
Reporting with care
We report what a brand states and what its label and documents show, never what a supplement will do for you. Sourcing claims are followed back as far as the paperwork allows: to the grower, the harvest, the lot and the certificate of analysis. Where a step in the chain is still opaque, we say so plainly. Words like clean, pure and natural are treated as claims, and we say what document, if any, stands behind them.
Seed to Capsule offers information, not medical advice. Statements about supplements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration, which does not approve supplements before they are sold, and no product here is intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Ask a doctor or pharmacist before starting a supplement, especially if you are pregnant, nursing or take medication.
- No story says a supplement treats, cures or prevents a disease.
- A founder's experience is reported as experience, not as evidence.
- Traceable steps are credited, and opaque ones are named.
Access, gifts and samples
Brands send samples, certificates and invitations to farms and facilities. We accept product samples and documents, and nothing that comes with conditions. Paperwork earns attention; a free tub of powder does not.
When a sample, a facility visit or a trip informs a story, the story says so, including who paid for the travel. We do not trade favourable coverage for access to a supplier, an exclusive or an early look at test results.
- Samples and documents carry no promise of coverage.
- Anything given beyond the product is declined or returned.
- Brand-funded visits are disclosed in the story they inform.
Partner and sponsored content
Seed to Capsule sells three paid formats: a sponsored feature, a sponsored sourcing guide and a placement in Behind the Label. Whichever it is, it opens with the label "Sponsored" or "In partnership with" and the name of the brand that paid. They are produced outside our reporting and never passed off as part of it.
Sponsored pages answer the same sourcing questions as editorial and follow the same rules: no health claims, no unexplained clean or natural, the same corrections policy. A sponsor's claims need the same paperwork behind them as anyone else's.
- The label comes before the first line of copy.
- A sponsor cannot buy its way into an editorial sourcing guide.
- Sponsored pages make no claim that editorial would not make.
Reviews and recommendations
A product earns a place in Shop what we traced, or on the cabinet shelves, by being part of the story: the capsule whose supply chain we followed, the powder an interview turns on. Prices and serving sizes are taken from the brand's own listing on the publication date; check them before you buy. Some links to shops may be affiliate links; if you buy through one, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. It never decides what we trace or what we conclude.
A third-party seal is reported for what it certifies and nothing more: a seal for contaminants is not a seal for potency, and neither is a promise of effect. We attribute every claim to whoever made it. When we have seen a document ourselves, such as a certificate of analysis, the story says so; when we are reporting what a brand states, we say that instead.
- A place in Shop what we traced cannot be bought.
- Buying through an affiliate link costs you nothing extra.
- Seals are described by what they test, not by what they imply.
Corrections and updates
An error is part of the record, so we correct it on the record. The fix is made in the story, and a dated note at the end says what changed. We never remove a mistake without saying so.
Routine updates, such as a new price, a moved link or a product out of stock, are made without a note. A changed supplier, origin, test result or formula is a change of substance, and it is noted. Founders and brands who think we have attributed something to them wrongly, or that time has overtaken a story, should send us the document; the story will be corrected, updated or, where that is fairer, withdrawn.
- Corrections are dated and explained at the end of the story.
- Typos, broken links and price changes are fixed without a note.
- Every request from someone we have written about is answered by an editor.
Conflicts of interest
A conflict at Seed to Capsule means any financial or personal tie to the brand, grower, lab or supplier in a story. An editor with one steps aside, and a conflict that cannot be avoided is written into the story.
Seed to Capsule shares a publisher, VOL Collective, with other magazines, and the same founder can appear in several of them, each traced from a different angle. A commercial relationship between VOL Collective and a brand we cover is disclosed in the story.
- Financial ties are declared before an editor starts on a story.
- Contributors disclose paid work for supplement brands, suppliers and labs.
- A stake in a supplier counts as a stake in the brand it supplies.
Tools and transparency
We keep a paper trail. A story names its writer and its date, credits each figure to where it came from, adds an editors' note where a claim needs context and, in a sourcing guide, ends with the full list of sources. Photographs are credited too.
The tools we use are public, so you can check a label the way we do: the Supplement Facts panel and the other ingredients line; a brand's certificates of analysis; the NIH Dietary Supplement Label Database; the directories of products certified by USP and NSF; and the FDA's warning letters and recall notices.
- Sources are named in stories and listed in full in sourcing guides.
- We say which documents we have seen, and which we have not.
- This page is revised whenever our practices change.
Tell us where the trail goes cold.
Found an error, a missing document or a conflict we did not declare? Write to the editors. We read every message, and if we change something, we will tell you what and why.
