Hold each customer’s formulation, specification and certificate of analysis against the lot you shipped.

Your customers are food manufacturers. They do not buy off a shelf. They send a specification, ask for samples, approve a trial, and then expect every later lot to match the approved one within the limits they wrote down.

The data behind that promise is usually split. Formulations are in a chemist’s workbook, and spec sheets are in email threads. Sample requests are tracked on a whiteboard, and certificates of analysis are typed from lab results into a template each time a truck is booked. When a customer changes a specification or asks which sack of cumin went into last March’s blend, the plant must open four files and ask two people. It is slow. It is also easy to get wrong.

Buyers order a seasoning, flavour or functional powder against a target particle size, moisture and taste profile, and expect a lab sample made to that target before any order is placed. The technical team makes a lab sample, sends it with a draft specification, and revises the recipe until the customer approves. The approved formulation becomes a product code held for that customer, with its allowed raw material suppliers and its allergen statement.

Production weighs raw materials into the blender according to the recipe, mixes for a set time and sieves the blend. It then passes a metal detector before packing into sacks, drums or cartons. The laboratory tests moisture, particle size and any customer-specific parameters on a retained sample. A certificate of analysis goes out with the shipment. A retention sample is kept for each lot until the shelf life ends.