Cosmetic Peptide Sourcing Checklist
A free, practical checklist for brand owners, formulators and buyers evaluating cosmetic peptide suppliers. Work through it before you place a production order.
Download the one-page PDF
Print it, share it with your team, send it to your contract manufacturer. No email required.
Download the checklist (PDF)1 · Define your requirement before you ask for a price
- Intended use — topical cosmetic formulation, and the product form (serum, cream, mask, scalp).
- Grade — cosmetic grade, stated explicitly. Not laboratory or pharmaceutical grade.
- Quantity — evaluation quantity, first production order, and expected annual volume.
- Destination country — so freight, duty and any labelling implications can be quoted.
- Whether you need third-party testing on the batch, or in-house COA is sufficient.
- Whether you need custom labels, and by when.
2 · Request the same package from every supplier
- Batch-specific COA for the material that would actually ship — with a batch number.
- TDS / specification sheet, with a version or date.
- MSDS in the format required for your market.
- Purity and the method used — “≥98%” means nothing without the method.
- Identity confirmation by mass spectrometry, with observed vs theoretical mass.
- Content assay, if concentration accuracy matters to your formula (it usually does).
- Recommended use level and pH guidance for the material in a typical system.
- COAs from several recent batches, to gauge consistency rather than capability.
3 · Compare quotations on the same basis
- Normalise to cost per gram of active, not cost per gram of material.
- Confirm the Incoterm — EXW, FOB, CIF and DDP are not comparable as quoted.
- Add freight, duty and import handling to get landed cost.
- Add your own incoming testing — it is part of the real cost.
- Check what is included: documentation, third-party testing and label work are often quoted separately.
- Ask how long the price holds, and what triggers a change.
4 · Check on delivery — before the goods go into production
- Verify the batch number on the label against the COA you were sent. If they differ, stop.
- Inspect the packaging for damage and moisture ingress, and note it on the delivery paperwork.
- Check the appearance against the specification — for copper peptides, against the expected colour.
- Weigh or count the quantity received against the packing list.
- Photograph the material and packaging as received.
5 · File it, by batch number
- COA for the batch, filed under the batch number — not the order date.
- Specification sheet the batch was made against, with its version or date.
- MSDS, in the format required for your market.
- Purchase record tying the batch number to the supplier, date and quantity.
- Your own incoming check record — appearance, weight, who received it.
- Third-party report, where you commissioned one.
- Your trial-batch stability results, if you ran one.
Why the batch number matters
A certificate of analysis that is not tied to a specific batch cannot be verified against anything. Comparing the number on the COA with the number on the label takes seconds and catches the most common failure in this market.
It is the single most useful check available to a buyer, and it costs nothing.
Related reading
- How to read a peptide COA: HPLC and MS explained
- How to choose a peptide supplier: 12 red flags
- Cosmetic peptide purity: why 98% vs 95% matters
- Shipping cosmetic ingredients: documents and duties
Use it freely
This checklist is free to use, reproduce and share. Attribution is appreciated but not
required. If you would like to link to it, the permanent address is
https://pepteora.com/resources/peptide-sourcing-checklist.html.