We get asked this question A LOT ; ) Usually, the answer is ‘we just don’t know’ as there’s so much we can’t foresee (harvest conditions, testing results, shipping delays etc). You can opt to receive ‘back in stock’ notification emails by entering your email address on product pages.
We often receive calls and emails asking for health advice for every condition you could imagine. As much as we’d love to help, unfortunately, we’re not in a position to offer health advice as we are not qualified to do so. Obviously, we wouldn’t want to steer you in the wrong direction but mainly it would be inappropriate/unprofessional without being qualified. Usually, the best course of action is to consult a qualified herbalist/naturopathic nutritionist.
Don’t worry, you’ve not received the wrong product! It’s important to remember that the products we sell are not mass produced with the purpose of being homogenous, so the most likely reason for any differences is batch variation. Batch variation is quite common with the kind of products we stock, even with products from the same source. Flavour, aroma and appearance can change from batch to batch. It’s simply the nature of these kind of products and is to be expected.
Are you using Google Chrome as your browser? Chrome is by far the most glitchy browser and causes problems with many websites. Our recommendation is to use an alternative browser like Apple Safari, Microsoft Internet Explorer, or Firefox. Nine times out of ten by using an alternative browser, customers are able to proceed with their orders with no problems.
We believe it’s best to try and keep the basic price of products as fair as possible. The shipping we charge is always based on Royal Mail’s prices, except we mostly ship with Parcelforce who offer a vastly superior (next working day, tracked, insured) service. Many companies hide their shipping costs within the products price which, for transparency, we prefer not to do. There’s a saying you’ll hear from other retailers…’The customer always pays for shipping’ (off the record of course!), however, we believe the customer has the right to see how much they’re actually paying.
Almost all of our products are double tested (once at source and again when entering the EU) for heavy metals, yeast, e-coli, microbiological contaminants, mould, salmonella and foreign matter. Our organic products are tested for all of these plus pesticides and artificial fertilisers. Often products conform not only to EU organic standards but the extremely strict Soil Association standards.
Origin? – All of the countries of origin can be found on the product pages.
Organic? – All our mushroom powders are certified organic unless omitted from product pages.
How are they produced? – When cultivating mushrooms, the various types require being grown on different material but most commonly it’ll be wood. For example our chaga is grown on birch. To make it into a powder the mushrooms are usually heat treated at very low temperatures, often air drying as it’s more gentle, then milling, screening and then packaging.
Are they extracts? – Our mushroom powders are pure powders with no bulking agents so they’re not technically extracts, although we’ve always found that as long as care is taken in the growing stage the end product will be high quality. Of course we do also sell mushroom extracts in capsule form, these are genuine high strength, concentrated extracts made using hot water and alcohol.
BEWARE – Some retailers get this wrong and market their powders as extracts when they’re not! You’ll often see 10:1 etc ratios stated as the ‘strength’, however what they’re talking about is the weight of fresh mushrooms that they started with VS the weight of the dried powder that they’re left with once dried. This obviously is not what an extract is, so we advise caution when buying.
Fruiting body? – All of our mushroom powders are made with 100% fruiting body and never mycelium.
Beta glucans/polysaccharides? – Polysaccharides/beta glucans etc are not tested for. Testing for every nutrient quickly becomes not commercially viable, we find that as long as care is taken with the growing methods and production processes then the end result will be a potent product.
We do sell some products from China, mainly Chinese medicines and mushroom powders that you would expect to be from China. There’s a lot of talk about the pollution levels in China and there are a few things that people forget. In terms of land area, China is approximately the size of the USA, vast and with many differing macroclimates and wildly varying levels of pollution. Most of China is rural and mountainous and these are the areas we source from. Of course, organic products are double tested for pesticides, artificial fertilisers, heavy metals, e.coli, yeast, mould, salmonella and foreign matter. By law, any organic product entering the UK must meet the EU Organic Regulation and be certified by a recognised organic certification body.
Whilst many of our products are processed at very low temperatures, there’s actually no acredited definition of ‘raw’. It’s increasingly becoming a no-no to label products as raw as there is no certifying body that can verify raw status.
We endeavour to always use either biodegradable, recyclable or sustainable packaging materials. If you ever notice plastic bubble wrap in your parcel, this has been reused from parcels we’ve received. Our standard materials used for space-filling and protecting products during shipping are packing peanuts (which are actually edible, made from rice but are not so tasty, and will biodegrade) and the green coloured bubble wrap which is 100% biodegradable. We will never buy plastic-based space-filling materials. See our shipping and discounts page for more information.
Check out our video about our packaging here.
The majority of our products are vegan but there are a few exceptions. Bee pollen is the obvious example (some people don’t even consider this non-vegan) but otherwise it’s mainly things like our seaweeds which are totally raw so could contain small crustaceans etc. The only other products that contain animal based ingredients are a few of the supplement range that contain (usually) shell based ingredients…namely D3 capsules, Glucosamine Chondroitin+MSM and The Krill Miracle.