How We Test and Score
Straight Label reviews one supplement at a time, slowly. This page explains exactly what happens between "we ordered a bottle" and the score you see on the review, so you can decide how much weight our verdict deserves.
Who is behind this site
Straight Label Media LLC is a small independent publisher based in Eugene, Oregon, founded in 2023. We have no corporate parent, no supplement brand in our portfolio, and no interest in flattering anyone's product. Reviews are researched and written in-house.
Our lead reviewer, Derek Vansel, is a certified strength and conditioning specialist (CSCS) who has spent a decade around gyms, athletes and the supplement aisle. Derek plans each testing protocol, keeps the daily log, and writes the first draft. An editor then challenges every claim in it before publication. Derek is a reviewer, not a physician, and nothing he writes should be mistaken for medical advice.
How a product gets tested
- We buy at retail. The bottles come from the manufacturer's own store, ordered like any customer would, paid for from the editorial budget. No press samples, so there is no favor to return.
- We use it for 8 to 10 weeks. Most ingredient research on botanicals shows effects, when they appear, on a scale of weeks. Shorter "tests" are theater. For Horse Boost the log ran ten weeks, one gummy a day, no schedule changes.
- We track a fixed checklist. Energy through the day, training output, sleep, mood, digestion or any other tolerability complaint, plus the category-specific outcomes a buyer actually cares about. What did not change gets recorded with the same care as what did.
- We check the paperwork. Label claims against the official ingredient list, prices against the live checkout, guarantee wording against the seller's own policy page.
The scorecard
The editorial score is the average of eight criteria, each rated 1 to 5 and weighted equally: effectiveness, value for money, ease of use, onset speed, tolerability, taste, customer support, and label transparency. We publish every criterion score, not just the average, so you can re-weight them for your own priorities. A product that tastes great but underdelivers cannot hide behind the average.
Where the user statistics come from
Alongside our own test, we compile what buyers report across public feedback channels: review sections, community threads, and complaint boards. Each entry is tagged by sentiment, theme (energy, confidence, taste, shipping and so on), and time to first noticed effect where the reviewer mentions one. The percentages on the review page summarize that compiled set. It is an editorial aggregation, not a clinical dataset, and we present it as exactly that.
Independence and how we get paid
Some outbound links are affiliate links; a purchase through them pays this site a commission at no extra cost to you. That is the entire business model. Scores are locked before links are added, negatives are never softened for revenue, and manufacturers get no preview and no veto. The long version lives on the affiliate disclosure page.
Corrections
If a price changes, a formula is revised, or we simply got something wrong, we fix the page and refresh the "last updated" date. Spotted an error? Tell us and we will chase it down.