Six ways it’s done to you. All of them legal.
Twelve legal mechanisms sit behind the category's pricing. Here are the six that do most of the work — how it's done, with the studies attached — unified with the grading tiers, which are how we refuse to do it.
The markup
Take the price apart and the active ingredient is the smallest line on the receipt. Marketing is the biggest. That is not a distortion of the model — it is the model.
A brand paying 6.2% of retail for its ingredients has 93.8% to spend on being chosen. Once one company spends it on athletes and shelf position, every competitor must too, or disappear. The spend is not greed, it is the equilibrium — which is why no incumbent can unilaterally stop.
Fairy dusting
A label only has to name what is inside, not whether there is enough of it to do anything. Brands include a famous ingredient at a fraction of the trial dose and borrow the study’s credibility for free.
The label is the loophole. Naming an ingredient is a labelling requirement; delivering enough of it to reproduce the study is not. So the famous name goes on the front in large type, the quantity goes on the back in small type, and the trial gets cited in the marketing without ever being replicated in the capsule.
The form swap
Magnesium oxide absorbs at about 4%. Bisglycinate absorbs at around 80% and costs ten times more. Both are legally "magnesium". Only one reaches your bloodstream.
Both forms are legally magnesium, so both can carry the same permitted health claim. The cheaper one costs about a fifth of a penny per dose and mostly passes through you. The expensive one costs ten times more and mostly doesn't. Nothing on the front of either bottle tells you which one you're holding.
The proprietary blend
Group ingredients under a trademarked matrix and only the total weight has to be declared. The expensive actives go in last, in trace amounts, and the panel is built so nobody can check.
A proprietary blend is a trade-secret protection that was never meant to be a pricing tool. Declare 1,200mg total and you never have to say that 1,080mg of it is caffeine and tyrosine, and that the alpha-GPC you were sold on is 42mg. It is legal, it is common, and it is unfalsifiable by design.
The front label
"1200mg Fish Oil" is the weight of the oil. The omega-3 inside — the part with the evidence — is usually a quarter of that. The front is written for the shelf, the back for the regulator.
Front-of-pack weight and active weight are different numbers, and only one of them is regulated onto the back panel. "1200mg fish oil" is technically true and functionally meaningless — the number that matters is EPA and DHA, and it is typically a quarter of the headline. Read the back, always.
The evidence gap
Nearly half of all actives on sale have no completed human trial establishing a dose. They are typically the most expensive things on the shelf.
Tier C is not a synonym for useless — plenty of interesting molecules sit there. It means no completed human trial has established a dose, so nobody, including the seller, knows how much you should take. That uncertainty is priced as novelty rather than disclosed as risk.
Three tiers.
No exceptions.
Every active carries a tier, and the tier answers one question: does a completed human trial establish a dose? It doesn't tell you an ingredient is worthless. It tells you what you're actually buying.
Established human dose
Multiple randomised trials, or a meta-analysis, converge on a dose range in humans. 102 actives. We dose these at the trial level, not below it.
Limited human evidence
Some human trials exist; the dose isn't settled and effect sizes vary. 192 actives. We flag the uncertainty instead of hiding it behind a claim.
No established human dose
Preclinical, mechanistic or traditional use only. 244 actives — 45% of the category, and usually the most expensive shelf. You can still choose them. You'll know what you chose.
Now check one you own.
The Scamalyzer runs every mechanism on this page against a real product and returns the cost autopsy, the dose against the trial dose and a score out of 100.