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USDA Certified Organic
What is USDA certified organic?
Being USDA Certified Organic means that there’s no nonsense in your snack. Here’s how The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) explains it: “When packaged products indicate they are made with organic [specific ingredient or food group].” In other words, the product contains at least 70% organically produced ingredients.
As for the remaining non-organic ingredients, they are produced without using prohibited practices (genetic engineering, for example)–but can include substances that would not otherwise be allowed in 100% organic products.
What is the criteria?
To earn the USDA Certified Organic label, a product may not contain any of the following four (4) substances:
- Antibiotics
- Synthetic hormones
- Toxic pesticides
- GMOs
What is the process?
To receive official certification, a company must first apply to an accredited certifying body and provide the following:
- A list of all substances used in their soil in the past three years;
- A plan detailing their operations and any substances currently in use; and
- A list of products they have grown, produced or raised
Once the application is submitted and the fees are paid, the certifying body will conduct an on-site inspection to verify compliance. This process is repeated annually, which ensures that The Organic Snack Company stays vigilant and committed to bringing you truly special products.
What does this mean for you?
Now, you get to sit back and enjoy a tasty reward: all our food products are certified organic. They are also free from harmful substances like antibiotics, toxic pesticides, and synthetic hormones. That means clean eating for your customers and a manufacturer whose products you can stand behind.
Certified Gluten Free
What is certified gluten free?
According to the FDA, gluten is “a mixture of proteins that occur naturally in wheat, rye, barley and crossbreeds of these grains.” Gluten is found in all kinds of foods, including bread, pasta, cereal, and other daily staples.
Unfortunately, millions of people today report having some degree of gluten allergy—-from mild intolerance to celiac’s disease. As a result, consuming this protein mixture can cause an array of health problems.
To create products that are safe for everyone, all foods produced by The Organic Snack Company are certified gluten free.
What is the criteria?
At a minimum, under FDA guidelines to be marketed as a gluten-free product, the food must contain less than 20 parts per million of gluten–the smallest amount that can be detected by modern testing systems. At The Organic Snack Company, we go beyond this baseline & are audited by the independent 3rd party SCS Global Services to a strict 10ppm standard.
The FDA outlines that a gluten-free product cannot contain the following:
- Wheat
- Rye
- Barley
- Crossbreeds of these grains
- Any ingredient treated to have gluten removed
What is the process?
To earn this certification, The Organic Snack Company submitted an application and had its facility audited, and was found to meet all necessary criteria. However, this is not a one-and-done process; there are still annual audits that make sure that The Organic Snack Company carefully adheres to their rigorous standard. Any new ingredient or vendor must be approved before it enters our facility & we conduct regular on-site screening to check ingredients & finished goods.
What does this mean for you?
Nowadays, consumers have an unprecedented number of options to choose from when grocery shopping; they also want to know what’s in their food and how the ingredients will impact them. The Organic Snack Company recognizes that becoming a certified gluten free facility allows our clients to provide their customers with a good-for-you product that appeals to everybody. So when you see the gluten free seal on our products, you can be sure that we proudly take into account customer allergies and preferences.
Certified Non GMO
What is certified Non GMO?
Non-GMO Project Verification is the fastest-growing label in the natural products industry. This growth is attributed to the new efforts to eliminate genetically modified organisms (GMOs) from the foods we eat. The Organic Snack Company wants to play it safe. That’s why we choose to eliminate GMOs from our products–producing only natural foods for the consumer.
What is the criteria?
The Organic Snack Company undergoes a yearly audit of all ingredients supplied to the facility to ensure compliance. Any new ingredient must be approved prior to utilizing it in our facility.
What is the process?
To create this GMO-free environment, we developed a comprehensive plan that took all necessary elements into consideration–from ingredient vendors to manufacturing equipment. Maintaining certified Non GMO is an ongoing process which ensures that The Organic Snack Company continues to manufacture products that the client and their consumer can trust.
What does this mean for you?
Customers can rest assured knowing that only natural ingredients make their way into products manufactured by The Organic Snack Company.
SQF Certification
What is SQF?
The Safe Quality Food (SQF) Program is a food safety management system recognized by retailers and food service providers globally. According to SQF.com, this program is “designed to meet industry, customer, and regulatory requirements for all sectors of the food supply chain–from the farm all the way to the retail stores”. The Organic Snack Company’s SQF certification reflects our dedication to meeting the highest standards of food safety.
What is the criteria?
The organic snack company undergoes a rigorous audit of both our food safety documentation and our facility. From a documentation perspective, we are required to maintain thorough record keeping on everything from ingredient suppliers to onsite safety checks. Our facility has been designed with the SQF standard in mind and auditors ensure that our facility is constructed and maintained in a manner that not only minimizes risks to food safety, but actually improves the safety and quality of the products we manufacture.
What is the process?
Over a nine month period, TOSC worked with outside consultants and our internal Food Safety Team to create an SQF program from scratch that complies with this standard. Following a desk audit to ensure that all of our paperwork was in order, we underwent a multi-day onsite inspection with our SQF auditor. This process is completed annually, and every document in our food safety plan is reviewed at least once per year to ensure that it still conforms with our practices and the SQF standards.
What does this mean for you?
This means that we are at the forefront of Food Safety in our industry. Customers can trust that the products that they consume that have been manufactured by us meet the highest standards available and that we are constantly seeking to improve our food safety program with the end customer in mind!
2022 The Organic Snack Company