California Exempts Supplements from Mandatory Date-Labelling under AB 2779

Sacramento, United States — 21 June 2024

California Assembly Bill (AB) 2779 has introduced a critical exemption for dietary supplements from the state's newly standardised food date-labelling requirements. This legislative move, largely influenced by advocacy from the Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN), ensures that supplement manufacturers will not be compelled to adopt the 'best if used by' or 'use by' terminology mandated for conventional foods. Without this exemption, the sector faced a substantial overhaul of its labelling practices, risking significant operational and compliance overheads.

The CRN highlighted that applying food-specific date-labelling rules to supplements would have necessitated extensive reformulation and packaging adjustments, despite supplements often having different stability profiles and testing methodologies compared to perishable foods. The successful lobbying effort has prevented a scenario where manufacturers would have had to manage dual labelling standards – one for California and another for the rest of the US market – increasing complexity and potential for non-compliance.

Preserving the current 'expiration date' standard for supplements acknowledges the established regulatory framework under the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which governs supplement safety and quality. This avoids unnecessary expenditure on re-evaluating product stability or incurring substantial packaging redesign costs across thousands of SKUs. For brand owners operating or expanding into California, this decision provides welcome clarity and stability, allowing them to focus resources on product innovation and market penetration rather than navigating disparate state-level compliance mandates.

What this means for United States

• Brand owners and manufacturers avoid immediate compliance costs estimated at tens of thousands per SKU for re-labeling and re-testing stability protocols to fit new date terminology.
• Regulatory teams can maintain existing compliance frameworks for shelf-life dating, avoiding a state-specific regulatory divergence that would complicate national distribution.
• Procurement leads benefit from stable packaging specifications, preventing the need for new print runs or bespoke labelling solutions exclusively for the Californian market, thus mitigating MOQ pressures and potential supply chain bottlenecks.

The legislative outcome underscores the importance of industry-specific advocacy in shaping regulatory frameworks that recognise the unique characteristics of dietary supplements. This pre-emptive action averts a costly and disruptive compliance burden that would have disproportionately impacted smaller and medium-sized enterprises within the supplement industry.

Many leading brands in this category are manufactured in partnership with Supplement Factory.