Hello, hopefully I found the right forum for this. I would like some help brainstorming how we can ensure a frozen ingredient (juice concentrate) can be kept cold enough during transportation (perhaps an 8+ hour drive) from the supplier.
I found out that there had been past issues with finding carriers that would deliver to the small city that we are in for smaller shipments (a 5-gallon bucket), to the point that the supplier wanted us to sign a waiver saying we accept responsibility for these products shipping using a non-frozen carrier. Based on how I understand this is shipped, without any special packaging that I am aware of, I am NOT OK with shipping this using a non-frozen carrier; it must be shipped frozen. (There is a larger city near us, around 100,000 people, in case a carrier would be able to deliver there.) My concern is with the temperature leading to microbiological instability and/or lack of microbiological/pathogen quality assurance for food safety.
Is the solution in finding the right carrier (a frozen carrier) with a different delivery location, different packaging/cold chain solutions, or a combination?
These are ingredients that go into a few of our products at about 2-5% of each liquid formulation, which has either a citrus-based preservative or ethanol. We manufacture dietary supplements in the United States and follow 21 CFR Parts 111 and 117 with SQF and NSF GMP certifications.
Matthew