Seven Top Factory-made Herbal Products Tested:

All eight of the teas pictured share the same formula title - rehmannia 6/liu wei di huang wan. One is a traditionally handmade tea and the remaining seven were made from popular herbal extract concentrates manufactured in mass-production factories. We simply added water back to recreate the tea from which these concentrates were originally made. Four of those seven had been tablets or capsules, one a granular, and two fluid concentrates - one from a little dropper bottle.

Placed among those seven made in sprawling factories of stainless steel (like fastfood), can you spot the traditionally handmade tea? It’s not the one associated with giveaway incentives or advertised with revering testimonial. It’s the darkest one – the one that has retained all the potency markers: the strong tastes, smells and color. The mass-manufactured one next to it displays a good color but posseses a weak, stale flavor. The really pathetic one on the other end is endorsed by a renowned herbalist; obviously someone who did not have anything to do with actually making that product (or should not have)!

Potent advertisements.The makers of each of the seven mass-manufactured products mention laboratory potency testing, standardization, rigorous quality control procedures, government oversight, etc. But some are no stronger than a Chinese restaurant tea and that is a stark reality. Let’s be honest, if you were in need, which of the pictured teas would you choose? Try this test in your pharmacy or at home. Click here How to test an herbal product in three minutes for instructions.

Remember those strong tasting, fresh teas that you made back in college? In bleak contrast, some of the popular brands shown above do not appear to be of appreciable (if any) clinical value and none are close to the intensity of the fresh, handmade tea. A practitioner may have advanced diagnostic skills and may choose the correct formula all the time, but the lack of strength in overrated herbal products can doom a practice to perpetual mediocrity - and no amount of continuing education seminars relating to herbal medicine will compensate.