Private label
Private label: from a chain's brief to a filled shelf
Chains ask us for own-brand lines they can build a range around. We match the brief to a producer, agree the specification, and buy the run ourselves — so the accountability sits with us.
A category manager has a gap on the shelf: a price point below the branded lines, a pack size nobody else offers, or a claim the chain wants to own. That becomes a brief. We see those briefs because we are in front of the same buyers every week with the brands we already carry. The first job is translating the brief into something a factory can work from — annual volume, pack format, shelf life, declarations, and the date the first delivery has to land.
Matching the brief to a producer
GDH does not own factories. What we hold is a working picture of who can actually make the thing: line speed, certifications, minimum runs, and whether a producer genuinely wants own-brand volume rather than treating it as filler. We shortlist on that first and on cost second. Samples go to the chain's technical team, a trial run follows, and the producer is held to a written specification rather than to a conversation. If a shortlisted factory cannot meet the volume cleanly, we say so before anyone commits artwork or a launch date.
Specification, artwork and packaging
Private label lives or dies on detail. Ingredient or material specification, declarations and warnings, barcodes, case configuration, batch and date coding, and artwork built to the chain's own brand guidelines. We keep the approved specification and the signed-off print files, so the second run matches the first and a change of producer does not quietly change the product. Where labelling rules differ between markets, the pack is drawn up to the strictest version rather than reworked after the first order.
One supplier, one accountability line
The chain raises a single purchase order, to us. We buy the production run, hold it in our own warehouses and deliver into depots and stores against the chain's orders. If a run slips, a batch falls outside specification or a store runs short, that is ours to fix — we do not pass a factory's problem along to a buyer. Carrying the stock is what makes that promise real: the inventory sits on our books, so the risk of a long run or a slow start is ours.
Repeat runs, reviews and dental own-brand
Once a line is listed, sell-out data from the chain turns into call-offs for the producer, so the factory builds to a forecast instead of guessing at a reorder. At range review we come back with what the numbers support: hold the line, change the pack, move the price point, or stop. The dental channel works the same way. Practice groups and laboratories want consumables under their own name, and the brief, the specification and the accountability follow the same route.
In practice.
Briefs we see early
We call on the same category buyers every week. Own-brand briefs reach us while the volume, pack format and launch date are still being decided.
Producers chosen on capacity
Shortlists built on line speed, certification and real appetite for own-brand runs, then on cost. We say so when a factory cannot hold the specification.
The stock risk is ours
We buy the production run and hold it in our own warehouses. The chain raises one purchase order, to us, and short stores are ours to sort out.
FAQ
Questions brands ask us.
Tell us what your lines run, at what volume, to which certifications, and where you have spare capacity. When a brief fits, we put you on the shortlist and bring the specification to you. We buy the run ourselves, so you are selling to one customer working to one forecast, rather than chasing a chain's procurement team on your own.
The chain owns the brand and the artwork. The specification is agreed between the chain's technical team, the producer and us, and we hold the approved master and the signed-off print files. A repeat run is then made to the same document as the first one, and a change of producer has to meet the existing specification rather than set a new one.
Nothing. We do not charge producers or brands for listings, storage or delivery, and we do not issue quotes. We buy the production run and earn from the distribution margin on what we sell into the chains. Your only cost is making the product to specification and to the call-offs we give you.
Next door.
Send us your range.
We will tell you honestly where it fits and how fast we can start.