Case study: a first private-label capsule run in Sri Lanka

The account below is a composite. It is drawn from first-time capsule onboardings run at the Silk Foods Ceylon (SFC) facility in Matale, with the founder, the herb and the volumes changed. The sequence is unchanged, the timings are unchanged, and so are the two places the schedule slipped.

It is written for the founder who already sells a herbal capsule in small quantities and now wants a version that can sit on a retail shelf without a compliance problem attached to it.

Where the brand started

The founder had been encapsulating by hand for about eighteen months. A manual capsule filling board, a domestic sealer, roughly 70 bottles a month sold through social media and two independent pharmacies. The product worked. Repeat customers were the reason the founder wanted retail distribution at all.

The blocker was not the formulation and it was not price. It was that the bottle carried no manufacturer registration number, no batch code, and no date of manufacture. A retail buyer who checks those three fields before a listing meeting will stop at the first one. The founder had been told the product needed “a certificate” without anyone specifying which one, from whom, or in what order.

That is the ordinary starting position. A first capsule run is a registration project with a manufacturing step inside it, not the other way around.

Why the first question was regulatory, not technical

Sri Lanka moved the goalposts on this category in 2023. The Ayurveda (Amendment) Act No. 19 of 2023, certified on 09 October 2023, redefined an Ayurveda product to include a health supplement, a food supplement, a cosmeceutical or a device. A herbal capsule that a founder thinks of as a supplement can therefore fall under the Department of Ayurveda rather than only under food law, and the amended Act gives the regulator explicit power to license manufacture, inspect premises and control advertising.

The penalty schedule in the same Act is the part founders tend not to have read. Operating without a required licence or permit, or displaying a mark implying a product is licensed when it is not, carries a fine of up to Rs. 200,000 and up to one year of imprisonment. For a company, a first offence sits between Rs. 50,000 and Rs. 1,000,000.

So the first working session was not about fill weight. It was about deciding which route the SKU would take, because the route decides the label, the claim and the audit trail. The related walkthrough on taking a herbal SKU through R&D and Ayurveda registration covers that decision in more detail, and the Ayurveda and SLSI route comparison for private-label capsules sets out what each path asks for.

Separately, the premises question applies regardless. Under the Food Act No. 26 of 1980, food establishments register with the food authority for their area, and the Food (Registration of Premises) Regulations of 2019 have been enforced since 01 January 2020. A home kitchen is not a registered manufacturing premises, which is the structural reason a founder at this stage is choosing a contract manufacturer rather than scaling the kitchen.

What the label actually had to carry

The Food (Labelling and Advertising) Regulations of 2022, notified in a Gazette Extraordinary on 14 February 2023 and summarised for exporters by the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, are specific about the main panel. The common name goes on it in bold in all three languages, alongside the brand name and the net contents in SI units.

Everything else can sit on another panel, and there is a lot of it: the full ingredient list in descending order of weight with INS numbers where additives are used, the manufacturer or distributor name and address, the packer, a batch or code number, the date of manufacture, the date of expiry, country of origin for imported goods, and nutrition labelling in letters no smaller than 1.5 mm. Packs of 25 g or less, or 30 ml or less, are exempt.

Three languages on a 60 cc bottle is a design constraint before it is a compliance one. The founder in this case had chosen a bottle that could not hold the required copy at a legible size, which is why the bottle colour and label cost comparison for capsule SKUs is worth reading before artwork starts rather than after.

The onboarding sequence, week by week

This is the schedule as it ran. Week 1 is the first brief, week 14 is the release of the first commercial batch.

Week	Step	Who carries it	Output
1	Brief, kitchen sample review, herb source disclosed	Founder and SFC technical team	Feasibility note and route decision
2 to 3	R&D and NPD: fill weight standardisation, capsule size selection, moisture and flow checks	SFC R&D	Locked formulation sheet
4	Raw material sourcing and incoming quality control	SFC procurement and QC	Approved herb lot with documentation
5 to 6	Pilot fill of the 180 bottle minimum, appearance and weight variation check	SFC production	Pilot batch and retained samples
6 to 8	Label artwork against the labelling regulations, three-language copy, batch and expiry fields	Founder’s designer, checked by SFC	Print-ready artwork
8 to 12	Registration submission and follow-up correspondence	Founder, supported by SFC documentation	Registration number on file
13 to 14	First commercial run, capping, labelling, release	SFC production and QC	Retail-ready SKU

The manufacturing weeks are the short ones. Weeks 2 to 6 and weeks 13 to 14 are production work and they behave predictably. Weeks 6 to 12 are paperwork, and paperwork is where a first-time schedule either holds or does not.

What the first run cost in minimum-order terms

Capsules carry the lowest entry volume of any format the Matale facility runs, which is why a first-time founder usually starts here rather than in glass or in retort.

Format	First-run minimum	Production window once formulation is locked
Capsules, bottled	180 bottles	2 to 4 weeks
Spreads, 300 g glass	1,500 jars	2 to 4 weeks
Beverages, 200 ml	1,250 bottles	2 to 4 weeks
Any format still needing formulation work	As above, plus R&D	6 to 10 weeks

180 bottles is a deliberate number. It is small enough that a founder can fund it from working capital and large enough to produce a statistically meaningful weight-variation check. The reasoning behind it is set out in the note on the 180 bottle capsule contract manufacturing minimum.

Where the schedule slipped, and why

Two slips, about five weeks between them.

The first was artwork. The founder started label design in week 6, after the pilot batch, on the reasonable assumption that artwork follows product. Three-language copy, an INS-numbered ingredient list and a legible 1.5 mm nutrition panel took three revisions and pushed the print order past the registration submission. Artwork should have started in week 1, in parallel, because none of it depends on the pilot result.

The second was herb documentation. The original supplier sold good material and could not produce lot-level paperwork for it, which meant the lot could not be released into a certified line. The herb was re-sourced from a documented supplier at a slightly higher unit cost, and the traceability chain for capsule herb sourcing explains what that paperwork has to contain. This is the single most common cause of delay in a first capsule onboarding.

Neither slip was technical. Both were foreseeable in week 1 and neither was foreseen.

What the founder would do differently

Three things, in the founder’s own order of regret.

Start label artwork in week 1, not week 6. The regulations are published, the required fields are known, and nothing on the label except the batch and expiry format depends on the pilot batch.

Ask the herb supplier for lot documentation before locking the recipe, not after. If the supplier cannot provide it, the recipe is not locked. For SKUs where a marker compound matters, decide the specification at the same time, as set out in the note on specifying curcuminoid content in a private-label capsule.

Decide the shelf claim early. A product positioned as a food supplement, an Ayurveda product or a general packaged food takes a different submission route, and switching route mid-project resets the clock. The step-by-step SLSI packaged food submission covers the food-side route for founders who conclude their SKU sits there.

For context on why the category is worth the paperwork: Sri Lanka’s food and beverage exports reached USD 478.05 million in 2024 on average growth of 5.79 percent since 2020, according to the Sri Lanka Export Development Board, and finished herbal products for both local and export sale are approved through a Drug Formulator Committee appointed by the Department of Ayurveda. A registered SKU is the thing that can eventually cross a border. An unregistered one cannot.

Frequently asked questions

Does a herbal capsule sold in Sri Lanka need Department of Ayurveda registration?

It depends on how the product is positioned. The Ayurveda (Amendment) Act No. 19 of 2023 defines an Ayurveda product to include a health supplement and a food supplement, so many herbal capsules fall to the Department of Ayurveda rather than to food law alone. The route is decided before formulation, not after.

What is the minimum order for a first private-label capsule run in Sri Lanka?

Silk Foods Ceylon runs a first-run minimum of 180 bottles for capsule SKUs, against 1,500 jars for 300 g spreads and 1,250 bottles for 200 ml beverages. Production takes 2 to 4 weeks once a formulation is locked, or 6 to 10 weeks if the formulation still needs R&D work.

What must a Sri Lankan supplement label carry?

Under the Food (Labelling and Advertising) Regulations of 2022, the main panel carries the common name in bold in all three languages, the brand name and net contents in SI units. Other panels carry the ingredient list in descending weight order, manufacturer address, batch code, manufacture and expiry dates, and nutrition labelling at 1.5 mm or larger.

How long does a first capsule run take from brief to retail-ready stock?

Fourteen weeks is a realistic first-time figure, as in the case above. Roughly six of those weeks are manufacturing and quality work, and the remainder is artwork and registration correspondence. Repeat runs of the same SKU drop to the 2 to 4 week production window, because the registration and artwork are already done.

Can a founder start without a finished formulation?

Yes. R&D and new product development is an entry service, not a prerequisite. A founder can arrive with a herb, a target dose and a shelf position, and the formulation sheet is developed from there. Plan a 6 to 10 week window instead of 2 to 4 weeks when the formulation is developed from scratch.

How Silk Foods Ceylon can help

For founders taking a first capsule SKU from a kitchen batch to a registered retail product, Silk Foods Ceylon operates a cellular-manufacturing facility in Matale that covers the steps between a tested recipe and a bottle a retail buyer will accept. First-run minimums are 180 bottles for capsules, 1,500 jars for 300 g spreads and 1,250 bottles for 200 ml beverages. Production runs 2 to 4 weeks once a formulation is locked, or 6 to 10 weeks where R&D and new product development come first. The Matale facility is BRCGS and FSSC 22000 V6 audited, with SLSI submission support, Sri Lanka Food Act labelling review and Department of Ayurveda documentation support built into a standard private-labelling engagement.

To brief a project, email b2b@esilkroute.com.lk or call +94 76 441 0389 or +94 76 918 5744.

Sources

Ayurveda (Amendment) Act No. 19 of 2023, Parliament of Sri Lanka, 2023. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://www.parliament.lk/uploads/acts/gbills/english/6301.pdf

Labelling compliance of herbal products in Sri Lanka, BMC Complementary Medicine and Therapies, 2025. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12522797/

Sri Lanka Food Labelling and Advertising Regulations 2022, GAIN report CE2023-0011, USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, 2023. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://gain.fas.usda.gov/Download.aspx?p=2249&q=21dfb6fe-e28e-4db5-9348-bcee2a77e478

Food (Registration of Premises) Regulations, Food Control Administration Unit, Ministry of Health Sri Lanka, 2019. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://eohfs.health.gov.lk/food/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=47&Itemid=207&lang=en

Performance Analysis Report, Planning Division, Sri Lanka Export Development Board, 2025. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://www.industry.gov.lk/web/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/EDB-English.pdf

Ayurvedic and Herbal Products sector overview, Sri Lanka Export Development Board. Retrieved 14 August 2026. https://www.srilankabusiness.com/ayurvedic-and-herbal/overview.html

Silk Foods Ceylon (Pvt) Ltd., Silk AgTech Park, Hapugasyaya, Nalanda, Matale, Sri Lanka. b2b@esilkroute.com.lk, +94 76 441 0389, +94 76 918 5744.