The fitness industry, and in particular, the supplement industry is growing rapidly. As per the statistics, the supplement industry was worth $32 billion in 2012 and is expected to become worth $60 billion by 2021. That is almost a 100% growth in less than 10 years time.  

Every time you visit a fitness expo, 10 new companies pop up selling protein supplements and claim to be better than the others. It's a melee of supplement companies out there.

Most consumers do not know that some companies run a little scam known as 'amino/protein spiking' where they dump cheap ingredients into their powders to pass tests and claim a higher protein content than they truly have. 

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In this piece, I shall give you information on how the companies do this and how you, as a consumer, can look out for it and not fall prey to these scams.  

With the growing education and information that whey protein is not just for bodybuilders, and that it can be used by anyone looking to get a convenient source of protein in their diets, the demand for the same has gone up. 

A lot of companies saw this opportunity and started to lure consumers with a fishnet called 'low price.' That's right, the companies fool you with what is in the supplement and on the promise of saving money, sell questionable stuff to you. 

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The 'amino/protein spiking' is done by adding cheap amino acids like glycine and taurine into the protein powders or non-proteinogenic (protein building) amino acids such as creatine and beta-alanine into the mix.  

They then get lab reports for nitrogen content of the protein powder and not that of the individual amino acids, which are the building blocks of protein. 

By these results, every amino acid (protein building or not) gets counted as protein but not all amino acids help you build muscle protein. 

THAT IS THE SCAM!

Let's take an example: you are shopping for protein powder and the label on the front of the package reads '25 grams protein per serving with 5 grams creatine and 5 grams beta-alanine' but the individual amino acid profile is not listed behind the package.

What you read it as - This supplement has 25 grams protein per scoop.

What it may mean - This supplement has 25 grams - 5 grams of beta-alanine - 5 grams of creatine - 15 grams protein per scoop. 

If the individual amino acids are not listed on the package, there is no sure way to know.  Coming to the solution of the problem here, how do you make an educated guess about the quality of the supplement before giving away your money?

Step 1: Look At The Ingredient Label & For The Leucine Content

If the ingredient label at the back of the package says 'proprietary blend' without giving a breakdown of what are the ingredients in that blend, chances are that the manufacturer is dumping some cheap amino acids into the mix and hiding it from you. 

Step 2: If There Is Leucine Listed There, How Much Is It?

Leucine is an amino acid that kick-starts the muscle protein synthesis in your body. Approximately 10% of the protein serving should be leucine. If a whey protein has 25 grams of protein per serving, 2.5 grams or more should come from leucine.  

If it falls short at this, do not buy the product.  

Another step here is to check how much of the protein serving is taken up by the BCAA profile. BCAA's are leucine, isoleucine, and valine. We already know now that the product we are looking at should have all the individual amino acids listed in their individual quantities at the back of the label.  

The BCAA should account for 20 to 25% of the total protein per serving. So, in the same example of 25 grams protein per scoop, the BCAA profile should add up to 5 to 7.5 grams minimum. 

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Step 3: Compare It With The Average Per Serving Price Of The Products In The Market 

Whey is sold by hundreds of manufacturers online, which is the best place you can look it up. On an average, the cost per scoop of a supplement that has 25 grams protein per serving is anywhere between 60 to 80 rupees. 

One kilo of whey usually has 30 servings, thus putting the cost of one-kilo packaging between Rupees 1800 to 2400. If you see that the cost of the product you are purchasing is way off this territory and unless there is some offer or a sale going on, it may be a better choice to steer clear of that brand. 

I hope this article makes selecting a whey protein supplement an easier task for you and keeps you safe from the scams run by a few manufacturers.

Author bio:

Pratik Thakkar is the co-founder and director of GetSetGo Fitness, an online fitness company. He is regarded as someone who will make it easy for you to understand the process by putting things in the right context and providing science-based recommendations for natural bodybuilding. 

You can reach out to him at pratik@getsetgo.fitness and follow him on Instagram and Facebook.