Co-packer
Also called Contract packer, Co-manufacturer, Contract manufacturer
A factory that makes and packs your product for you, to your recipe, under your brand.
A co-packer is a manufacturer you hire to make your product. You own the brand, the recipe and the finished goods; they own the building, the equipment and the people who run it. Nothing about the product is theirs, and nothing about the factory is yours.
The word is used loosely. Strictly, a co-packer packs product that already exists and a co-manufacturer makes it from raw ingredients, but in practice almost everyone uses the terms interchangeably and most sites do both. What matters commercially is which of you buys the ingredients — that single question changes your cost structure, your cash cycle and who carries the risk when a shipment is late.
Working with one is mostly a communication problem rather than a manufacturing problem. They are running your run next to four other brands’ runs, on lines with changeover rules, and the thing that goes wrong is almost never the recipe. It is that your plan and their plan are two different documents.
NextBatch keeps this straight for you. Cost per unit, tolling tiers, yield and traceability all derive from the same plan you and your co-manufacturer share — so none of it is a number somebody typed twice.
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