Lot code
Also called Batch code, Lot number, Batch number
The identifier printed on a unit that ties it back to the exact batch, date and ingredients it came from.
A lot code is how you answer the only question that matters in a recall: which units are affected, and which are not. It links a finished unit to the batch record, and the batch record to the specific supplier lots of every ingredient that went into it.
The chain has to hold in both directions. Forwards, from an ingredient lot to every finished unit containing it, so a supplier’s recall notice tells you exactly what to pull. Backwards, from a customer complaint to the batch and then to everything that batch touched.
Most food safety schemes require you to demonstrate that trace in both directions within a fixed window — often four hours — during an audit. That is achievable with paper, and considerably less stressful when the link was recorded at the moment the ingredient was weighed rather than reconstructed afterwards.
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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