IR Score V1: Cost Transparency Score

A 0-to-100 score that summarizes how auditable Inventory Ready's published cost data is for each supplement dosage form. The score has one job: make our inputs falsifiable so a reader can disagree with a number and check why.

Method version v1.0 · Computed against IR's published cost reference data (2025-2026 vintage; last updated 51 days ago) · Last reviewed 2026-05-06

How this score works

For each supplement dosage form (capsules, tablets, powders, gummies, softgels, liquids), the score reflects three things a reader can verify directly: whether a price range is published, whether explanatory notes are substantive, and whether a maximum-plausible price ceiling is declared. A high score does not mean the numbers are correct; it means the numbers are presented in a way that supports someone else checking them.

Component	Weight	What it checks
Range published	40%	Yes if a low and a high estimate are both published, not a single point figure
Notes substance	30%	Higher when explanatory notes are detailed enough to follow how the range was derived
Maximum cap defined	30%	Yes if a maximum-plausible price ceiling is set for this form, which flags data-entry errors

The overall score is the unweighted average of per-dosage-form scores. Computation is deterministic and reproducible from IR's published cost reference data.

Current scores

100overall · computed from 6 dosage forms

Computed from 6 dosage forms; data last updated 51 days ago; cited against 11 industry sources.

Dosage form	Score	Range	Notes	Cap
Capsules	100	Yes	305 chars	Yes
Tablets	100	Yes	211 chars	Yes
Powders	100	Yes	247 chars	Yes
Gummies	100	Yes	356 chars	Yes
Softgels	100	Yes	273 chars	Yes
Liquids	100	Yes	359 chars	Yes

Limitations

The score does not adjudicate accuracy. It is a structural-transparency metric, not an accuracy metric. An entry can score 100 and still be wrong; we mitigate this by cross-referencing 11+ named industry sources in our published cost reference data, but that is independent of this score.
V1 covers only the dosage-form table. Tariff data, fixed costs (setup, testing, labels), packaging per-unit, and formulation-type multipliers are not scored in V1. V2 expansion is gated on T+30 measurement evidence.
Notes-length is a proxy. Substantive 60-character notes can score lower than fluffy 250-character notes. The proxy chose minimum effort to auditable signal; future revisions may add named-source detection.
No external benchmark. The 0-100 scale is internal. We do not claim a 100 here is equivalent to a 100 elsewhere; this score is for auditing IR specifically.

Frequently asked questions

What is the IR Cost Transparency Score?

It is a 0 to 100 score that summarizes how transparent Inventory Ready's published per-unit cost data is for each dosage form (capsules, tablets, powders, gummies, softgels, liquids). Higher means a published low-to-high range, substantive explanatory notes, and a reasonableness bound (a maximum-plausible cap). Lower means one or more of those components is missing.

Why does Inventory Ready publish a transparency score on its own data?

Independent assessments are only useful when the assessor's inputs are auditable. The Cost Transparency Score makes IR's cost-data inputs falsifiable. If a reader disagrees with a score, they can read the underlying data file and verify the components directly.

How is the score computed?

For each dosage form, the score weights three components: range provided (40 percent), notes quality (30 percent), and reasonableness bound (30 percent). The overall score is the unweighted average across all dosage forms. The method version is fixed as v1.0; future revisions will be versioned and dated.

What does the score not capture?

The V1 metric does not score IR's tariff data, fixed-cost data (setup, testing, label design), packaging-per-unit data, or formulation-type multipliers. It does not adjudicate whether the underlying cost data is correct, only whether the dataset has the structural elements that make it auditable. A high score does not imply IR's cost figures are accurate; it implies the figures are presented in a way that supports independent verification.

How often is the score recomputed?

The score is computed on every page render against the underlying cost reference data. Whenever the data is updated (sources added, ranges refreshed, maximum-plausible price ceilings adjusted), the score reflects the current state without manual intervention.

Method version v1.0 (locked at first publish; future revisions ship as v1.1, v2.0, etc.).