We all assume honey is simple: bees buzz, flowers bloom, honey drips. But for many in the honey world, there’s a tension that isn’t obvious on the supermarket shelf. That tension is this: not all honey arriving in North America is what it claims to be. Some honey is illegally sourced, diluted, mis-declared, or transshipped to dodge duties.
Back in 2010, a group of honest honey companies and importers came together and said: “Enough.” They founded True Source Honey, LLC, which launched the True Source Certified® program.
Here’s the Heart of What They Built – And Why it Matters:
- The program creates traceability from hive to jar. You can follow a load of honey through exporters, packers, audits, testing.
- It ensures authenticity and legal sourcing. The program demands third-party audits, lab testing (for instance, to detect added sugars or mis-declared origin) and record-keeping.
- It protects honest beekeepers and the U.S. honey industry. When cheaper, questionable honey floods the market, it undercuts prices and tarnishes the reputation of all honey.
- It restores consumer trust. When you see the True Source Certified® seal, you know someone has verified more than just a label claim—you’re seeing a supply chain issue being dealt with.
Transparency & Traceability
GloryBee believes it is critical to ensure that the honey we import is ethically and legally sourced in a transparent and traceable manner. True Source Certification verifies the country of origin of all GloryBee honey.
Each flower species has a unique pollen grain, and all honey contains trace amounts of pollen which can be used to determine its major floral sources and geographical origin. Through DNA testing of the pollen in honey, True Source confirms its origin and floral sources.
An independent third party audit firm then tracks the honey from the beekeeper that harvests it to the distributor that exports it and confirms full compliance with U.S. and international trade laws.
True Source Certification protects the viability of commercial beekeeping in the U.S. which is essential for pollination of the food we eat.