Accepted answer
Answer first: comparing suppliers is only meaningful if the comparison holds the laboratory, the method and the compound constant, and most published comparisons hold none of them.
Content is the more discriminating measurement than purity for supplier comparison, because purity clusters tightly among competent suppliers and content does not.
Cost per milligram, adjusted honestly
| Step | Value | Note |
|---|
| Vial price, 10 mg nominal | £34.00 | As advertised |
| Nominal cost per mg | £3.40 | 34 ÷ 10 |
| Measured content | 9.2 mg | Independent content assay |
| Cost per actual mg | £3.70 | 34 ÷ 9.2 |
| Dead-space loss, 20 draws | 4 % | 80 µL of a 2 mL fill |
| Cost per delivered mg | £3.85 | 3.70 ÷ 0.96 |
| First vial, with £110 assay | £14.85 | Testing dominates a single vial |
More usefully, lead time and lane behaviour are supplier properties too and are easier to compare than analytical ones, because they need no laboratory at all.
Inter-laboratory spread on identical peptide material is routinely half a per cent to a per cent by RP-HPLC, which is the noise floor for any cross-laboratory comparison.
One laboratory, one method, one submission. Otherwise it is not a comparison.