Madagascar supplies the large majority of the world's Bourbon vanilla, and almost every serious buyer of natural vanilla ends up sourcing from the island at some point. But a first import is rarely blocked by price. It is blocked by the practical questions around it: which grade actually suits the product, how much has to be bought at once, which certificates customs will ask for, and who pays for what along the way.
This guide answers those questions in the order a first-time B2B buyer meets them.
Start with the grade, not the price
Vanilla is not a single product with a single price. Madagascar Bourbon vanilla is sorted into grades that differ in moisture, appearance and intended use, and choosing the wrong one is the most common and most expensive mistake a new buyer makes.
Whole-bean gourmet grade — usually called Black Gourmet or Grade A — is the presentation bean. It is dark, supple, visually uniform, and carries a high moisture content, typically in the 30–35% range. It is what you buy if the bean itself will be seen: retail tubes, patisserie, fine dining, gift packaging.
Extraction grades — Red Souple EU, Red US, Red Split, and the shorter Short and Cuts categories — are drier, generally around 20–25% moisture, and are graded on aromatic content rather than looks. They are what you buy if the bean will be macerated, ground or extracted. Because you pay for less water, extraction grade is the rational choice for any process where appearance is irrelevant, and paying gourmet prices for extraction use is simply paying for moisture.
The naming matters at customs too. "Red US" and "Red Souple EU" describe preparation conventions expected in those two markets rather than two different qualities, so tell your supplier the destination market before you ask for a quote.
As a reference point, our own FOB Madagascar prices in September 2026 run from $60/kg for Red Split up to $70/kg for Black Gourmet, with Red US and Red Souple EU in between; current prices by grade are published on our homepage. Any quotation you receive should state the grade, the moisture range and the bean length band together — a price without those three is not a comparable price.
How much you have to buy: MOQ and samples
Wholesale vanilla is not sold by the handful. Our commercial minimum is 10 kg, and that figure is fairly typical for direct-from-origin suppliers: below it, the fixed costs of export documentation, phytosanitary inspection and airfreight make the per-kilo price meaningless.
Ten kilos of vanilla is a substantial commitment for a first order, which is why samples exist. We send complimentary samples and ask only that the buyer covers the courier cost, generally $50–$70 depending on destination. A sample is not a formality: it is your opportunity to check moisture by feel, measure bean length, cut a bean to look at the seed content, and run the beans through your actual process before committing to a container of them.
Order samples of the exact grade you intend to buy, not the prettiest grade the supplier offers.
Certifications: what they are and what they are for
Three certification questions come up in almost every vanilla negotiation, and they serve different purposes.
Organic certification is a market-access requirement, not a quality claim. If you intend to sell into the European Union as organic, the goods must be covered by EU organic certification — ours is issued by Ecocert under the operator code MG-BIO-154 — and each consignment must travel with a Certificate of Inspection issued through the EU's TRACES NT system. Without that COI, the goods can still enter the EU, but not as organic. For the United States, the equivalent is USDA Organic certification under the National Organic Program. A supplier who says "we are organic" without naming a certifying body and a certificate number is telling you nothing verifiable.
Food safety documentation is the second layer. Buyers frequently ask for HACCP or ISO 22000. Be precise about what your supplier actually holds: HACCP-based handling practices and staff training are not the same thing as a third-party HACCP certificate, and a serious supplier will draw that distinction for you rather than blur it. Ask for the certificate, its scope and its expiry date.
Ethical and traceability schemes — Fair for Life, Rainforest Alliance, Slow Food Presidia and similar — are commercial differentiators rather than regulatory requirements. They matter if your own brand makes claims about farmer income or forest cover, and they are worth nothing if you cannot trace them back to a named collection zone.
Which brings up origin. Vanilla marketing tends to collapse into a single word, "SAVA", but Madagascar's vanilla zones are not interchangeable. Ours is collected between Mananara Nord and Maroantsetra, an area of forest-grown vanilla and UNESCO biosphere reserve. If origin is part of your product story, ask for the district, not the country.
Incoterms: who pays, who insures, where risk transfers
The Incoterm attached to a quotation changes what the number means, so never compare two prices without checking it first.
FOB (Free On Board) is the most common term for vanilla from Madagascar and the basis of most published price lists, including ours. The seller delivers the goods on board the vessel at the port of loading, cleared for export; from that point, freight, insurance and all onward risk are yours. FOB gives you control over the shipping leg and is generally the cheapest headline price — which is precisely why it looks cheaper than it is until you add freight.
CIF (Cost, Insurance and Freight) puts the sea freight and a minimum insurance cover on the seller's side, up to the named destination port. Risk still transfers at the port of loading, which surprises many first-time buyers: under CIF you are insured, but the goods are legally at your risk across the ocean.
DAP (Delivered At Place) takes the goods to an address you name, with the seller carrying transport and risk to that point. Import duty, VAT and customs clearance remain your responsibility. DAP is the simplest term for a buyer without a freight forwarder, and the most expensive.
We quote FOB, CIF and DAP. For a first order of 10–50 kg, airfreight under CIF or DAP is usually the sensible route; sea freight only starts to pay for itself at volumes well above that.
The documents that travel with the goods
A vanilla shipment is a paperwork exercise as much as a logistics one. Expect the following set, and expect your customs broker to ask for all of it before the goods land.
The commercial invoice and packing list describe the transaction and the physical consignment — carton count, net and gross weight, grade per carton. The certificate of origin establishes where the goods were produced; as a Least Developed Country, Madagascar benefits from duty-free access to the EU under Everything But Arms, and the origin proof is what unlocks it. The phytosanitary certificate, issued by the Malagasy plant protection authority, confirms the consignment is free of quarantine pests. The bill of lading or air waybill is the transport document and, for sea freight, the document of title. Organic consignments add the Certificate of Inspection described above.
Two destination-specific obligations catch buyers out. Importing food into the United States requires the foreign facility to be registered with the FDA and a Prior Notice to be filed for each shipment, and the importer carries its own duties under the Foreign Supplier Verification Program — those are your responsibilities as importer, not your supplier's. Importing into the EU means the consignment enters through a designated entry point and, for organic goods, through TRACES.
Vanilla beans, whole, fall under HS code 0905.10; crushed or ground vanilla falls under 0905.20. Confirm the classification with your broker before the goods ship, not after.
Questions to ask before you place a first order
The suppliers worth working with answer all of these without hesitation. The ones who deflect are telling you something.
- Which grade are you quoting, and what is the moisture content range for it?
- What is the bean length band, and what percentage falls below it?
- What is the vanillin content, and can you show a recent laboratory analysis?
- Which collection district does this lot come from?
- What is the harvest year of the beans on offer?
- Which certifications do you hold, issued by which body, under which certificate number, valid until when?
- What is the minimum order quantity, and what does a sample cost me?
- Which Incoterms can you quote, and what exactly is included in each?
- How is the vanilla packed for export — vacuum-packed or loose, what carton weight, what liner?
- What documents will accompany the shipment, and who files the phytosanitary certificate?
- What are your payment terms for a first order, and what happens if the consignment fails inspection on arrival?
Write the answers down. When a second supplier quotes you a lower price, this list is what tells you whether it is genuinely lower or simply a different product.
A realistic timeline for a first order
From first contact to goods in your warehouse, plan for six to ten weeks. Roughly one to two weeks for quotation, sample dispatch and evaluation; one to two weeks to agree specification, terms and payment; one to three weeks for preparation, grading, packing and export formalities at origin, which depend partly on the harvest calendar; and then the transport leg — three to seven days by air, four to eight weeks by sea to Europe or North America.
Vanilla is harvested mid-year and cured over several months, so availability and price both move with the season. A buyer who starts the conversation two weeks before they need stock will pay for the hurry.
Working with us
Madamarket Export is the trading name of Sustainable Concepts SARL, based in Antananarivo, collecting vanilla between Mananara Nord and Maroantsetra. We work with professional buyers only, from a 10 kg minimum, with USDA Organic and EU Organic (Ecocert MG-BIO-154) certification, and we quote FOB, CIF and DAP.
Tell us the grade, the quantity and the destination port, and we will come back with a firm price and a sample.