As long as you know what you’re buying, it doesn’t matter who or where supplies it. The benefit of a brand name is that you are sure you are getting the right stuff.
That said, people write long and learned articles about stains and finishes.
The base chemistry is important in finishing to allow control of the depth of colour (color) and also to allow removal. Avoiding carcinogens is a new idea, but extremely valid.
For myself, I like vandyke for pretty much everything. It gives a suitable ‘brown’ for most things. Water based, user friendly, mix up as much as you need when you need it. Keeps forever in the jar/box.
One things though, if at all possible, I’ll try and put it over a base coat of blonde shellac. Why? To allow adjustment of the colour and control absorption. Alternatively, make up a weak solution, in the expectation of using several coats to deepen the colour to what you need. If you have scrap material to experiment on, you may not need to do this, but bear in mind that if you are colouring a ship model, any end grain, or joints, will absorb more stain, and this is irreversible. See comment about shellac above to prevent this happening.
J
