Purified, crystalized, brand-name, food-grade salt, delivered to my doorstep, is about $3/pound. Demand for that is pretty limited - how much more salt would you use, if you could buy it for only $1.50/pound?
Vs. this device produces "concentrated seawater" - which still contains every bit of algae, fish poop, plastic pollution, etc. that was in the original seawater.
I think if you did it at that scale it might flood the market and push the price down. You might be able to trade it to areas with a legitimate need, but you'd be competing against the people who just scoop it from ancient seabeds with a bulldozer.
considering that 6 months ago, 3 lbs of salt was sold for $2.29 (pnw, Oregon) and now sells for that for a single lb, that might be ok to flood the market and lower the price. if it can be disposed of for that price.
shrinkflation sucks, it doesn't mean we need to be beholden to it.
The price is already just about as low as it's reasonably going to go, with the price being dominated by factors unrelated to the actual production of the salt. Your average person consumes under ten grams of salt per day. The market simply isn't that large, and it's easy to make it in bulk at those scales.
* labor (no, price for labor hasn't increased 3 fold)
* transport (no, the price for transport hasn't increased 3 fold)
... still looking for an explanation why prices would increase 3x, and allow the packaging to be redesigned to be 1/3 of the size but with new plastic (as opposed to cardboard/recycled) and be sold at the same price.
if you can lower the cost of the original product, shouldn't you also be able to avoid some shrinkflation/redesign/platicification?
It might mean a 3x increase in margins for the producer or reseller, as has been the case for a lot of the price increases seen after the pandemic.
Or, most realistically, it's a combination of all of these - some increase in labor and transport prices, some increase in the producer's margins and some in the reseller's. Not to mention various other intermediaries taking their own cuts.
But sea salt hasn't gone up 3X in price. You have to look at actual market rates, not the arbitrary price being charged by one single store that's raising prices because they can (and which they'll do for any product). Searching right now, I'm seeing around $0.60/lb for bulk sea salt, e.g.: https://www.webstaurantstore.com/regal-salt-sea-fine-25/1020... And note that it might be cheaper still from a local supplier if you go pick it up in person.
Or, to put it a different way, the responsibility is on you as a consumer to actually get the best price on whatever you're shopping for. Some retailers can raise the price arbitrarily high, but you don't need to fall for it.
Sea salt sells for about $3/lb