I know the words “cheap” and “fish” are not often used together, especially in a sentence talking about a good idea, but I’m going to attempt.
All week, I’ve been eating smoked salmon. I had a salmon quesadilla, I had some salmon sushi, I even had some salmon and cream cheese on crackers as a lovely afternoon snack. So how my doing this on my typical grocery budget of $25 a week? I bought the trim. Allow me to explain.
The next time you’re in a grocery store, check out your smoked salmon section. You’ll notice that farm raised salmon are cheaper than wild salmon (rumor has it it’s less nutritious) and you’ll notice a few different companies that offer the product. Where I live, prices seem to range from $25-$30 a pound. We don’t often think of smoked salmon this way (as in price per pound) because we buy it in 4-8 ounce packages but that’s what the unit prices there for!
You also see that smoked salmon is that eye level. If you look a little lower or a little higher, you may see a product called smoked salmon trim. Smoked salmon trim is part of the smoked salmon that didn’t quite make the cut but it’s $7 a pound. A little easier to swallow then $30 for me!
You may notice a difference if you’re, say, making a spread on a platter but otherwise it’s still salmon which, last I checked, is a high-quality protein source.
The concept of packaging second rate food products and reselling them at a lower price is not one unique to salmon. As a matter of fact, my friends at Barkwheats often package the dog biscuits that are little crumbly and sell them to stores cheaper than retail.
In selling samples/trim/insert name of grade b product here, the company is losing less money in that it doesn’t have to give away or throw out not so perfect products and consumers like myself and quite afford the real deal can still purchase products from these companies. And in knowing that the trim from Ducktrap is good, I may be more likely to buy their version of the fancy smoked salmon the next time I throw a nice brunch.
Reaching more types of consumers and wasting less? It’s a good idea all around. Yum!