• We are now running on a new, and hopefully much-improved, server. In addition we are also on new forum software. Any move entails a lot of technical details and I suspect we will encounter a few issues as the new server goes live. Please be patient with us. It will be worth it! :) Please help by posting all issues here.
  • The forum will be down for about an hour this weekend for maintenance. I apologize for the inconvenience.
  • If you are having trouble seeing the forum then you may need to clear your browser's DNS cache. Click here for instructions on how to do that
  • Please review the Forum Rules frequently as we are constantly trying to improve the forum for our members and visitors.

$270 per ounce

Jack House

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 12, 2010
Messages
2,611
Location
I80, USA
I just found the Spanish Saffron at Wal-Mart. My jaw dropped, showed it to one of the support managers and his jaw dropped. He then showed it to everyone that past by.

Never thought I'd see anything so expensive being sold at Wal-Mart. For the record they only sell it in quantities of 0.06oz for like $16 a bottle. It was the highest priced spice they had, both by ounce and SKU price.

So, who thought I was talking about some precious metal when reading the title? :p

Posted using my HTC Evo
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Jan 15, 2007
Messages
10,444
Location
Valhalla
Do you know what saffron is? Do you know how it is harvested and then packaged?

And was anybody forcing you to buy it?

Yes, it is expensive*. So what? Buying a $10 DVD from Wally World when your kid needs food is also expensive. Which one makes you more upset?

This is not really directed at the OP. It's directed at the notion that just because the price is "high" something is expensive.

stay safe.

*Actually, $16 for 0.06 oz is a very reasonable price for saffron, if it is in fact real Spanish saffron.
 

carry for myself

Regular Member
Joined
May 1, 2011
Messages
544
Location
Maine
and heroin costs $5,214.00 an ounce :p or roughly estimated at $200,000 a kilo which is 35. some odd ounces. why are we talking about drug prices lol
 

thebigsd

Founder's Club Member
Joined
Mar 23, 2010
Messages
3,535
Location
Quarryville, PA
This is officially the most random topic that I have seen to date on OCDO. Congratulations!!! :D

Skid, you seem to have an inate knowledge of saffron. Out of curiosity why is it so expensive...and don't tell me to google it...:D
 

smokeyburnout

Regular Member
Joined
Sep 19, 2011
Messages
125
Location
connecticut
Saffron as it is sold for seasoning is the stamen of the saffron plant. Obviously a small part of the flower which means a lot of work and man hours goes into picking and raising them causing the price to go up. Also, almost all saffron produced comes from Iran and importation as well as all other expenses and rarity all work to increase the price. This plant is a pain to grow as they aren't self replicating and male plants are sterile.
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Jan 15, 2007
Messages
10,444
Location
Valhalla
Saffron as it is sold for seasoning is the stamen of the saffron plant. Obviously a small part of the flower which means a lot of work and man hours goes into picking and raising them causing the price to go up. Also, almost all saffron produced comes from Iran and importation as well as all other expenses and rarity all work to increase the price. This plant is a pain to grow as they aren't self replicating and male plants are sterile.

Close, but not quite a cigar.

What you called "the saffron plant" is a crocus - those flowers that peep up out of the snow in late winter here in North America. And yes, most cultivation is in Iran although "Spanish saffron" comes from flowers grown in Spain (whoda thunkit?). affrom from flowers grown in other places (The Netherlands, Turkey, France and a bunch more) is not called by the place/country of origin - probably because there is not much more money they can squeeze out of the point of origin issue. No matter where it's grown the stigma must be plucked by hand - 3 to 5 per bloom pulled out individually with a tweezer because tearing apart the bloom destroys too many of them.

Saffron has always been the most expensive botanical, even outstriping tulips diring the Dutch tulip wars.

I know folks who buy it in 10-pound lots - several times a week. They run a restaurant.

stay safe.
 

Jack House

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 12, 2010
Messages
2,611
Location
I80, USA
I realize that Saffron is rare and hard to produce. That you don't use that much when cooking and therefore don't have to buy an ounce unless you're running a restaurant. But $270 is still a lot of money. I found it interesting that such a high priced spice was sold at Wal-Mart, I found it surprising that it wasn't kept under lock and key, like most things at Wal-Mart.

I don't think anyone here is complaining about the price. I'm merely pointing it out because I was amazed that it cost so much. Especially when the second highest price (per ounce) was like $50 or something. And yes, I do consider it expensive. If it is as strong as I have heard, then perhaps it is not unreasonably priced. Still, what is reasonable and what is expensive is not mutually exclusive. My computer will cost me something like $1500 when I am finished building it. Is it expensive? Sure is, is it unreasonable? Absolutely not. It's actually a very reasonable price for performance to cost ratio.

This is officially the most random topic that I have seen to date on OCDO. Congratulations!!! :D
Why thank you, kind sir! :D
 

CO-Joe

Regular Member
Joined
Oct 14, 2009
Messages
184
Location
, ,
What I think is especially funny, given the comparison in the thread: saffron vs MJ.

With saffron you have a spice which is very time intensive to produce, lots of man hours for comparatively tiny output, and the source flower only blooms once a year during a two week window.

Cannabis, on the other hand...There's a reason it's called weed, you know...because it grows like a weed. There are still millions of wild, non-cultivated (low THC content) plants growing in the wild, in ditches and forests across the US. We pay the DEA a ton of money to find this stuff and burn it.

On the other hand, the cultivated product probably doesn't take 1/1000th of the preparation or labor to produce as saffron does, yet the open market price is comparable. Kinda says to me the drug trade is mighty profitable.
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Jan 15, 2007
Messages
10,444
Location
Valhalla
Isn't saffron the key spice in Paella? I could see how a restaurant serving that would use a lot.

You can get by with tumeric if all you want is yellow color - and a lot of places do that because most folks have no idea how to taste what they put in their mouths.

In the last couple of years I have saved a metric ton of money by switching to cheaply made food that barely has edible ingredients, as opposed to the decent to actually darned good stuff I used to eat. Thanks to medical issues I lost my ability to taste just about anything except "heat". Used to be I could tell you what spices were used; nowadays I can make a good stab at what the predominant color of the item is.

And for all you folks discussing the price of pot - any of you old enough to remember when the local FD would come out and do a controlled burn of the vacant lots? The neighborhood turned out, and everybody stood downwind.:D More fun than following the DT spray truck.

stay safe.
 
Top