this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2025
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Mildly Interesting
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Why is tube meat always the cheapest? Surely you could put any quality of meat you want in there, but it's always the cheapest.
Cheaper to package. They can just have a crazy long tube of meat going through a roll of film that gets tied off by a machine and they've got a ready-to-sell product. The chunks that come in the little trays have to get chopped, placed on the tray, then wrapped (which is probably still 99% automated, but more steps, more machinery, and more actual packaging)
That makes sense, but it doesn't explain why the high end meat isn't packaged the same way.
Good point. My two guesses would be:
Tube meat is commonly associated with "cheap"/bulk meat, so for marketing purposes, the individual packs may sell better.
I understand that the more the ground meat is handled, the taste/ texture can suffer. The long meat tube method may subject the meat to more unfavorable handling, ie the ties at the end compressing the meat more than an individual package.
Those both sound believable enough to me!
I struggle to believe packaging is a significant cost factor.
Idk, I work in the packaging industry, you'd be surprised!
When you buy a bottle of water, you're paying for the plastic it's in and the truck it came on. Nestle is just a big, evil disposable water bottle distributor that happens to fill the bottle before sending them out.