Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a sourdough bread, right? Now, there's a rabbit hole to dive into. It uses a different type of levain / yeast culture compared to bread based on dried yeast. Long story short, sourdough was / is how bread was made throughout history. Fermentation takes a very long time due to the nature of the levain. At some point, bakers noticed how the leftovers from brewers yeasts drastically shorten fermentation. That and…
> That's a sourdough bread, right? Yes, the one I linked is made out of sourdough, which is a sign of quality here. Though, we do also have the same style of bread without sourdough.
Ingredients: Artisan bread is usually just flour, water, salt, yeast (sourdough is just flour and water, too). Sandwich bread can include milk or other fats to make it softer and is more of a “cake”. In industrial settings, there are a lot of preservatives included in the sandwich bread.
Mixing: Artisan bread is mixed by hand. Sandwich bread is mixed in a mixer. The former thus has less worked gluten.
Shaping: Artisan bread is made into a ball (similar to “spinning” pizza dough). Sandwich bread is poured into a tin and requires no shaping.
Bake: Artisan bread is baked at high heat, around 500F, in steam. Sandwich bread is baked in a specific tin at lower heat, like a cake.
As you can see, the sandwich bread is easily scalable and, being essentially a cake, is preferred by many. A loaf of sandwich bread is around $1-$2 where an artisan bread is like 4x more.
Also, there are flours, like rye, which have to be made with sandwich-type methods. These flours don’t have enough gluten to hold shape on their own.