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America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

latimes.com

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Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#181

Post by erikpukinskis »

petrocrat wrote: post #112
erikpukinskis wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling something fashionable is just a cheap way to be dismissive. I’d respect you more if you stated openly which aspects of vegetarian efficiency, morality, pollution, health you think are nonsense. There are good arguments to be made there, but you’re hiding behind an empty insult.

The argument for omnivorianism that I find unassailable is that plowing which is required for annuals is actually worse for the environment than ruminant emissions. While utilizing perenials will require ruminants for a truly holistic agriculture that cycles all nutrients efficiently. So a Perennial plant base agriculture with ruminants to hlelp cycle nutrients is the best ag option available, so eating a few a of th…

That seems plausible, although it rules out almost all commercial meat. Since the feed will have gone through the same tillage.

I certainly wouldn’t argue against anyone who is buying meat from someone like Joel Salatin.

I wonder if there’s a word for this... “either stop eating beef or start paying a lot for it” diet?

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#182

Post by jghn »

PeterisP wrote: post #179
jghn wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The virtual economy of UO was killed by the time the beta test ended. We're talking about the NPC shopkeepers here, not the player owned vendors. The NPCs were supposed to follow things like supply/demand as well as having preferences as to what they wanted. Players got mad as they wanted to just be able to dump any old crap (typically bucketloads of skullcaps) to any old NPC. The NPC shopkeepers also kept hours, wou…

You can't have a meaningful economy if significant parts of that economy are 'magical' such as bucketloads of spawned NPCs getting bucketloads of scullcaps out of nowhere. Expecting a reasonable supply/demand for something that gets spawned without limit, and gets harvested as a side-effect of something people want to do anyway, is like expecting a supply/demand based trade in candy wrappers or banana peels; The obvi…

Or, if one sticks to their supply/demand guns the skullcaps become worthless and either are avoided by players as a cheap way to skill up or it becomes a gold sink. Both are useful.

NB that in early UO, skullcaps weren’t a drop, they were mass produced as they were the most cost effective way to build stats and skills. Doubly so if shopkeepers would actually pay for them

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#183

Post by AcerbicZero »

xahrepap wrote: post #67
stonogo wrote: post #61

I'd be interested to know how much of this has to do with the dilution of the meaning of 'leather' in terms of consumer goods. The market is flooded with garbage products, which are produced by slicing a thin veneer of leather and gluing it to a plastic backing, which is then sold as "bonded leather." It's gotten so bad that full-grain leather products are exceedingly rare. Since 90% of "leather" products are such aw…

I had a really awesome leather belt that I got when I was 15. I stopped wearing it when I was 30 because my weight finally out outgrew the belt. Still have it. It's no worse today than it was when I got it as a teen. I go through about a belt a year now. Because I always seem to end up with this crap you describe. Even if I try to avoid it. Guess I need to do a better job looking... Or just lose some weight so I can…

I had a similar experience although the cheap cast zinc on the buckle finally failed. The leather is still in pretty decent shape, despite ~15 years of abuse.

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#184

Post by deelowe »

Izkata wrote: post #170
deelowe wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check out Tanner goods. Definitely buy it for life belts, wallets, etc.

Just FYI, if you do mean what the sibling replies say, a "life belt" is a flotation device in the shape of a belt. Refers to a "life jacket".

"buy it for life", belt. Not buy it for, "life belt."

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#185

Post by ValentineC »

dcchambers wrote: post #177

Unfortunately these lower leather prices certainly don't seem to have affected the price of premium, handmade leather goods. Leather is good in so many things: wallets, belts, shoes, bags, jackets... It's naturally water-resistant and lasts for decades , yet it seems like all the big-box stores and manufactures have abandoned real full-grain leather for synthetics or even cheaper leather alternatives (PU, "top grain,…

> it seems like all the big-box stores and manufactures have abandoned real full-grain leather for synthetics or even cheaper leather alternatives (PU, "top grain," "corrected grain," "genuine," etc).

If we're specifically talking about full-grain leather, I suspect that it's because consumers have this unrealistic ideal of "unmarked"/"mint" leather that's hard to achieve, at low prices, on large pieces of full-grain leather.

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#186

Post by MandieD »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #181
petrocrat wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The argument for omnivorianism that I find unassailable is that plowing which is required for annuals is actually worse for the environment than ruminant emissions. While utilizing perenials will require ruminants for a truly holistic agriculture that cycles all nutrients efficiently. So a Perennial plant base agriculture with ruminants to hlelp cycle nutrients is the best ag option available, so eating a few a of th…

That seems plausible, although it rules out almost all commercial meat. Since the feed will have gone through the same tillage. I certainly wouldn’t argue against anyone who is buying meat from someone like Joel Salatin. I wonder if there’s a word for this... “either stop eating beef or start paying a lot for it” diet?

Selective omnivorism?

I actively avoid meat in the company cafeteria and at most restaurants, but buy grass-fed beef or a free-range chicken most weekends to cook, or packaged free-range chicken legs if I’m feeling a bit lazy. The price per pound is ridiculous (“why did you spend 15 bucks on a little chicken that looks like a damn mockingbird?”) to my dad, who eats a good half pound of meat every day.

In the end, I probably spend about as much on meat as a less-picky meat eater in Germany does. 1kg free-range chicken legs: 8-10 EUR, 1kg cheapest chicken legs: 2-3 EUR. Two free-range chicken legs weigh about the same as one cheap one.

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#187

Post by mrnobody_67 »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #51
luxuryballs wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much of this is because of the increase in cheaper faux leather, maybe even also combined with inflation, you may be paying the same numerical amount for poly leather as you did for genuine leather 20 years ago. Also I guess if a company can cut costs by using the improved poly leather and the consumer doesn’t notice or care then that’s the move.

More like cheap Chinese bonded leather which permeates most sub-$100 leather goods. I make a pass on buying most leather products because it's so hard to find decent quality without an overinflated price. I don't even dare buying it online unless its a niche where substandard materials are unlikely.

Feels like the leather industry needs to launch an education campaign to distinguish the real thing from the cheap China knock offs... big marketing/branding opportunity for the sector. Most consumers, myself included, have no clue about grading leather, etc.

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#188

Post by Izkata »

deelowe wrote: post #184
Izkata wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just FYI, if you do mean what the sibling replies say, a "life belt" is a flotation device in the shape of a belt. Refers to a "life jacket".

"buy it for life", belt. Not buy it for, "life belt."

The list makes it really hard to read that way with parens. It parses like this to me:

  Definitely buy it for (life belts, wallets, etc).

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#189

Post by diminoten »

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #14
diminoten wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge swaths of America still see meat as an every meal thing ( myself included), and beef is a large part of that.

I would have a hard time without meat. There's so much food I don't like.

I also have a terrible palate, do you think that's part of it for us? Beef is a fairly "guaranteed" taste that, depending on the cut, will give you what you're looking for regardless, I'd expect.

Re: America has no use for hides, so leather prices plunge

#190

Post by dandelany »

delfinom wrote: post #155
Guest0918231 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go to Etsy.com. It's great for leather products. I bought lots of belts from brand names growing up, and they all quickly fell apart. Then I learned about full grain leather. I talked with a local person I found on Etsy, provided the measurements to the center hole, chose a solid stainless steel buckle from their selection, gave them the measurements for the width of the belt, and they cut one from some black, full g…

The problem with Etsy is these days it's flooded with Chinese sellers hawking the same products they would on Amazon but at a markup.

I hear this all the time, and I'm sure it's true in some product categories, but it has not been my experience at all, at least not lately. Go search "full grain leather belt" on Etsy, do the tiniest bit of research on the sellers on the first-page of results, and tell me I'm wrong...
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