 All right, we just have one more quick presentation for you guys before we head to lunch Coming up next is Dan Dan Elmer coming. I'm the owner of the San Francisco bath salt company here to tell us a little bit about Epsom salt Hello everybody Just want to echo everybody's thoughts about the organizers of the event. I think they've done an awesome job and Already I've become an expert in float tanks. So and there's a lot more to come So I should say at the outset I've only got 10 minutes. There's a lot I want to get through So we're not gonna have time for questions, but I'm gonna be around for the whole weekend So please catch up with me if you've got any questions or you need any clarification So a little bit about us We're a family business. We've been around since 2002 We're a supplier and manufacturer of salt products. So we supply products for all sorts of applications For personal care for the food industry industrial applications and of course float tank owners We're a distributor and we buy our Epsom salt from two manufacturers Jals chemical out of North Carolina USA and layout chemical out of China And we've been supplying float tank owners now for about eight years We got our first order when we just started the business and we were really small and I got a call from a local customer wanting 800 pounds For use in his home, and I was like what the heck does somebody want 800 pounds at Epsom salt for the bath So anyway long story short I got into a real interesting conversation And this this customer educated me about floating and I've been interested ever since So what do you need to know about Epsom salt? Well really I think my job is to Give you the right information so that you can make an informed decision about the Epsom salt your purchase Epsom salt is a simple product and it gets really over thought. It's a commodity product But there's a lot of misconceptions out there and it's so fundamental To the to the float process. I think it's really important that you understand it So the big question really is domestic versus imported salts Five years ago, this wouldn't have even been a question Domestic salts were the only thing you could find and then there was a large price increase from the domestic manufacturers And that kind of left the gap at the bottom of the market a lot of Epsom salt is used for agricultural purposes etc And those customers they really just want the cheapest product they can find So with the price hike it kind of left room at the bottom of the market for importers to come in with cheap products And fill that void so There's really two considerations or should I say two categories when it comes to Epsom salt When we talk about domestic product we talk about Manufacturers Giles chemical or PQ corporation. They're the only manufacturers in the US. I Throw one other manufacturer in there. It's a German manufacturer called K and S So for all you guys that aren't from America or Canada You're probably going to see K and S products and it can really be classed with Giles and PQ corporation It's a very good standard of product a very similar manufacturer If it's made by any other manufacturer, it's imported and it's likely imported from Asia, which Generally has a stigma behind it just simply because it's from China or India So let's go into a little bit more detail about the different manufacturers So the domestic manufacturers being mainly Giles chemical and PQ corporation So this salt is as pure and reliable as you can get. I hear all sorts of stories and get lots of questions People come with facts from different manufacturers about why their salt is better I'm pretty impartial. I represent a company from China and a company from the usa And I know I'm not going to win everybody's business But I can tell you that the the us manufacturers produce the purest most reliable controlled salt there is Typically sell two grades of salt usp and technical grade In simple terms usp grade it's a food grade salt used for pharmaceutical purposes technical grade is used for everything else When it comes to the us manufacturers the kind of the dirt a little secret in the industry is there's really no discernible difference between the two Both usp and technical grade are made on the same lines in the same plants with the same raw materials The only real difference is the usp salt is certified by the fda So obviously these salts are made in the usa which could be seen as an advantage Typically the domestic manufacturers Don't grade the salts into different grain sizes. So you'll see a mixed crystal size Uh, often the imported salts come in you see really large nice crystals Um, I can tell you that has absolutely no bearing on the quality or the usability of the salt Again, it's another tactic salespeople will use to say hey look how beautiful my salt is these crystals are so big Um, it really just has no bearing on the quality of the salt whatsoever And obviously an imported salt a domestic salt. Sorry is going to be more expensive So you're looking at 12 to 20 cents a pound more expensive So if it's imported it's made by any other manufacturer other than k and s pq or giles chemical We import our product from leo chemical So we independently test that product. We've visited the plant in china And um that product typically tests to the same standards as usp Obviously, it's going to be cheaper 12 to 20 cents a pound cheaper I do want to say though that you need to address the quality on a supplier by supplier basis I mean, I can speak for the company that that we do business with because we've vetted them so thoroughly and we've tested the salt However, I really cannot speak to the quality of any other manufacturer and there are a lot of them Uh, so as I mentioned sometimes the imported salt you see in large crystal sizes. This has no bearing on the quality Also, the labeling can be confusing on imported products. Uh, there's only two grades of salt There's usp grade and technical grade Due to things like uh import regulations sometimes the manufacturers have to put terminology on the bag which is really confusing Uh, but really It's only going to fall into two categories usp or technical grade So typically the imported salt is sold as fertilizer Um, I've seen recently in the last year or two more and more people buying epsom salt for the float tanks from things like nurseries um There's two reasons for this I guess, uh, you will probably get the lowest price salt that's out there And also there's the availability question You guys kind of require an unusual quantity of salt and And it may be just what's available to you locally I had an interesting conversation actually with a Norwegian manufacturer called Yara And they manufacture their salt specifically for fertilizer And they are very very reluctant to sell their salt for any other purpose other than fertilizer I couldn't get any solid details as to why other than the fact that You know the manufacturing processes everything they do is with the intention of selling that as a fertilizer So I mean you can draw your own conclusions from that But to me it's perhaps a reason to question The quality of some of the salts that you might find that are sold specifically as a fertilizer So finally factors to consider when purchasing so Do you prefer domestic or imported if you're willing to pay a little bit more? Then you know domestic product is great if you really just shopping on price You know you would end up with imported product What level of service do you require like I said you guys are in kind of an unusual Zone when it comes to the quantity of salt you use I mean typically a tank would require 800 pounds of salt It's really easy to go to your drugstore and buy five pounds of epsom salt It's not so easy to go and buy 45 pound bags of epsom salt from the store Also, it's easy to go to a manufacturer and buy 40 000 pounds But that middle ground can be a little bit tricky And that's where distributors like ourselves come in Where we're buying in a large quantity and selling it off in in quantities that are appropriate for you So if you're interested in imported product, I'd ask some questions about the sauce You need to find out as much as you can about the product Availability is always going to be a question Just depends on where you live A final thought on on the the qualities of the salt beware of fine-grained salt Fine-grained salt has a tendency to clump An epsom salt comes in 50 or 55 pound bags and with changes in humidity That bag of salt can come become a 50 pound lump of salt And believe me, that's no fun to deal with and that takes a long time to dissolve in your tank So I would recommend just staying away from fine-grained salt entirely So really your consideration is price versus quality convenience and peace of mind And I just really summarized by saying You know, if you're currently getting a USP product to domestic products And you're happy with the price and the service, everything's great You know, we sell a technical grade product from China that we've vetted thoroughly And I can stand behind that product Every other product that you might find on the market You know, I think you just need to do some investigating And figure out if you can find a comfort level with that So that's everything like I said, please feel free to seek me out Anytime during the conference And I'm actually going to have some printouts of the slide on our table outside And there's a little bit of extra information in there, some chemical analysis and things like that So please feel free to come by and grab one Thanks very much and enjoy your lunch