## Money
recipes and site always free
anti-consumption ethos
base infra covered by Peaceful Foundation
optional $1 video unlocks fund projects like the undercurrent
ethos:
affordability
clarity
community benefit
## Summary
A quick look at how the site covers its costs and generates surplus.
| scale | monthly fixed costs | plus variable costs | revenue (1% pay $1) | monthly surplus | yearly surplus |
|------------------------------|---------------------|---------------------|---------------------|-----------------|----------------|
| 1,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$91 | ~$10 | ~-$81 | ~-$972 |
| 10,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$94 | ~$100 | ~$6 | ~$72 |
| 50,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$122 | ~$500 | ~$378 | ~$4,536 |
| 100,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$173 | ~$1,000 | ~$827 | ~$9,924 |
| 250,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$326 | ~$2,500 | ~$2,174 | ~$26,088 |
| 500,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$581 | ~$5,000 | ~$4,419 | ~$53,028 |
| 1,000,000 visitors | ~$91 | ~$1,091 | ~$10,000 | ~$8,909 | ~$106,908 |
| one hundred million visitors | ~$91 | ~$10,271 | ~$100,000 | ~$89,729 | ~$1,076,748 |
Fixed costs (~$91/month) are the baseline: domains, monitoring, media storage, image hosting, and they don't change with visitor count.
Variable costs scale with traffic: images, audio streaming, video streaming.
Revenue comes from ~1% of visitors paying $1 to unlock high-resolution 720p video and higher-bitrate audio. The site breaks even at roughly 14,600 visitors per month.
### Costs
Every cost the site incurs, split into fixed (same every month) and variable (scale with traffic).
#### Fixed costs
Fixed costs are costs that don't change no matter how many people visit the website.
These are the baseline operating expenses: domain names, monitoring, media storage, and image hosting.
| line item | monthly | yearly |
|-----------------------------|-------------|-------------|
| domain: reasonable.diet | ~$8.75 | ~$105 |
| domain: reasonable.recipes | ~$8.00 | ~$96 |
| domain: reasonablediet.org | ~$1.00 | ~$12 |
| monitoring and analytics | ~$15.00 | ~$180 |
| WebRTC signalling | ~$5.00 | ~$60 |
| hexagons.world integration | ~$2.50 | ~$30 |
| Mux storage (audio + video) | ~$50.40 | ~$605 |
| R2 image storage | ~$0.30 | ~$4 |
| **total fixed** | **~$90.95** | **~$1,091** |
domain renewal
~$213/year total (~$17.75/month)
reasonable.diet — ~$105/year, primary domain, short and memorable
reasonable.recipes — ~$96/year, alternative, speaks the purpose immediately
reasonablediet.org — ~$12/year, fallback if .diet TLD is blocked or mistrusted
hosting
Cloudflare Pages
completely free for static sites
no server to maintain, no uptime monitoring needed beyond basic checks
monitoring and basic analytics
~$15/month
lightweight uptime monitoring and privacy-respecting analytics
no Google Analytics, no tracking pixels
WebRTC signalling
~$5/month
Cloudflare Worker that helps devices find each other for P2P sync
does not handle recipe or shopping-list data; all data stays on users' devices
only passes small handshake messages between devices
hexagons.world integration
~$2.50/month
static region data and local price bands for ingredient sourcing
almost no compute; served from edge cache
Mux storage (audio + video)
~$50.40/month
audio: 500 recipes × 10 cook-along tracks × 40 min × $0.00024/min = ~$48.00
video: 500 recipes × 2 min × $0.0024/min = ~$2.40
this is pure storage; delivery is counted separately below
video storage scales with recipe count
not every recipe has videos, but on average ~2 short clips per recipe
as more recipes are added, total video storage grows proportionally
audio tracks grow over time as more creators record cook-along podcasts
popular recipes accumulate more tracks than others
a small subset of recipes carries most of the audio traffic
most tracks get only a handful of plays; popular tracks carry the delivery cost
R2 image storage
~$0.30/month
~15GB of original recipe images, posters, and thumbnails at $0.015/GB
edge-resised variants are generated on-the-fly and cached; not stored in R2
##### total fixed: ~$90.95/month
why fixed costs are so low
the site is static + local-first:
no user database
authentication uses the browser's built-in WebAuthn / passkey API
peaceful passport links devices for P2P sync without storing accounts server-side
no passwords to hash, no personally identifiable information to store
no global sync backend
no account storage
no heavy compute
so almost nothing scales with traffic
#### Variable costs
Variable costs fluctuate depending on how many visitors there are to the site.
The main drivers are image delivery, audio streaming, and video streaming.
Assumptions:
~30% of visitors watch short instructional videos
these are linked/popped-out clips for recipe steps that need clarification
~2 clips per recipe view on average
~15% of visitors listen to cook-along audio
~1 audio track per recipe view
~20 minutes average listen time (partial completion, prep, shared-device cooking)
audio delivery costs ~1/10th of video delivery per minute
audio: $0.00008/min, video: $0.0008/min
video storage scales with total recipe count
not every recipe has videos, but on average ~2 short clips per recipe
video count does not grow per-recipe over time — only with more recipes
images scale with total recipe count, not per-recipe image count
That works out to roughly:
~3.0 minutes audio + ~0.6 minutes video consumed per visitor
Mux provides 100,000 free delivery minutes/month
at ~3.6 min consumed per visitor, the free tier covers ~28,000 visitors
after the free tier:
image hosting: ~$0.0003/visitor
audio delivery: ~$0.00024/visitor
video delivery: ~$0.00048/visitor
combined variable at scale: ~$0.00102/visitor
| visitors | images | audio delivery | video delivery | total variable |
|---------------------|----------|----------------|----------------|----------------|
| 1,000 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$0 |
| 10,000 | ~$3 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$3 |
| 50,000 | ~$15 | ~$5 | ~$11 | ~$31 |
| 100,000 | ~$30 | ~$17 | ~$35 | ~$82 |
| 250,000 | ~$75 | ~$53 | ~$107 | ~$235 |
| 500,000 | ~$150 | ~$113 | ~$227 | ~$490 |
| 1,000,000 | ~$300 | ~$233 | ~$467 | ~$1,000 |
| 10,000,000 | ~$3,000 | ~$2,393 | ~$4,787 | ~$10,180 |
| one hundred million | ~$30,000 | ~$23,993 | ~$47,987 | ~$101,980 |
image hosting
~$0.0003 per visitor
recipe images, step photos, and posters load for every visitor
stored in Cloudflare R2
Cloudflare generates smaller variants on-the-fly at their CDN nodes
the original large file is stored once; visitors receive only the size they need
this keeps bandwidth and cost low without manual thumbnail work
audio delivery
~$0.00008/min
free for first ~28,000 visitors/month (within Mux's 100K free delivery minutes)
after free tier: scales with listens
audio-only streams cost ~1/10th of video per minute
assumes ~15% of visitors listen, ~1 track, ~20 min average
most tracks get only a handful of plays; popular tracks carry the delivery cost
video delivery
~$0.0008/min
free for first ~28,000 visitors/month (shared free tier with audio)
after free tier: scales with views
assumes ~30% of visitors watch, ~2 short clips per recipe view
videos are linked/popped-out, not inline, for steps that need clarification
video count is capped at ~2 per recipe and does not grow over time
##### combined variable: ~$0.00102 per visitor at scale
~$0.0003 (images) + ~$0.00024 (audio) + ~$0.00048 (video)
below ~28K visitors: only images cost money; audio and video delivery are free
#### Total cost at scale
fixed: ~$90.95/month (includes Mux storage)
variable: ~$0.00102 per visitor (after ~28K free visitors)
total = fixed + image delivery + audio delivery + video delivery
| visitors | fixed | images | audio delivery | video delivery | total |
|------------------------------|-------|----------|----------------|----------------|-----------|
| 1,000 | ~$91 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$91 |
| 10,000 | ~$91 | ~$3 | ~$0 | ~$0 | ~$94 |
| 50,000 | ~$91 | ~$15 | ~$5 | ~$11 | ~$122 |
| 100,000 | ~$91 | ~$30 | ~$17 | ~$35 | ~$173 |
| 250,000 | ~$91 | ~$75 | ~$53 | ~$107 | ~$326 |
| 500,000 | ~$91 | ~$150 | ~$113 | ~$227 | ~$581 |
| 1,000,000 | ~$91 | ~$300 | ~$233 | ~$467 | ~$1,091 |
| 10,000,000 | ~$91 | ~$3,000 | ~$2,393 | ~$4,787 | ~$10,271 |
| one hundred million | ~$91 | ~$30,000 | ~$23,993 | ~$47,987 | ~$102,071 |
if costs ever spike unexpectedly
→ point people to creators hosting full videos on traditional platforms
→ or restrict webms to $1/month supporters
→ audio and recipe text always remain free
### Revenue
with costs low, a small optional revenue stream is enough to create surplus
~1% of visitors pay $1 to unlock high-resolution 720p video and higher-bitrate audio
this is purely optional; all content remains free at lower resolution
revenue = $0.01 × visitors per month
one-time encoding cost: $12.50 (covered by first 13 paying visitors)
profit after encoding is surplus for projects like the undercurrent
| visitors | monthly revenue | yearly revenue |
|-------------|-----------------|----------------|
| 1,000 | ~$10 | ~$120 |
| 10,000 | ~$100 | ~$1,200 |
| 50,000 | ~$500 | ~$6,000 |
| 100,000 | ~$1,000 | ~$12,000 |
| 250,000 | ~$2,500 | ~$30,000 |
| 500,000 | ~$5,000 | ~$60,000 |
| 1,000,000 | ~$10,000 | ~$120,000 |
| 10,000,000 | ~$100,000 | ~$1,200,000 |
| 100,000,000 | ~$1,000,000 | ~$12,000,000 |
### Potential revenue avenues
but these are all optional
#### Recipe Book
cheap paperback and premium hardcopy + free PDF
print-at-cost with small optional margin
acts as outreach, not monetisation
keeps the ethos clean
#### Global Wellness Retreat Network
a calm, optional revenue layer
separate from addiction cessation
for people who want a healthy, grounded environment after quitting
or simply people drawn to wellness, good food, sunlight, and routine
model
partner globally with:
Easyway
Jason Vale (juicing / detox retreats)
Perfect Health Diet (they have run retreats before)
independent wellness hosts
small centres already offering sauna / ice bath / nature setups
PF provides:
standards
a calm curriculum
recipe structure
mealtime patterns
light health foundations (PHD)
local hosts provide:
venue, facilities, pricing tier
local staff, kitchens, and culture
extras (sauna, cold plunge, simple movement, journalling, nature walks)
purpose
creates a global network of places where:
people who've quit addictions can stabilise in a healthy environment
people interested in wellness can meet each other
shared routines reinforce good habits
food is simple, cheap, PHD-aligned, and universally accessible
culture is calm and human rather than performative
this fills the "missing middle"
between:
free cessation materials (quit smoking, porn, alcohol, sugar, etc.)
and:
living a stable, connected, healthy life afterwards
it gives people a safe place to deepen recovery or simply recharge
how it scales
PF creates:
• a retreat template
• a short host-course ("how to run a reasonable retreat")
• checklists for food, schedule, pacing, safety
• simple certification: "meets Reasonable standard"
hosts anywhere in the world can:
• apply
• run the standard model
• set their own price tiers
• offer whatever extras they want (open-ended)
PF earns:
• small licensing / standardisation fee per retreat
• optional revenue share if hosts prefer simplicity
• affiliate income when recommending trusted retreat centres
for participants
they pay for:
healthy food, accommodation, calm structure, community
plus any local amenities
they know:
the menu is cheap but good
the environment is grounded
the ethos is not performative wellness
value alignment
Easyway / Jason Vale already run "feel better, live better" retreats
Perfect Health Diet has strong credibility and a healing framework
Reasonable.Diet adds:
cheap, sustainable meals
calm planning
a universal template
a global network
together these create:
a genuinely healthy alternative to expensive, aesthetic-driven wellness retreats
long-term
hosts can be anywhere:
Thailand, Bali, Portugal, regional Australia, Goa, Mexico
reasonable.diet lists them on the site
participants browse by:
budget, vibe, location, facilities
global network grows without centralising operations
retreats create:
real-world presence
community around food and health
the "post-cessation, living well" layer