[delecti]

A 400 calorie bottle of Soylent has 9g of sugar, a 181 calorie bottle of Slimfast has 18g of sugar. That's 4 times as much sugar per calorie. Similarly, a 220 calorie bottle of Ensure has 15g of sugar, about 3 times as much per calorie. Cynically, Slimfast is for people trying to convince themselves that they're being healthy and losing weight, and Ensure is for people who have to stay hydrated while suffering from diarrhea. It's hardly a surprise why they hasn't caught on with the HN crowd as meal replacements like Soylent has: they're not made for it.

The spin of the marketing is almost certainly part of it, Soylent being marketed as "don't bother stepping away from that super important coding problem, just have some soylent," but it's also the first marketed (non-medical) product that really aims to be nutritionally complete and balanced. There are certainly criticisms you could levy at Soylent WRT whether they've succeeded at that goal, but at least it's their goal.