Actually I see more and more growers starting to use powdered nutrients. Lots of people moving over to products like Jacks. I've been using powdered nutrients for years. Before that I did use bottled nutes. GH 3 part and then Botanicare PBP. The GH worked just fine but that sludgy micro they have mucked up my reservoirs and such. I also used the PBP for a couple of grows and while it worked just fine it was too damn expensive. I live close to American Agriculture which is the oldest hydro shop in Portland and was where I get my coco and other supplies. They have their own line called VitaGrow which is powdered nutrients. I was in there one day years ago talking about how expensive the bottled nutes were and one of the guys suggested I try their inhouse nutrients. I was skeptical at first but gave it a shot as they were a fraction of the cost of bottled nutrients.
Fast forward a few months, I had the best grow I ever had in my life, my equipment stayed nice and clean, and I spent at most 20% of what I had been spending on nutrients. I've been using VitaGrow ever since. It's similar to Jacks just with a slightly different NPK. I'm lazy too but when it comes to money I'm not. Anyway, that's my story about powdered nutrients. Not that it has any relevence to anything.
