@gwsmallwood The Leather scent is not my favorite either (it's the only thing we make that I don't like), but my husband loves it! It is definitely one of those "you either love it or hate it" scents. And yes, it makes the whole house smell like leather. lots and lots of leather. Recommendations? Should we lessen the amount of fragrance we use? Get rid of the tobacco leaf?
I thought both were fine. I like that the scent is strong, and I definitely got more leather than tobacco. Like I said, I may keep it around to use when my wife isn't home.
I received my Barber Shoppe soap and Shaving Oil today! Thank you so much Amanda!! Right out of the tin the soap smells fantastic! Classic Barber Shoppe. I'll be using both products tomorrow and Monday for my face and head shave, and then exclusively for my head shaves for the next week or more. I'm very interested in trying the Shaving Oil as a standalone product on my head. Stay tuned! Kerry
Last Monday I was gifted the Bay Rum shave soap from the Soap Exchange! It came shipped safely in a box with packing peanuts, a card, a letter and an old fashioned tin of the soap. The lid was held on securely with electricians tape. I’ll try and break this up into sections. 1. Scent - Its sweet like licorice with just the slightest hint of a spice. I’ve never used a Bay Rum product before but if this is what Bay Rum tends to smell like, I’d buy it again. It isn’t overly strong and it doesn’t surround your face after your shave. Every now and then you may get a small smell but it’s so faint and pleasant that I couldn’t imagine it being a bother. It tends to be stronger as a puck than as a lather which is the opposite of other soaps I’ve used and this to me, is a good thing! 2. Lather - This is the first Tallow based shaving soap I’ve used and I have to say, I think I prefer tallow soaps. I soaked my brush in hot water for a few minutes, shook out the excess and lathered up the brush. The first time I applied directly to my face. It has a cooling effect which is nice and the lather goes on very even. It was a little paste-feeling the first pass so I added about three drops of water from my fingers and it cleared it right up. I usually don’t face lather, but I’d say this soap is very easy to face lather with. My next shave I did bowl lather and I was surprised at how well the soap held up when adding a lot of water. It gets a very pearly wet look to it and is very slick but it goes on with a lot of cushion and doesn’t run off your face. I’ve heard that compared to glycerin soaps (Van Der Hagen), tallow soaps are finicky with water. I didn’t find this to be the case with this soap. I didn’t drown it in water but I wouldn’t drown VDH either. It doesn’t take a bunch of water to get a nice wet lather and here is the best part… If you like dryer lathers, this soap is still plenty slick and leaves enough behind to touch up on your face. Sure, you may get some soap stuck in your DE but its still very comfortable to shave with as a drier lather! It doesn’t seem to dry out quickly when the lather is plenty wet. I don’t shave like a sloth and I’m assuming that any lather will dry out if you let it set on your face for over ten minutes. I took my time on one pass, and found the lather to be plenty wet even after six or so minutes. It doesn’t dissipate either! In fact, the only time I’ve gotten this lather to fade is by adding too much water. 3. Packaging - It’s a nice tin soap container with a Soap Exchange label. The scent is written in pen, or at least it looks that way and I find it to be a nice homemade touch. The puck itself is 4.5 oz and it fits in the container fairly snug and reaches the top. The lid comes off easy without needing to pull and tug and I found there to be enough breathing room that the soap dries itself fairly quickly even with the lid on. This review probably isn’t great and I may have missed a few points but I will say this. for 10 dollars this soap is pretty much a steal in my opinion. It lathers easy, smells great and is very very slick. It works great with a DE and I’m sure could very well be a favorite among straight shavers. I would buy it again and I highly recommend you to try it out!
Most of the gentlemen above have covered the details. I can say it easily produces thick lather or thinner one (depending upon water mixture) that provides good slickness. Example, my first two passes can be made thicker for more cushion, but the lather can be thinned down for the last pass so that you can see missed areas without compromising slickness and effectiveness. This soap is a solid addition to the den. Thank you Amanda, I think you have hit on a winner with this formula.
Here are my two shaves from today, the first one is what I used on my face, second was head. I'm not typically a shaving oil user but I did find this beneficial. On the back its suggested that it can be used as a standalone product, I'll give it a try on my head in the coming days. The Barber Shoppe scent is fantastic! I'll have more comments after a few more uses. Thank you Amanda!
What difference does it make whether or not a soap has tallow, so long as the soap works well? Tallow alone is no guarantee of a good shaving soap.
Just guessing that you might want to try one with half the levels of each fragrance and see if that works leaving the mix of the fragrances the same. Sometimes less is more.
Put it this way: All of my favorite soaps have tallow. Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not. My least favorite has tallow (Williams). But given the chance to buy a soap, one with tallow and one without; I'll pick the one with tallow. If the Exchanges blind test is ligit, then I'm not alone in my preference
A lot of shaving soap makers prefer to use tallow. It is composed primarily of stearate triglycerides (stéar means tallow in Greek). Stearic acid is 18 carbons long and fully saturated which allows the molecules to take on a linear conformation, so they pack closely together. This also makes it solid at room temperature. Plant based oils are usually unsaturated and this can give them U-shaped forms that make them less capable of packing close together, and they are more likely to be liquid at RT. The longer carbon chain (18 versus 6-10 in most plant derived lipids) means it can be mixed with more additives and still keep it's solid form. Because of these properties you will notice even vegan soaps add vegetable derived stearates to their formulae. Many will also use palm oil because it is high in stearate.
I'm a newbie but here you go. I had a great shave today slowly moving the blade up to a 5 I lathered up the Blue Water put some of the shaving oil on my face and went to town. I am really liking The Soap Exchange product. It lathers up easily and has a nice pleasant smell ( though I wish it was a little stronger smelling) PMing Amanda she says menthol will be available mid September. I will purchase this when I need more. Great product.
It's so odd that you mention licorice! There is absolutely no Anise (black licorice) in the fragrance I make, yet some people say they smell it in there. Just goes to show you not only how subjective scent is, but how very different some things smell to others -Amanda
I agree, Amanda. I don't smell any licorice at all. If I did, I wouldn't get within 10 feet of the stuff. Instead, I smell one of the very few Bay Rums that I really like.
Amanda, Would you consider making a custom scent? I found some hair products made by some brothers in Bedford, TX and really want to make a shaving soap with this scent. I'm also in Ft. Worth, so I look forward to getting the chance to smell the new scents in person.