What is the status concerning "Shaveapocalypse"?

Yeah, if i order one of the russian ones, i will order that. But i 've read too many people saying it's sharper than Astra and i don't want sharper. I am pretty sure at the end i will order something like 400 Personna Reds and be done with it. I prefer a safer shave with more passes, than a riskier shave with less. I have enough "risky" blades already (i know i must be very careful with Astra and Dorco). I want one more "safer" and the Personnas felt very safe. Tried Treet Platinum this morning. The shave result was very good, but the shaving experience was rather bad. It reminded me of a kind of hybrid between Derby and Super Max Super Stainless, but in a bad way. While it was medium sharpness, it felt less smooth than the Supermax and got 0 weeper in an "easy" location. It kind of felt a bit rougher than i expected...Maybe i was just in a bad day, i will have to try again with another one. Another reason i don't want the very sharp ones, is because i also think of the DE89, which is more aggressive. Ah! I found out that the Swedish guy CAN do shipments with tracking "if you buy big quantities". This i must investigate further, as to how much big, is exactly that. Although it's still more hassle waiting for a pack to cross practically the entire continent. Anyway, i find most plausible that i will order Personnas at some point and who knows, maybe when i will be pensioner, too dumb for computers and too old for my other hobbies, i will see shaving as my last remaining hobby and start suddenly making it my only moneysinker and i will order a mass amount of Gilettes...

But, you are right. At least for now, i must keep trying what i have. I don't think Croma will enchant me, but Dorco Prime might, since i was wowed by Dorco ST301. Thanks for all the advice and tips.

Ah! A Weishi CL made its appearance again in Amazon, but most interestingly. all kind of Weishis suddenly appeared under the name of "QShave" too. Weishapocalypse avverted. This doesn't mean that i am not glad to have 2 more Weishis coming in as spares and i will actually buy yet a 3rd EJ DE89, just in case. Today, i made an experiment to see again the blade misalignment and i dropped the zamak head. Nothing broke, but i realized that better have 2 spares for the EJ DE89 too. And since the "lesser, smooth handle" models are currently in discount, at 16 EUR, i may as well buy one more, so to have 3 Weishis and 3 DE89s.

I am not so worried about the disappearance of soaps or brushes, as i am about the increasing difficulty to find blades here. Already the situation is pretty dire, down to 2 local shops.

 

Oh, if that's the concern I hear ya. I have never been able to buy blades or decent blades retail. I've had to order online since day one. Even if large companies that produce blades(Gillette) stop making blades, I think you'll start seeing "artisan" or " little man" blade production to fill the demand. I just wonder what the lag time will be. And what the cost will be due to small batch production.

 

Unfortunately, I don't think that it'll ever be an artisan production. It requires too much equipment. Even if you didn't run it through the cryogenic process, you have to take the original ribbon of steel, stamp it, grind it, print it, bake it, coat it, snap it, wash it, and package it. It requires at least a small factory - but not that much in the way of manpower.

 

Oh - I would like to find a factory that would do custom printing of blades, like they did 50 years ago. "Marlin Repeating Rifles", and so forth. Sure beats matchbooks.

 

You don't think somebody like Stan at ATT or Douglas at PAA would pickup old specs from 2 or 3 of the most popular blades and run with it?
And if it does take a small factory some kind of joint venture between two such folks might bring it to pass?
I don't know what all it involves. I have seen that when there is a demand someone will eventually fill it if they can make a profit; which is my concern about cost.

 

That's the entire business model of Gillette owned AoS. Those stores exist to keep people in the cart ecosystem. Go in and play ignorant, they will lead you to carts.

 

I'm just saying it wouldn't be an artisan type product. It's an industrial process, which is the opposite of an artisan product.

 

10/4. I gotcha. And btw I don't mean to be confrontational. I speak directly and it doesn't translate well in mediums without tone or body language.

 

I run a manufacturing plant. This is very accurate. The cost of entry in true manufacturing companies would blow people's minds. Having said that, despite Gillette's first world market dominance, DEs are still more popular in the rest of the world (i.e among the majority of world population), and there will always be someone willing to invest to serve that enormous market. If a few plants go away, sales volumes and margins go up for everyone else, so there is no real scenario where this happens in our lifetime. None. The "shaveapocolypse" is fiction. Like Y2K or the zombie apocalypse it makes a great story that's fun to talk about, but it's just that... a story.

 

I don't think the cost of entry to a blade manufacturing plant would be insurmountable, or blow someone's mind. Having watched the video on youtube on 'how blade are made', it seems like a rather simple line. Probably require about 5000 SF of floor, and half a mil or so of machinery.

 

I hate to disagree, but I've spent my whole life running manufacturing companies and have been in literally hundreds of plants of many different types both nationally and internationslly. Many of my closest friends also run manufacturing operations too. We often talk amongst ourselves about how the average person doesn't have any concept of how much it would cost to start up even a simple manufacturing operation (not an assembly or machining operation) that actually develops, manufactures and sells a good quality product and meets all appropriate regulations, product liability insurance requirements, distribution network development, paying payroll and building inventory before selling, hiring a sales force to sell it, etc. etc. etc. Universally we have the discussion that when we use real life examples with real numbers we've actually looked at, people always think we have lost our minds or are making it up. Based on previous life experience I know I have no ability to convince you otherwise, but trust me, half a million doesn't get you anywhere close to starting up a manufacturing plant that has any chance of survival. I'm not trying to be rude or appear arrogant, as there are a lot of things I don't know much about, but I eat, breathe and sleep manufacturing and look at plant p&ls on a daily basis.

 

I was talking about the _plant_. That's it. No ongoing expenses. No staffing, no marketing, no sales, nada. I have some small idea of the costs of large scale metalworking equipment. If you asked me how much to put together a plastics factory, I wouldn't have a bloody clue. Even the metalworking equipment I'm familiar with is of the order of 'bend it, stamp it, break it', not drop forging, casting, milling, or assembly. My experience with casting is limited to sand and nothing that takes more heat than aluminum (Well, and my aunt's pottery kiln. Of which I know it gets hot and bakes the clay. )

One thing that a lot of people do seem to forget is that this is NOT new process production. This process was apparently invented in the early 1900s using purely mechanical production. The only thing 'new' that happened was when the coatings were added. Even changing metals wasn't really new - just a new metal. The development is done - as long as you're willing to replicate what's already there.

I have a customer that takes huge rolls of steel, runs them through very heavy, very expensive equipment, and turns them into sheets - and narrow rolls of steel. That narrow roll of steel would be sold to a razor maker - because unless you're BIG (like Gillette was at their heyday), you wouldn't want to invest in that machine. Let me see if I remember the process from the Merkur? video. it had to be a very long production line, because the razors weren't cut off of the strip until near the end. (Better yet - just watch the video). None of those machines _have_ to be very large for a single line. If you try to do a lot of lines, then things go up like crazy. I think the most complicated single machine is the packager. (My father worked on designs for a bag taping machine. Interesting project)

So, rather than looking at it from the perspective of building an entirely new kind of plant, I was looking at it from the perspective of "Hey, all this stuff is already out there." I shudder to think at what it takes to put together an electronics fab plant, even just for prototyping. (semiconductor class).

 

I get what you are saying, but cost of entry includes way more than floor space and equipment. If you are making sharp blades and don't include the cost of a multi million dollar product liability policy as a necessary startup cost, that illustrates the point I was trying to make. We haven't even mentioned that you have to have a duplicate spare parts for every part on every piece of specialized equipment unless you can afford to shut down production, short customer orders, and go out of business waiting for the right part to get here from Germany or Japan. Along with about 50 other things we haven't discussed that are real start up costs required to start up a real manufacturing business with a real chance of succeeding.
People imagine that starting a small regional ice cream plant is relatively inexpensive too. The plant needs minimal square footage, with some machines and a freezer. That couldn't cost more than a million or two, at the most, right? Try 30. Not kidding. Real number that is on the low side and is discounted as a "brown field" real estate purchase (existing plant upgraded to current codes and regs). That's plant only. It's exponentially more expensive to start a manufacturing business nowadays than people imagine. It wasn't that way 50 or even 20 years ago. It is now. It's hard for people to wrap their head around.
In a somewhat unreated note, what I enjoy most about these forums is it is devoid of debates like this could escalate into. Let's agree to disagree and be friends who pif each other stuff, give each other Shave advice and make each other laugh. Honestly, do either of us really care what the hypothetical cost of a hypothetical company during a nonexisistent fictinal apocolyptic scenario is? I know I don't. I have a proposal: PM me your address and I'll PIF you a couple cream samples and we'll talk about what you liked and what you didn't, and end up being friends who may not agree on the minimum startup costs of a factory, but are really glad we met on this forum. Deal?

Edit: there is a reason I should not post on shave forums when battling insomnia and reading posts at 2:30 in the morning. @Bookworm, your posts were much more reasonable, well thought out and polite than my mind enterpreted them last night. In contrast, mine were a bit more abrasive than intended, making me come off a bit like an arrogant ass. My bad, sir. (I also realizing we're not so much on different pages here, we're just talking about different things.) However, I still enthusiastically stand behind what I said about the shave cream PIF! Awaiting your inbound PM.

 

No, you don't understand. Here there are only 2 local ONLINE shops left. The italian Amazon only sells Dorco and Vidyut SuperMax SuperStainless directly. I gave links in my previous posts. I simply don't want in 5 years from now, having to order blades from Bulgaria or Poland by mail, like many other Italians already do to find good prices. This is the only italian wetshaving forum i 've found. This is their section for useful online shop links:

http://ilrasoio.com/viewforum.php?f=64&sid=dbe2c1448ed6bdd83737b720bc697623

As you see:
- EBay is 1st link (Nothing locally. you are looking to international shipments without tracking usually. Those from outside EU are probably aggravated by customs tax too, as i read in Ebay terms. Hence why most try to buy from Poland or Bulgaria that are in the EU).
- Preattoni is italian, but without blades (he has soaps etc).
- RazorBladesClub is in Sweden.
- Yourshaving.com is spanish.
- Gifts and Care is spanish.
- Bestshave.net is turkish and appears shut down, some say probably because their goverment has blocked Paypal there.
- Businkaolya is russian ebay seller.
- Soloestetica is the one of the 2 remaining italian shops that sells blades. It has simply detached the male departmet and renamed it into "barbaebaffi.it" , which i posted previously. Soloestetica now continues purely as women's website.
The only other italian remaining blades online shop, is the one i order from, the "Barbers united" , which also sells in english as i found out yesterday, under the name "shavingworld", but the blades selection, is limited:

https://www.rasoigoodfellas.com/categoria-prodotto/lamette-da-barba-box/

I may as well buy blades while there are still local online shops. Because i will be feeling a moron, if i will have to pay double or triple the price in the future, to get blades from USA (as it already happens with Shark Super Chrome) or from Russia paying shipping with no tracking and customs import fees.

The local blade market, is based only on "barbaebaffi" and "Barbieri Uniti" (aka rasoigoodfellas). That's Bladeapocalypse minus 2 for me. Blades don't degrade, so why not stash them up? Already the Gilette blades, are available only in barbaebaffi and at prices starting at almost twice the money compared to the guy in Sweden. I may actually make a big order from the guy in Sweden after some months, assuming he can use an express courrier (like DHL) to make the shipment and that he can leave the tucks inside their boxes. Because he has the policy of stripping the tucks from the original box. Which i hate, cause it will be an ugly mess to have dozens of tucks lying around, without knowing easily how many you have left etc.

Like i said yesterday, i went to a neighbourhood shop and noticed they had 2 last tubes of Proraso cream, blue and red at just 1.90 (probably forgotten in time) and i grabbed both. I went to the cashier and the woman there told me "anything else monsieur?". The "Monsieur" , was a frenchism to make a laugh with me, because i was buying their last wetshaving supplies and so i had to be the "weirdo" dandy... They also have zero DE blades (i looked).

That's how bad things are. Another thing that has impressed me, is that nobody here sells Parker Variant. Not even through Ebay. Not that i had it in program, but someone in the forum told me "get over with it and buy an adjustable", so out of curiocity i went to the best price searching machine of the country and there is nothing. I search the local Amazon, nothing. I search EBay, nothing. I don't think wetshaving has a rebirth here at all... I hope this changes, but right now, when your own (and only) shaving forum has more foreign providers than locals and has made conventions with UK, Irish and Spanish shops to give discount codes to its italian members, i 'd say the situation doesn't look good.

 

IMO Shaveapocalypse = Self justification to purchase more stuff.
Nothing wrong with that, but for me I don't foresee anything in my lifetime in the next 40 years (hopefully) becoming impossible to acquire.
I can see where blades (DE) MAY become harder to find but not likely.
There's Zillions of estate razors, new companies making razors, brushes and more soap introduced daily it seems.
I'm content with what I have now, several pucks of soap I enjoy (MWF, Tabac and L'Occitane Cade bought years ago).
I know I am odd man out, not a collector. I started out that way, but pumped the brakes and downsized a while ago and only have what works best for me.
It's not even a hobby anymore, just an enjoyable, cost efficient method of removing facial hair.
For the other 99% of the folks here, more power to you and as far as hobbies go, a cheap one. Ask someone who collects guitars or guns.
For me, my hobby is pipes and baccy. Now there is a hobby facing issues. But I'm set there as well, I have enough of pipes and baccy to last the rest of my life.

 

Wow, Fu! I had no idea that Italy was such a DE shaving wasteland. Given how many classic shaving products come from Italy, that's surprising. Now I understand why you are amassing enough blades to last the next two lifetimes .

 

I had no idea either, because i was never looking for blades. If i make an agreement with the guy in Sweden about reasonable shipping costs using an express courier with tracking, i will make a mega order from him, something in the order of 600-800 blades and be done with it. Blind purchase of 100packs of Indian Gilettes, Rapiras and Supermax mainly. If i don't like some, i don't care. I hate international packages, i must make one and for all buy from him. Otherwise, i will just get some hundreds of Personna Reds.

Yes, we have soaps and brushes, but apparently, we export more than we use. About blades, i found this yesterday, which i think explains the situation pretty well:

https://www.badgerandblade.com/forum/threads/buying-de-blades-while-in-italy.471811/

^ Consider that i don't live downtown, but currently, in my zone, 2 local supermarkets and 1 store with housecleaning supplies/soaps/shampoos and stuff like that, have currently 0 shaving brushes and 0 shaving creams, because *i* bought them all. When i say "all", i mean: 2 Proraso blue creams, 1 Proraso Red cream, 1 Proraso boar brush. That's it. They 're still out of stock and God knows when they will restock. Oh, but if you search for Proraso Aftershaves, you can find them easily, since cartridge shavers use them too. Same if you search Proraso canned foam. Oh, one of the supermarkets has a few Proraso green tubs, but only because i didn't take them (i don't like Vicks Vaporub scent).

What he says about Bolzano blades is true. It's a city in NE Italy, but the blades are german. This is a list of italian razor and blades brands throughout the history:

http://www.ilrasoio.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=2164

I think only Fatip exists today and no blade. Oh and Figaro, but makes plastic cartridges and shaving foam AFAIK. I think the list of what was and what is today, speaks for itself.

 

I edited my post above with apologies to @Bookworm above. On the off chance that some insane insomniac actually read my post before I edited it, feel free to review it again, as the addition at the end is much more important than anything I said in the original post. Cheers!

 

You know that the solution is right? The straight razor! Cmon Fu, you know you are straight curious!

 

My reply will be very short, but clear: