This should be a New Year's resolution for many shavers here. In my time here, one piece of advice can be dispensed pretty much without even thinking when someone talks about struggling with a soap or cream...."more". Use more product, use more water, and work the lather more. It works pretty much every time. I know this is nothing revolutionary...people give this advice around here all the time. But I don't think people take the advice often enough.
There is still the persistent contest to see how fast people can load a soap. It is like there is a pretty yellow ribbon for who can load a soap the fastest or with the fewest swirls or use the smallest amount of cream. "I load for 8 seconds and get enough for 10 passes." "Oh year, well I load for 6 seconds and get enough for 12 passes." Odds are both of these folks are either exaggerating or getting lousy lather...or both.
At the end of the day how long you load is largely irrelevant. It just matters how much product you actually load. A feather soft Kent will load slower than a dense, short-lofted boar. If you gently load the Kent for a minute and aggressively load the boar for 15 seconds and both load 1 gram, that is all that matters. The idea that you can load virtually no product and get a decent lather is foolish.
Creams and soaps are cheap. The majority of people here have too many anyway (myself included). In 2014, let's all use more product.
There is still the persistent contest to see how fast people can load a soap. It is like there is a pretty yellow ribbon for who can load a soap the fastest or with the fewest swirls or use the smallest amount of cream. "I load for 8 seconds and get enough for 10 passes." "Oh year, well I load for 6 seconds and get enough for 12 passes." Odds are both of these folks are either exaggerating or getting lousy lather...or both.
At the end of the day how long you load is largely irrelevant. It just matters how much product you actually load. A feather soft Kent will load slower than a dense, short-lofted boar. If you gently load the Kent for a minute and aggressively load the boar for 15 seconds and both load 1 gram, that is all that matters. The idea that you can load virtually no product and get a decent lather is foolish.
Creams and soaps are cheap. The majority of people here have too many anyway (myself included). In 2014, let's all use more product.