Unbelievable

[churchilllafemme]

50 of the Personna 74 blades just sold on the auction site for $273!

[mmack66]

Did I overpay or something?

[tsv]

If you get 40 shaves per blade, that's 2,000 shaves. So it's only 14 cents a shave. Try that with the latest Gillette Cart.

[BroJohn]

50 of the Personna 74 blades just sold on the auction site for $273!

Holy cow!! Well, if this is the going rate for these blades, then my personal net-worth just increased.

I like'em but there's no way that these blades are worth that kind of money.

-- John Gehman

[churchilllafemme]

If you get 40 shaves per blade, that's 2,000 shaves. So it's only 14 cents a shave. Try that with the latest Gillette Cart.

Forty shave per blade?? Really?

[ouch]

That's ridiculous.

(Both the auction price and the claim of 40 shaves per blade.)

[Marcoparis]

That's ridiculous.

(Both the auction price and the claim of 40 shaves per blade.)

Best I did is 10 shaves per blade (3 passes)

[GreekGuy]

That's ridiculous.

(Both the auction price and the claim of 40 shaves per blade.)

+1 no disposable blade is worth that kind of money. It may be good, but no blade is really THAT good, even if it shaved for you. Plus, I don't know who could get 40 shaves out of a blade. I find 10 to be ridiculously high as well, but 40?

[Scott0079]

One born every minute.

[michiganlover]

+1 no disposable blade is worth that kind of money. It may be good, but no blade is really THAT good, even if it shaved for you. Plus, I don't know who could get 40 shaves out of a blade. I find 10 to be ridiculously high as well, but 40?

I got 18 solid shaves from a Personna 74 injector blade, and could have gotten a few more.

A normal Injector blade is good for about 10 shaves for me.

Other than increased longevity, I didn't think the blade was anything special. It feel as smooth as a regular Injector blade.

There is no way I can see these being worth $5.46 each!! That's pure craziness!!

[Arrow]

Jeez, I'm NEVER going to get to try one..........

[ouch]

There is no way I can see these being worth $5.46 each!! That's pure craziness!!

You can get a 20-pk of Pellas for less.

[mandoman]

whats the big deal about Personna 74 blades

[mharris127]

whats the big deal about Personna 74 blades

Supposedly they shave longer and smoother because of a coating on the blade. Testing on B&B shows that they do last longer, but not enough to justify $5.00 a blade!

[michiganlover]

Supposedly they shave longer and smoother because of a coating on the blade. Testing on B&B shows that they do last longer, but not enough to justify $5.00 a blade!

The Personna 74 were made of Tungsten steel. They have a titanium coating.

The company didn't make them for long, because a longer lasting blade flies against the normal method of selling razor blades (which are designed to be disposable, and wear out fairly quickly so the customer has to come back for repeat business frequently).

I have to wonder what the company was even thinking when inventing the product. If you invent a razor blade that lasts twice as long, then you effectively reduce your sales by half. It was a bad business decision anyway you slice it.

[xillion]

The Personna 74 were made of Titanium.

The blades themselves are made of Tungsten steel. 74 is the number for Tungsten on the periodic table. They do have a titanium coating.

[haiti222]

"I have to wonder what the company was even thinking when inventing the product. If you invent a razor blade that lasts twice as long, then you effectively reduce your sales by half. It was a bad business decision anyway you slice it."

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Phillip Morris owned them at the time and tried to apply their ideas of marketing and profitability they learned from cigarettes to shaving. They poured money into product development and created a huge number of innovative, quality products from 1970-74 or so:

Personna 74 (Tungsten Blade with Titanium Coating)
Face Guard (Still sold for hospital use today)
Double II (bonded DE-like twin blade cartridge)
Injector II - Twin Blade Injector
Floating Head Injector Razor
Flickr- For Women Rotating Blade system


Unfortunately, only the Flickr was a big success. Despite lab tests and Consumer Reports heralding the quality of their products (which PM hoped would build market share, loyalty, and a willingness to pay high prices) ASR did not gain much market share.

By 1976, ASR was using much of its capacity to build blades for the popular BIC disposables. Philip Morris, having failed in its goals, then tried to sell ASR to BIC. The sale fell through, so there was a management buyout, including a low interest government loan to keep the plant in Virginia open. The buyout had a lot of debt, and product development and marketing ceased. The management also immediately cheapened the DE and Injector blades by stopping the titanium coating and switching to the platinum coating used in store brands. This Personna blade was still excellent (and contained Tungsten for quite a while), but quality started to slip from the late 70's for at least a decade in their Men's products, and they were primarily a store brand maker.

To answer your question directly, they felt the quality would get people to buy them over Gillette and Schick. As a much smaller competitor, they even stated in some ads that they knew they had to be much better to even get people to be willing to try them. The ad posted above was all about stimulating trial- it had both a coupon and a free blade offer. If their plan had worked, over time they may have tried to regularly increase prices (and hoped competitors would follow).

Who knows, if it worked, we might be paying $2-3 per blade for excellent DE and injector blades from all the majors, as cigarette companies fell into that lets all increase prices regularly every year pattern. Carts might have been less of the market had Personna 74 become a winner.

[michiganlover]

The blades themselves are made of Tungsten steel. 74 is the number for Tungsten on the periodic table. They do have a titanium coating.

DOH...that will teach me to post right before bed time. Original post correct for accuracy. Thanks.

To answer your question directly, they felt the quality would get people to buy them over Gillette and Schick. As a much smaller competitor, they even stated in some ads that they knew they had to be much better to even get people to be willing to try them. The ad posted above was all about stimulating trial- it had both a coupon and a free blade offer. If their plan had worked, over time they may have tried to regularly increase prices (and hoped competitors would follow).

Thanks for the thoughtful explanation. This makes perfect sense. A huge gamble though it would seem, as it would take mega advertising dollars to go from #3 to #1. Makes me wonder if they were able to patent the idea of using tungsten steel for blades. If they weren't able to do so, there would be nothing to stop Gillette, and Schick from making a similar blade.

[haiti222]

Great question! Gillette was going to use tungsten as a coating (see this 1969 patent by Fischbein, the same guy that developed how to coat blades with PTFE)....

http://www.google.com/patents?id=9z4...page&q&f=false

Also, Wilkinson mentions titanium as a second possible metallic coating in this patent (filed after the 74 was out...

http://www.google.com/patents?id=RKM...page&q&f=false


ASR's patents of the time seem to have been mainly about the blade pack design and maybe the FLICKR....

In some ways, maybe they were doing this calculation...If Gillette and Schick made their blades as long lasting as the P74, Gillette and Schick would lose more money in the blade sales dropping.

After that was kind of the dilemma Gillette was in when everyone else switched to stainless and took market share. They had to switch, but did not want to.

Instead Gillette pushed the Trac II.

[Rufust445]

If you get 40 shaves per blade, that's 2,000 shaves. So it's only 14 cents a shave. Try that with the latest Gillette Cart.

I get 4 shaves from a Dorco ST-301, and I bought 150 of them for $10.00 on eBay.

That's less than 2 cents per shave.

There's been a stock market bubble, a real estate bubble, and now maybe a DE shaving bubble, among others.