DE shaving, as said above, is purely a tiny, niche market. For example, the ONLY store in our area that even carries a DE razor is a beauty supply that caters to licensed cosmetologists only. Not sure why but they carry a cheap ($12) DE razor, and also carry Derby and Personna blades. The point is that wet shaving in general may be growing, but it's microscopic in the scheme of things. I elec shaved for 30+ years, like my dad. then I shaved with a cartridge for 1 month. With both methods my shaves were adequate, but my face ALWAYS hurt. With my DE razor, barely any discomfort. What I'm saying is that its a personal choice and that always means a tiny market.
World Trend back to DE Shaving?
- Thread starter DoctorShavegood
- Start date
Like someone said, most guys don't want to take the time. I'm guilty of this myself. Most of my life I used an electric razor. I knew I preferred wet shaving but just didn't want to take the time to do it. Then after I retired and I found B&B and haven't used my electric since.
- Thread starter
- #63
What would Don Draper do? We all know he would say,"you need a marketing plan, a slogan, and ad that says you want to DE shave but you didn't know you wanted to DE shave until I told you you wanted to DE shave." For that matter any marketing plan. The DE is not marketed, advertised or commercialized. No one out there knows it exists(except for chaps here...love ya Bros).
So when the guys go looking at the Fusion carts in the drugstores or hypermarkets (in Europe) as mentioned earlier, they do not see the own brand or branded DE blades, the Palmolive stick and maybe cream, the Wilkinson Sword Blue bowl and bristle brush? Entry level products are not exactly great, but they are not jumping at T&H, Penhaligons, Floris etc either...
AOS, êShave, AdP, and Molton Brown have made shaving upmarket and possibly aspirational but it's expensive compared to a Fusion and shaving gel and niche just like the Jermyn Street crowd..
Mühle, Merkur, and E Jaggers are not exactly inexpensive for a test run either...
Last edited:
I think the traditional soaps and creams and brushes are there, because they are bought by the generations who started shaving before the nineties.
Everything happens later in Europa; I think canned gels and foams did only really catch on after 1990 or something?
But traditional shaving is dying here as well. I cannot buy even half of the stuff I could before in the supermarket. My generation might be the last who was taught wet shaving by their dads, and who thought it was the normal way to shave.
Canned shaving foam has been in the UK since the 1950's, shaving gel is a more recent introduction. A certain niche consumer has been buying traditional products since the 80's,
stores such as Crabtree & Evelynn, L'Occitane, Body Shop selling various products.
The Netherlands as with the UK has basic entry products - De Vergulde Hand etc. Very few stores carry traditional shaving items, as in the UK, for example in Holland I visited stores in Breukelen, Leiden and in Amsterdam's Nine Streets. My local Etos did stock Gold Dachs.
I think there's a growing portion of the population that understands the fact that "newer" isn't always "better." I think that they realize that they get better results with less waste. That segment, sadly, probably isn't growing fast enough.
The thread title is World trend back to DE shaving, a small increase in the niche segment in the developed world will not have any effect on the DE market as India, China, South East Asia move to cheap cartridge razors. I imagine China dumps hundreds of millions of disposables in Africa.
I've never been further than Eastern Europe, but there it's all cartridges as well, nowadays. I bet that Russia will be no different, not even in the remote areas.
I don't know if canned foam already was widely available in the Netherlands in the 70's and (early) 80's. Bad memory. But I do know that the supermarkets sold Omega brushes, at least three brands of soap, and two or more brands of DE blades.
None of this is available anymore now, apart from DVH and Palmolive, and cheap China made brushes. And loads of canned products.
That is a cartridge land too.
Which is for some an advantage....
Twenty five percent of the cost of a pack of Contour Plus carts...
But I can choose any one of my ten original Atra's/Contour's...
Wow...well said Doctor, right on the mark! The poor slobs don't know the WANT to wet shave.
"hated the introduction of that slime strip. It made the carts worse, imho."
Amen. I used to keep my cart in the shower, and I would look at that strip and think, "What bacteria is growing on you today?". I don't miss cart shaving at all. There will always be a small portion of shavers that want something better. This practice is kept alive by us for the next group that comes along.
Amen. I used to keep my cart in the shower, and I would look at that strip and think, "What bacteria is growing on you today?". I don't miss cart shaving at all. There will always be a small portion of shavers that want something better. This practice is kept alive by us for the next group that comes along.
Most men in India and all parts of Asia are still shaving with DE razors where the manufacturing plants are, even though cartridge razors are marketed to them.
Have you not seen the sales figures quoted for the Gillette Guard? It's capturing the hearts of Indian shavers....
I believe have seen this one before, Gillette guard is made completely from plastic - My Indian buddy never uses DE razor at all, strangely.
Last edited by a moderator:
i live in denmark in europe and no know i know is de shaving or has ever talkede about it... none of the razors, soaps, brushes etc can be bought in stores here - only way is on the internet. Like some of of you have said, men dont have the time for de shaving today, hell, they hardly have time to shave, let alone spending 3 times or more for a shave... And NOBODY is gonna beat Gilette, they are the kings and nothing is ever gonna change that... Sad but true...
