What should be next?

I'm so indecisive on my next purchases. I need ideas on what soap and aftershave to order next..

Catie's Bubbles, Dapper Dragon, Tiki (Not so sure about her scents) none appeal to me anyways, or another artisan? I stick to artisan soaps and those are the main three that I have not tried yet.

Fine, captain's choice, or another recommendation? I love Fine Platinum

I haven't tried to many of the ones you're looking at, but I have tried Tiki Bar and I find that they perform really well and smell great. If you're not too fond of the scents on her site, send Amanda an e-mail (or pm her through B&B) and see if she can make you a custom scent. Good luck!

Have a look at Stirling soaps too

I'd focus my next few purchases on shaving soaps as well. There are quite a different brand to select from so you have many options. Since soap/foam is such an integral part of shaving I'd go with some shaving soaps.

Gaines09 said:

I'm so indecisive on my next purchases. I need ideas on what soap and aftershave to order next..

Catie's Bubbles, Dapper Dragon, Tiki (Not so sure about her scents) none appeal to me anyways, or another artisan? I stick to artisan soaps and those are the main three that I have not tried yet.

Fine, captain's choice, or another recommendation? I love Fine Platinum

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Thanks for your service to our country!

On soaps, I think you're missing out not trying some of the commercial stuff - Arko, Palmolive, Tabac, etc...the list goes on. Is there a reason soaps made by small companies are preferable to you?

@gaines09, what artisan soaps do you already have and like? Are you looking for something similar, or branch out, fragrance-wise?

I have soaps from all of the artisans on your list, and they're all great. I'd say Catie's Bubbles (French style) would be the way to go. I would've said that Dapper Dragon is a great value, but they just raised their prices and (this is just my opinion, I mean no offense) I don't think the performance is commensurate with those new prices.

For other artisans not on your list, Cold River Soap Works and Strop Shoppe are definitely worth a look.

+1 for strop shoppe. HTGAM and petal pusher fancies are both worth picking up. I've also heard nothing but rave reviews for tiki.

Another vote for strop shoppe...I think the tallow soaps are excellent

I can also recommend Stirling Soap!

Any of the Barrister&Mann soaps... Great scents and terrific performers

jamesspo said:

Thanks for your service to our country!

On soaps, I think you're missing out not trying some of the commercial stuff - Arko, Palmolive, Tabac, etc...the list goes on. Is there a reason soaps made by small companies are preferable to you?

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Honestly I'm just more of an artisan soap kind of guy. I'd rather support a growing business not one that has already boomed. To me the quality drops when you are a mass producer. Not that they're bad or anything.

unkajonet said:

@gaines09, what artisan soaps do you already have and like? Are you looking for something similar, or branch out, fragrance-wise?

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So far I've tried pretty much all that have been listed. The ones ive listed are the ones I've yet to try.

Barrister and mann, HTGAM, & Stirling are my favorites so far. In that order.

I've only tried some of the tiki soaps: captain, spice island, set sail, citrus mint blast, and landlocked. Except for the captain, most of them are IMHO, pretty heavily scented. They all perform well. My two favorites are the captain and set sail. I bought the vegan formula on the ones I have, and liked the set sail enough to try the tallow.

I'm interested in tiki because of all the hype, but none of the scents sound appealing to me other than the citrus mint blast. I'm afraid it will have too much menthol for my liking, but who knows.

It has a lot less less menthol than Proraso green, by comapison. It smells strongly of citrus. Honestly I really couldn't detect any menthol at all, but that might just be me. There was little to no cooling sensation, so she keeps it pretty light.

Just to add to that, if you've tried B&M Adagio, the Adagio is more cooling than tiki's citrus/mint.

Of the three you list, I've tried Catie's Bubbles and Tiki, both are nice.

The Tiki Citris Mint Blast has just a touch of menthol, very light cooling effect. I think you would like it.

With Catie's Bubbles I need to add a lot of water or the lather is too thick, there are not many soaps I can say that about, try some!

unkajonet said:

Just to add to that, if you've tried B&M Adagio, the Adagio is more cooling than tiki's citrus/mint.

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I have tried adagio and it was the perfect amount of menthol. Stirling glacial soaps just ruined mentholated soaps for me. That stuff is ridiculously mentholated lol. I loved the scent of lemon chill too. Such a shame

Is it true that fine is removing menthol from their aftershaves?

Gaines09 said:

Is it true that fine is removing menthol from their aftershaves?

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I'm assuming you saw the Maggard newsletter, because I was a little perplexed when I saw it myself.

I spoke to Mr. Fine a few weeks ago, and what he told me is that all aftershaves will now be the original formula. The original formula has menthol in it, but less menthol than the formula he has been selling since the Platinum came out. IMHO the extra-menthol formula was not as good because the extra menthol interfered with the scent; it really dominated it. But the original formula had just enough menthol for a very nice sensation, but was undetectable in the scent. Frankly, this was the best news he could've given me; I think the original formula was perfect.

To summarize: to the best of my knowledge (direct correspondence with Mr. Fine), Fine splashes will still contain menthol, but a lesser amount than they have since releasing platinum. Basically - unless I'm severely misinformed - they're going back to being perfect.