Help with Mike"s Bay Rum

I bought a tin of mike's bay rum natural soap after reading reviews on this line. I have had a hard time getting a nice thick , lasting lather. I have been using the Marco method to build the lather. Unfortunately the lather had been thin and dries quickly . Does anyone have suggestions for this product?

Thanks

I have Mike's Barbershop and Hungarian Lavender but my comments should apply to his Bay Rum too. I get inconsistant lathers with both of mine but one of the secrets is to bloom the soap and use a stiff brush. Try a boar or a horsehair next time.

Mike's is a great soap for me. I always get a great lather. I soak the soap in water along with my brush. I squeeze the water out of my brush, dump the water off the soap, and load the brush heavily for 20 seconds. Then I add water as I face lather. It does take a lot of water but the end result is excellent for me.

The Captain.

Just load for longer and work the lather for more than you would normally do. It sounds as you are not loading your brush long enough and not working it and adding enough water.
It is a great soap and there are quite a few videos on YouTube showing how it is done.
Good luck.

Captain Coarsebeard said:

Mike's is a great soap for me. I always get a great lather. I soak the soap in water along with my brush. I squeeze the water out of my brush, dump the water off the soap, and load the brush heavily for 20 seconds. Then I add water as I face lather. It does take a lot of water but the end result is excellent for me.

The Captain.

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+1 for this.. I usually bloom Mike's in warm water, while the brush is also soaking. After a few minutes, I pour off the water on the soap and squeeze most of the water out of my brush. I then load the brush for 30-45 seconds and begin face lathering. As Captain Coarsebeard said, I usually add water to the bristles of the brush if more water is need then go back to the face. You can also reserve the bloom water and wet your face with it or use it to add water to your face later (its very slick).

I had a lot of problems with this and other soaps and it turned out to be the water.

Try a test with some other water like distilled or filtered or some bottled water 1 or 2 times.
I would be curious as to the results.

DoubleH said:

+1 for this.. I usually bloom Mike's in warm water, while the brush is also soaking. After a few minutes, I pour off the water on the soap and squeeze most of the water out of my brush. I then load the brush for 30-45 seconds and begin face lathering. As Captain Coarsebeard said, I usually add water to the bristles of the brush if more water is need then go back to the face. You can also reserve the bloom water and wet your face with it or use it to add water to your face later (its very slick).

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I also bloom Mikes while in the shower, before loading. I use luke warm water, and load with a moist brush, not wet or damp. This tutorial (Below) works best for me when loading soaps. This has become my preferred soap loading method and works well with Mikes, Stirling and Cella.

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php/21136-How-to-make-great-lather-from-a-soap-Tutorial

Bloom with a little water, load well, hydrate the lather with plenty water. Best lather I get out of most of my soaps come from Mike's.

Musikmann said:

I have Mike's Barbershop and Hungarian Lavender but my comments should apply to his Bay Rum too. I get inconsistant lathers with both of mine but one of the secrets is to bloom the soap and use a stiff brush. Try a boar or a horsehair next time.

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I second this! I haven't used Mike's Bay Rum, but i do own the Hungarian Lavender and get such beautiful and slick lather. I use this same method. Use a nice boar with backbone, bloom the soap for a couple of minutes. Its worth it!

Mike's tins, in particular, need a lot of moisturizing if they are dry when you open them up. I thoroughly soak a brush and then swirl it on top of the soap. Then take a shower and get ready to shave. I wet and swirl it again all before lathering on top of the puck. The puck will keep absorbing water while you shave so keep putting a wet brush to it. Alternatively, make it your every day soap and just keep moisturizing it every day and putting the lid on.

Althernatively, if you have the soap puck in a container, it's easy to lather by swirling all over the soap puck.

I find the lather from Mike's as good as any.

Mike's also lathers really easily when used a shave stick.

I've heard that from others too. I have some plastic shave sticks and I might load up one with Mike's for travel.

Badger in the Sun said:

Mike's also lathers really easily when used a shave stick.

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The face lathering technique went much better for me. I agree, the more I use it the better technique I will develop.

Thanks again,

Vito