Where to buy a safety razor in San Francisco, CA

I'm a newbie buying first safety razor. I know tons of places to get one online but it would be nice to walk in to a store and hold different razors to get a feel for them. I am considering a merkur hd or a merkur 38c. It would helpful to see how the different weights and handles feel.

Where can I get a merkur HD in the san francisco bay area? San francisco, Oakland, Berkeley??? For those of you wetshavers in the area...

I would look at knife stores (i.e. pocket knives and the like). There was a small knife shop in the mall where I used to live (smaller town) that carried a variety of Merkur razors, along with some straights. They even had Col. Conk soaps and a few brushes. Their prices were a few dollars more than you would pay online, but there was no shipping to factor in and you could physically touch the item before purchase.

Rick welcome to the DE wetshaving community. Both razors you are considering are an excellent choice.

Get them both. Online.

Grant's Tobacconists, on Market between Sutter and Montgomery, carries the Merkur line.

+1 on Grant's Tobacconists on Market at Sansome. They also have Col. Conk soaps.

Not that you asked, but if you are new to wet shaving, I have also found some sources for soaps and creams in SF (at least when I went).

I don't own a car, so my range of travel is fairly limited to Financial District (work), Mission (home), Hayes Valley, Castro and Noe Valley. That said:

- Art of Shaving in Westfield Mall.
- L'Occitane and Crabtree & Evelyn in Embarcadero Center 2.
- The Body Shop on California at Front.
- Nancy Boy on Hayes between Gough and Franklin.
- The Humidor on Battery at Sacramento has Muehle-Pinsel.
- Caswell-Massey on Sutter at Stockton has Caswell-Massey (of course), Proraso and Musgo Real.
- Neiman Marcus on Geary at Grant has Zirh and Kiehl's.
- Bare Necessities on Castro at Market has Baxter of California.
- Common Scents on 24th St. at Sanchez has Omega.
- Lehr's on Church at 28th St. has Speick and Tabac.
- Cable Car Clothiers on Bush at Sansome has Kent/Mitchell's, Trumpers and Truefitt & Hill. (also has Kent brushes.)

Anyway, just an FYI, and my input on a question never asked.

Should be an Art of Shaving store around. They have some of the Merkurs in stock.

Whoa thanks guys i was just about to ask that question. if i where to buy a merkur hd whats the price gonna set me back for the razor the blades the soap/cream and brush?

hdc3rd said:

Whoa thanks guys i was just about to ask that question. if i where to buy a merkur hd whats the price gonna set me back for the razor the blades the soap/cream and brush?

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The price depends on what soap and brush you are buying. The HD alone might be $10 to $15 more than the online price. Unless you have some really good reason to buy locally i would get everything from one of the online seller's like Lee of Leesrazors (since we are talking Merkur and Lee has one of the best rates for these). It easy and would cost much less than a brick and mortar store even if you factor in the shipping cost.

Just wanted to update this post, as I've been visiting the local places.
caswell/massey is no longer there.
the humidor has 1 or 2 kits with brush and new razor, not worth visiting unless you want a cigar.

Cable Car clothiers is awesome and worth visiting. I easily spent 30 min there and am heading back. So much stuff, a little pricey, but they will make you a custom suit and a you can buy a fedora to match your kent brush.

The Shaver Shop in Oakland, at 4930Telegraph at 51st is a knife store that sells scissors and cutlery, and metal rods with dagger ends, has a shaving section at the back. Omega brushes, merkur safety razors and colonel conk soaps, strops and kits. Also some nice badger brushes, but can't remember the brand. Some vintage razors up high on a beam, look up.

Nancy Boy store is ok, just lots of product. They do have brushes, but they come as part of a kit. The salesman was willing to sell one individually, didn't buy it though.

Crabtree & Evelyn is a good visit, but l'occitaine is not. The sales ladies hawk you.

anyway, I hope this helps someone else.

aaron

+1 on Cable Car Clothiers. Kent Brushes and other Brit stuff. $$$ but worth it to visit an old fashioned kind of Haberdashery store.

BTW. Grant's tobacco store on Market has been there forever. If I am not mistaken it was established by the Grant that was one of the Band of Brothers of WWII fame.

Just ran across a small knife shop in the North Beach area that had a selection of Merkurs (HD, Slant and a Progress, which I've never seen in a retail store before!) for sale, along with Merkur blades. They also had a couple pucks of Col. Conks and some straights (I think one was labelled Solingen, couldn't see the other ones.)

I was late for lunch and there were a couple clients taking up the one employee's attention so I couldn't check prices. Everything else in there seems pretty reasonably priced though.

If you check the first picture here, the razors are on the bottom shelf of the display case lower right side. http://www.northbeachshop.com/pages/columbuscutlery.html

Do you ever travel up to the North Bay? I recall a mall in Santa Rosa that had a knife shop and a C&E. The knife shop actually carried the Vision and Progress, which was unique (most places only carry the Merkur Classic).

Just stopped into Lehr's on Church at 28th, neat little shop carrying all sorts of German products. Very friendly owner, told me that her husband shaves with Speick as well and we chatted about shaving for a few minutes.

I picked up a bottle of Speick splash for $20 and a shave stick for $7.99, and noticed some Speick. edC and shaving cream as well. There was also an extensive collection of 4711 and Tabac products, but I didn't check those prices.

VR6ofpain said:

Do you ever travel up to the North Bay? I recall a mall in Santa Rosa that had a knife shop and a C&E. The knife shop actually carried the Vision and Progress, which was unique (most places only carry the Merkur Classic).

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+1 on SIMON the Santa Rosa Mall. I was there in August and the knife store(Cutlery & More I think) on the first floor had about a 6ft display case of stuff. A Tobacconist on the second floor had Some Merkur stuff as well.

Plus in Petaluma was a Sonoma Cutlery store that had a fair amount as I recall.

Jay

Go West Young Man said:

Just stopped into Lehr's on Church at 28th, neat little shop carrying all sorts of German products. Very friendly owner, told me that her husband shaves with Speick as well and we chatted about shaving for a few minutes.

I picked up a bottle of Speick splash for $20 and a shave stick for $7.99, and noticed some Speick. edC and shaving cream as well. There was also an extensive collection of 4711 and Tabac products, but I didn't check those prices.

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nice post ! I must have passed by this place many times,but never noticed it ! this is what makes the forum so great,you always get great info....I will buzz by there soon...by the way,the best prices on 4711 that I have encountered are at bed,bath and beyond stores

If anyone flying in finds themselves a bit further south on the Peninsula and in need of blades, the JJ&F Market in Palo Alto http://www.yelp.com/biz/jj-and-f-food-store-palo-alto carries the famous Wilkinson Sword blades @ 5 for $1.65.

Not the cheapest price out there, but I'll spend a couple extra cents to support a local merchant over WalMart any day.

Since we're bringing back older threads anyway

This place sells straights and wet stones for sharpening. I didn't look close enough to see if they sell brushes and DEs as well but I wouldn't be surprised if they do. They also have a ton of nice kitchen knives:

Williams Cutlery Co. 650-322-5589
Town & Country Village | 855 El Camino Real, Palo Alto, CA

Williams Cutlery specializes in top of the line cutlery, in addition to manicure sets, grooming items, shavers, optics and gifts. They also offer blade and knife sharpening services.

Mon - Fri: 10am - 5:30pm/ Sat: 10am - 6pm/ Sun: 12 - 5pm

Looks like they do sell DEs: http://www.williamscutleryandgifts.com/shavers.html