Saving Shaving

Review: Braun Beard Trimmer

DavidM — Wed, 14 Oct 2020 19:32:54 +0000

Review: Braun Beard Trimmer BT7240

In a previous post (Bad Equipment or just Bad Luck?), I grumbled and complained about the beard trimmers that I have thrown away over the years. I finally realized, of course, that it was all my fault. I bought cheap junk. So why should I be surprised when it turns out to be cheap junk? So I committed to spending time researching and spending more money this time around.

Let’s talk about my choice. The Braun Beard Trimmer BT7240.

Over the years, I have learned what I want in a beard trimmer and what I don’t want.

I want the trimmer head should be small enough to get under my nose and around my chin easily. I want the trimmer to be cordless, lightweight and washable in water. I want some control over beard length, but it has to be quick and easy. A twist or a ratchet of some sort to adjust length from maybe a #1 to maybe #6 (up to 3/4 of an inch) and I don’t want to change out the guard or the trimmer head to do it. In fact, I do not need or want my beard trimmer to have 30 attachments.

By the way, if you need a reminder of what those trimmer numbers mean, here you go:

Number 1 – one-eighth of an inch or about 3 mm
Number 2 – one-quarter of an inch or 6 mm
Number 3 – three-eighths of an inch or 10 mm
Number 4 – one-half of an inch or 13 mm
Number 5 – five-eighths of an inch or 16 mm
Number 6 – three-quarters of an inch or 19 mm
Number 7 – seven-eighths of an inch or 22 mm
Number 8 – one inch or about 25 mm

My previous post mentioned that I was looking at a model from Panasonic and one from Phillips Norelco. But some reviews worried me and I had my doubts. Then I finally hit on the Braun BT7240.

The product info said that with just one plastic trimmer guard I could go from 0.5 mm to 10 mm in 0.5 mm increments. Nice. It seemed to hit on all the other needs and wants so I finally clicked from Amazon. Price was about $69 which was right between the two earlier models I was considering. Like most Amazon orders, it showed up quickly and I was excited to try it out. My immediate thought was that the performance was very acceptable, but I waited about 6 weeks to post this review.

I buzz my beard about twice a week, so I have about a dozen uses under my belt now. My initial thought was well founded and I find the performance to be excellent. Powerful, comfortable and easily adjustable. The dial is super easy to adjust and fine-tune to the exact length you want. It comes with 2 trimmer guards. One allows 1 mm to 10 mm and the other can go from 11-20mm. I shouldn’t need the larger one but I will keep it. It also came with only 2 other trimmer heads (detail trimmer and shaver). Might be interesting…but I put them in the travel bag and put them away for now.

Just two complaints. One doesn’t matter at all. The other one is more important.

The stand that comes with the trimmer unit allows the unit to stand up and stay charged. But it is pretty lightweight and it could fall over easily. This might bother me more if I actually planned to use it. I don’t. I am a minimalist sort of guy and I choose what I have out on the bathroom vanity carefully (on my side anyway). The good news is that the trimmer battery lasts a really long time. I charge the trimmer up then put the charger in the top drawer. I have charged it a couple times out of habit – not that I felt it needed it.

The more important complaint is that it has a definite preference to go in one direction, against the grain. Wet shavers shorten this to ATG. If you are unfamiliar with the terminology, with a little care you can feel the direction your hair is growing (easy when you are feeling stubble). It is rarely growing straight out at 90 degrees from your skin. Feel the hair from different directions and you will find that it is smooth in one direction (with the grain, WTG) and rough in one direction (ATG). So other trimmers I have used didn’t really care what direction it was used. The Braun seems to really work efficiently when going against the grain and a bit less effective WTG or across the grain (XTG). Not a huge issue but I noticed it more than once. And it really became more apparent when I shaved my head with it.

Remember, I had a dream of using my new trimmer to buzz my head as well. I usually use a big corded Wahl clipper (Model MC3).

I slap on the size #2 guard and buzz my head down every week. I am happy with it but setting up to use it is a little troublesome. I really wanted this new Braun to be able to handle double duty here. So I kept the same small plastic trimmer guard on it and set the dial for about a #2 shave. The Braun was powerful enough to do the job but anyone who has buzzed their head knows that changing your angle across your head many times is the key to avoiding those missed long patches of hair. I could easily tell that the Braun trimmer worked better ATG. So it took some adjustment on my part to change my shaving method a bit. I consider this very acceptable and I will continue to use it. This allows me to trim my beard and head before a shower – clean and easy. This is a huge win in my book.

Summary:

It is easy to trim my goatee and my head at the same time and all I need to do is turn the dial. I expect good things from this beard trimmer. I will update this review if I feel differently. But right now I am very pleased with the purchase and I do recommend it.

The post Review: Braun Beard Trimmer appeared first on Saving Shaving.

A WIN for the new DE Blade Sampler Pack

DavidM — Fri, 14 Aug 2020 01:46:06 +0000

I have really enjoyed working through my recent sampler pack of double edged (DE) razor blades. Some of these blades I have tried in the past. But one type was new to me and I wish I had tried it sooner.

Full disclosure, my own personal shaving needs are not extreme. My facial hair is fairly fine. I skip a day here and there – especially in the days of working from home during the days of COVID-19. So a normal week would consist of 4-5 uses. But after a week I do tend to see a difference. There is a bit more drag and I notice some increased skin irritation – which I have always been susceptible to. Blades are fairly inexpensive so there is no reason to attempt to squeeze more life out of each one.

My recent go-to blades have been my Astra 100 pack. These are great blades at the incredible price of about $0.07 per blade. But it is fun to try different blades so picking up a sampler pack is always recommended. Recently I received this set of 100 blades.

It is safe to describe all these blades as quality. But often I find that they feel pretty similar to each other. Which is not a bad thing. My normal Astra blades do a great job so if the new ones also do a great job well… that’s great.

But the Gillette Platinum blades really felt different. They added a definite smoothness to my shave even on the short strokes on my lower lip to clean up my current goatee.

I learned that Gillette supplies these blades from their production facility in St Petersburg, Russia where they make a wide variety of DE blades.

They are called Platinum but they are really made of stainless steel – just like every other DE blade. They call it that because they carefully place a layer of platinum atoms on the blade. The layer is 100-400 angstroms thick. That is 0.04 microns. That is super thin…but it does the job (which is to protect from rust and harden the edge).

Bonus Info!

On a technical side note, this is accomplished by atomizing the platinum in a vacuum and making it stick to the receiving metal (the blade edge). The method is called “physical vapor deposition” and it is the same thing I used when I would prepare samples for a scanning electron microscope. But back then I used tiny amounts of gold. I ended up reviewing some of the patents on this technology, one from Gillette and one from Bic.

EP2454057 Atomic Layer Deposition Coatings on Razor. Assigned to the Gillette Company. Patent Granted April 18, 2018

EP1815040A1 Method for deposition of a layer on a razor blade edge and razor blade. Assigned to BIC Violex SA. Patent granted January, 6 2016

This is fun stuff! You will find many blades are covered with something…very often Teflon. I will have to write a separate blog post on this since I find it interesting – and you may too!

Interestingly enough, I found that these awesome Gillette Platinum blades lasted about 1 week of use (4-5 uses). So no difference vs my current Astra Blades (also platinum coated by the way)! And get this…the Astra blades are also made by Gillette in the very same factory as the Gillette Platinums. Gillette acquired the Czech company that produced the Astra blade in 1996 and have producing them in the same St Petersburg facility ever since. If interested, you can check out an earlier blog post about Gillette’s dominance in the razor market.

Wow. I just came to a revelation:

I am now convinced to never buy a 100 count pack of any DE blade. For me, it is too fun to explore different blades. I do not want to stick with one blade for 1-2 years (even at $0.07 per blade)! So I will soon pick up a 50 pack of Gillette Platinum Blades for less than $9.00 (about $0.17 per blade). See links below if interested in checking out the Sampler Pack or the Gillette Platinum Blades.

I will order them unless I find another blade I like better in this sample pack. I have a couple more brands left and I have my eye on that black Feather Hi Stainless. Never a dull moment…

The post A WIN for the new DE Blade Sampler Pack appeared first on Saving Shaving.

Bad Equipment or just Bad Luck?

DavidM — Tue, 14 Jul 2020 02:43:25 +0000

My experience with beard trimmers…

Every year or so I end up at TJ Maxx or Marshalls buying another beard trimmer.

And they are a disappointment every single time.

They all seem to cost about $20 and last around 12 months. It either simply breaks or my frustration grows until I ditch it. If you do the math the monthly cost is pretty low. But I am reminded every time I pick it up that I don’t like using it. My mother would certainly tell me to suck it up and use it until it stopped working. But life is too short to use bad grooming tools. You can quote me on that.

“Life is too short to use bad grooming tools”

SavingShaving.com

I should really know better. Buying ‘junk’ and expecting it to be ‘not junk’ is foolish. When possible, I try to live by simple rules. Buy quality things. Don’t get fooled by bling and useless features I don’t need. Strive to fill my life with simple, elegant designs that are both efficient and effective (that is why I am so drawn to safety razors, of course).

But a drawer in house is currently hosting these disappointing items:

The top one is the Norelco Series 3100 trimmer. Decent weight and feel but the trimmer head feels bulky and I could never get it under my nose well to trim my mustache. It eventually stopped holding a charge. I thought I tossed it so I was a little surprised when I found it. It is not sold anymore but Norelco still had a link to product details.

My current trimmer is the ugly yellow one in the photo. A Wahl Model 9953. Summary: frustrating and disappointing. I call it frustrating because it doesn’t cut in 1-2 passes. More like 4 but for some reason it is as loud as a F1 car. Its claim to fame is the ability to spin the head 360 degrees in a circle to make it easier to use. I never once needed to do that. The whole thing feels cheap and this is especially true for the plastic guards. I also find it strange that the rubber surface actually grabs and holds much of the hair you are trimming off. It still holds a charge quite well but it was underwhelming right out of the box. It seems Amazon still sells it so you can see some details and reviews, if interested.

Not really recommended.

Do I just have bad luck or am I buying bad equipment? I have thought about this question quite a lot. It is more accurate to say that I am consistently making a bad decision. Buying a cheap trimmer over and over again breaks all my rules. So you are here witnessing my current moment of clarity. No more.

I should have really learned this lesson much earlier. I need a new trimmer and it will be significantly better than the ones I have been using.

But I also have another motive. I have one more electric trimmer in the house – but it belongs in a slightly different category. I use a big corded Wahl clipper (Model MC3) to buzz my head. I slap on the size #2 guard and buzz my hair down every week. I am pretty happy with it. But it is way too big for normal beard trimming. It is a corded unit but that is only a slight annoyance. It has all the power I need to complete the task quickly and I can do it without a mirror since everything gets the same length.

And now I am wondering if the new unit can also buzz my head? Is it possible to get rid of all the handheld trimmers and just use one? I usually use my beard trimmer with a mirror in the shower before the water gets turned on. Easy clean up. It would be fabulous to be able to change the length setting and give my head a quick buzz at the same time.

So what’s next?

The truth is…I don’t know. I have been reading reviews and scouring Amazon to find a better and (understandably) more expensive beard trimmer. I get tied up reading all the reviews so I haven’t found the one I want to buy yet. I am currently looking at a newer model Panasonic or a Phillips Norelco.

I know it takes several months to get blog readership going and we are just at the beginning here. But if anyone reads this and has a suggestion – please let me know. I will keep looking then I’ll pull the trigger on a new one. And, of course, I will post on what I chose when I give you an in-depth review!

Update:

For a review of the trimer I finally purchased – click Braun Trimmer Review!

The post Bad Equipment or just Bad Luck? appeared first on Saving Shaving.

The Razor Wars continue…

DavidM — Thu, 25 Jun 2020 18:08:15 +0000

The Razor Wars continue…

aka…The 800 lb gorilla doesn’t always get to sit where he wants.

Gillette has always been the 800 lb. gorilla in the razor wars. They were first to the market with modern replaceable blades (see history of the modern safety razor) and continued their market dominance by spending barrels of money on R&D and advertising. A decade ago, the US razor market was firmly owned by Gillette with about 70%. Schick was a far away number 2 at about 19% and the rest was filled in by Bic and a few others. But then things changed. These market leaders have lost significant ground to upstarts and things have gotten more complicated.

Ten years ago, the existing razor market was the picture of vulnerability – minimal players and fat margins. Dollar Shave Club originated in 2011 and was soon followed by Harry’s in 2013. They both offered low-price cartridge razors for direct shipment to your home in a reoccurring membership program. I consider Dollar Club and Harry’s good examples of disruptive innovators. They significantly affected the market and forced the other established entities in the market to adapt. Which they did. Gillette and Schick later started their own deliver-by-mail programs.

Dollar Shave Club was purchased by Unilever in 2016 in a reported $1 billion deal. Seem like a lot of money? It is. But remember that this market is quite large and Proctor and Gamble had about $6.1 billion of sales in their grooming division in 2018 (mostly Gillette).
Gillette annual report here.

And because I like numbers here is another…P&G purchased Gillette in 2005 for $57 billion.

Where does it all stand now? In the US, Gillette has less than 50% of the razor market, Schick has about 14%, Dollar Club 8% and Harry’s 3%. Gillette still has the majority of the market but has lost a lot of its strength. Gillette net sales have decreased in the last couple years and in 2019 took a $8 billion writedown on P&G’s books.

Ignoring the numerous lawsuits that these companies keep trading back and forth, the next major move was made by Schick (or more specifically, its owner Edgewell Personal Care) in May 2019 when it attempted to buy Harry’s. Perhaps this was a way to finally get an edge (pun intended) on the market and get something Gillette did not have. The deal was set to close in 1Q20 for a reported $1.37 billion. Cue the Fed. The purchase was stopped by the United States Federal Trade Commission because they said it would result in “serious harm to consumers.”

Here is a link to the written legal decision of the Harry’s lawsuit. It is redacted by the FTC but still fun to read.

Edgewell was forced to scrap their plans to purchase Harry’s and now the world waits for the next move in the ongoing razor wars.

The post The Razor Wars continue… appeared first on Saving Shaving.

Vibrating Razors…part 2.

DavidM — Wed, 10 Jun 2020 18:09:41 +0000

Let’s look again into the world of vibrating razors. In my previous post, I showed an early vibrating razor, the Stahley Live Blade. It was released in the mid-40’s and you just wind it up and off it goes.

But what came next? There was the short-lived Orbiter 4000 offered by Gillette in the late 1960’s. Sales were lackluster and it disappeared quickly. Badger and Blade has a great post about the Orbitor 4000 and you should take a look.

Fast forward to 2004 and the razor wars continue to rage on. As always, it has come down between archrivals Gillette and Schick. Technically, the fight was with Wilkinson Sword but both brands (Schick and Wilkinson) were owned by Energizer Holdings (and then later Edgewell Personal Care). But back to the story…

The two companies have been trading lawsuits for a long long time. In this case, Wilkinson Sword was about to release the Quattro, the first four-bladed razor. Gillette sued to stop the all Quattro sales since they alleged that the razor infringed on their own patents. To put it bluntly, Gillette got swatted down by the courts and it seemed that they would have to beat them in the market instead.

Gillette launched the M3 Power in the United States in May 2004. The M3 Power included three blades and a battery-powered feature which caused the razor to vibrate. Gillette called the feature micropulses and at the time, Peter Hoffman, president of Gillette’s blade and razor division, said it “delivers gentle pulses” that “excite the hairs”. Wilkinson Sword wasn’t having any of that. They filed multiple lawsuits in multiple countries. They first won in Germany when 2 different courts said Gillette’s claims were misleading and false. Gillette changed their television ads based on that decision but other advertisements were not changed.

And in May 2005, the United States District Court in Connecticut weighed in. Visit the Harvard site if you want to read the decision. In short, Gillette lost. The court decision uses words like “unsubstantiated and inaccurate”, “greatly exaggerated” and “literally false.”

Gillette had to change its claims in commercials and print advertising as well as change its packaging for the product. The M3 Power sold well but is a bit outdated now. Of course Gillette improved upon it and released the Fusion5 Power (and apparently people enjoy using them).

Not to be outdone…Schick, of course, has their own powered razor. The Hydro 5 Power.

The post Vibrating Razors…part 2. appeared first on Saving Shaving.

Vibrating Razors?

DavidM — Mon, 25 May 2020 14:12:26 +0000

Stahly Live Blade Razor

A vibrating razor blade? Really? Personally, I do not usually get excited about bells and whistles. Boring? Perhaps a little. I would rather surround myself with things that are simple and high quality. In 2004, Gillette introduced the M3 Power Razor that included a battery to send vibrations through the razor to improve shaving. Just the sort of thing that would NOT appeal to me. At all.

What I didn’t know what that the M3 Power Razor was not the first razor to introduce that particular feature. It was the Stahly Live Blade Razor way back in the mid-1940’s. After a few twists of the base, the razor used internal springs to generate 3,000 side-to-side vibrations per second. By most accounts, this razor gave an excellent shave and continues to have its fan base today. You can still find these gems on ebay and specialty sites/stores. Photo: Joe Haupt from USA / CC BY

The post Vibrating Razors? appeared first on Saving Shaving.