Month: September 2011

About the product:

This is the second RealShaving Co. product that I am reviewing.  It is still part of the “Step 1” range that makes up the “Pre-Shave” routine, preparing your bread, and skin for the actual shave.  This product is designed to soften the hair about to be shaved by warming the hair, and moistening the whiskers.  This is also the second product of this “type”, the other being Gillette’s Thermal Face Scrub.  I could not get a decent picture of the sample bottle( being a small bottle and me not having a decent enough camera, and since this product is one of the few of the RealShaving Co. products NOT sold in my area, I grab the picture from their website ( sorry for the men’s health picture with it.  I don’t usually like doing promotion for things i don’t personally endorse.

The Good:

My opinion of this product was a surprise to myself.  I was less than impressed with the Gillette thermal scrub i had tried a few months back.  So I didn’t have very high expectations going into trying this product.  My experiences had been less than stellar.  So you can imagine my surprise when i find myself really enjoying this product.  The premise of a thermal mask, is to heat up your beard to make the bristles softer, hence easy to cut through with your razor.

The application of this product is pretty straight forward, simply wet your face, squeeze out some of the product into your hands and then rub onto the wet area of your face.  You will almost instantly feel the warming sensation, and with the pumice like texture, it will easily remove any dead skin at the same time.

This product offers a nice alternative if you don’t shave after a shower.  Instead of keeping a hot face towel to soften your beard first, this product works really well.

The Bad

Well there here are the bad parts, for me anyways.  First, sometimes the pumice like substance tends to stick to your face when rinsing.  Be sure to rinse properly because if you miss one, you’re going to see some blood.  Second , the product isn’t available locally, after some quick research the product doesn’t seem available anywhere.  RealShaving Co?  any comments?  The product works really well, does exactly as advertised.  It offered a better than the experience i have with another competitive product in the same category.

Overall

I really enjoyed using this product, and would love to add to my regular routine, but can’t find the product anywhere, online or in a brick and mortar store.

For more information I encourage you to look up the Real Shaving Company and their products

website: http://www.realshaving.com/
twitter: @realshavingUS / @realshavingUK

This is the follow up to the post is wrote about 2 months ago when I first received my tub of bluebeard’s revenge shaving cream. The reason for waiting so long was to give it a proper run through, and to properly test their beard reduction claim. They claim that after prolonged ( 30 to 60 days ) of continuous usage of their Bluebeard’s revenge shaving cream you will see a noticeable reduction in density, coarseness and length of your beard follicles.

I am a every other day shaver, more that I can tolerate it easily for two days and don’t have a clean shaven policy at work, so I decided to give it the full 60 day to try it out. What was nice of the folks at Bluebeards was that they sent a full sized tub for my reviewing purposes, not just a “sampler”. The purpose behind this is so that people reviewing can really put it through the ringer, and have ample time/product to make sure that they are getting the best out of it.

First observation

First let me tell you about Bluebeard’s revenge shaving cream, it is an EXCELLENT cream. The smell is a wonderful clean smell without being overwhelming. The packaging is well done, and whoever did the design really paid attention to the last detail, the stamped lid. The packaging is entirely recyclable, and just screams manly with the embossed skull and cross bones on the lid.

The shaveThe cream offers great skin protection and lubrication for the razor. It just glides over your face without resistance and no irritation. It builds the lather quickly and easily and has a nice thick and creamy feel to it. Using a minimal amount of cream provided enough lather for a full 3 passes with some excess for touchups. This cream offered me a great shave and no razor burn or irritation of any kind. My skin felt nice and smooth, I just wished the smell persisted a little more. I guess I’m going to have to try their aftershave balm if I can manage to get my hands on some.

The claim: reduce your beard using Bluebeards shaving cream

Now, on to the part about the beard reduction. I cannot support the claim about the density of my beard being reduced, but i can 100% support it slowing down the growth and the toughness of my beard follicles. My beards growth after 3 or 4 days wasn’t as thick or as long as it usually is following continued used of this cream. It did not however appear more sparse, I still had the same density of hair, it just seemed to take longer to grow out, and the hair itself seemed thinner and more fragile, leading to the blades slicing through them like air, or a hot knife through butter.

The conclusion

To round out my review of Bluebeards shavin cream, it is a fantastic cream, and strongly recommend to anyone, especially those looking to shave less often. The cream is an excellent shave cream, and will help you reduce your beard. It is an excellent cream and worthy of the claims that the company makes.

I would like to send out my kudos to the guys(and gals) at The Bluebeards revenge, especially to Nick for kindly sending me a tub and the doubloon brush.

My only slight dissappointment is the availability ( or shipping rates ) for getting it in Canada. Although rumor has it, that the Bluebeard’s revenge may have some news to announce in 2012.  Nothing concrete yet, but I will definitely keep an eye out on that one.

For more information about the bluebeards shaving cream or any of their other products head on over to http://www.bluebeards-revenge.co.uk/ and be sure to follow their updates on twitter @thebluebeards

About 2 weeks ago Real Shaving company ( @realshavingUK @realshavingUS ) sent out a request for bloggers willing to test out and then write about their products.  This seems to be a trending theme  for companies trying to reduce their marketing costs and get their brands known around social media(maybe more on that subject later).

I volunterred since i’ve seen these products around ( they are available at our local version of shopper’s drugmart’s, Pharmaprix ) in Montreal, and i’ve been looking at them for a while wanting to try them, the prices are really attractive. Being locally available means no shipping costs/delays, an always attractive option.

Over the next couple weeks i will be reviewing 4 of their products that make up their 3 step shaving process.  Step 1, Pre Shave ( daily facial scrub, Hot towel mask ), Step 2, The Shave ( shaving cream ), Step 3, Post Shave ( after shave balm ).

Thanks again Alison.

Stay tuned for my reviews