Thread: New to soaps/cremes...need advice because my neck is hating it.

For the last 10 years or so I've been using Aveeno shave gelor it generic equivalent coupled with a Mach III blade. I’ve shave Mon-Fri (the past couple of monthsI’ve gotten lazy and have been shaving M,W,&F.) My routine has been shower,shave, rinse with warm water, towel dry and that’s it. No aftershave, no nicks, no irritation, facea touch dry in the colder months but no big deal really.

My actual shaving process is with the grain above the jawline followed immediately with against the grain w/out relather on right cheek…repeaton left cheek. The neck gets against thegrain treatment from the get. I can get 6-8 shaves from each cartridge. I can push it further if I’m too lazy to goto Sam’s and buy some more but it’s not a real comfortable shave…still no skinirritation though.

Well, nostalgia got the better of me and I decided to startshaving with soaps and a straight. Haven’tused the straight yet, still on the cartridges, but here’s my dilemma. I picked up a cheap soap at the local RiteAid a month or so ago, can’t remember the name of it. I used it two days in a row and my necklooked like a pair of irritated ostrich skinned boots. I threw it away and didn’t shave for a fewdays to let it calm down, which it did, went back to my generic Aveeno and noproblems since.

Fast forward to a Christmas day. I got the Mitchell’s Wool Fat that was on myChristmas list and lathered it up no problem. This stuff glides like nobody’s business but it was loading up my MachIII cartridge pretty good…had to rinse the razor more often. My neck is not a happy camper with thiseither. First day I didn’t use anaftershave. Second day I bought someNivea for sensitive skin and my neck didn’t really seem to appreciate it. My neck doesn’t look as bad as it did withthe cheap soap but it is definitely irritated. So I won’t be shaving for a couple more days.

By the way, I’ve got a Merkur 38c on the way along with asample pack of blades from amazon..should be here on Thursday. It’s got Feathers, Gillete 7 oclock, Astraplatinum, some other platinum, and Lord something or other. Any recommendations on which to use first?

So now what? I’m notreal keen on spending 150 bucks on different soaps looking for something thatworks. Funny thing is economics was a very close second to nostalgia in thedecision to switch. Looks like I may beshaving for another 20 years before I start seeing a return if I have to buy a100 different things to find out what works.