Thread: trends in razor sales

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Never going to happen. In general the more members the better any site looks and the hierarchy on the search engines is affected which affects ads and who ever owns sites. I don't think there is a way to actually remove a member from the list. Even banned members still show up as members of sorts.

Not only that, but it becomes a horrid mess.
All posts are in a database, linked to the member record for example.
It is really, REALLY bad database practice to delete records without deleting the linked records.
In other words, either we'd have to delete their posts as well, or end up with tons of orphaned posts.

So no.

Originally Posted by Birnando

There has been a certain growth in the straight razor market over the course of the last few years.

As to prices, yes, they seem to have gone up somewhat too.
As a whole.
There are still bargains out there, but the number of vendors, restorers and active hobbyist has made them less apparent.
A lot of people see an opportunity to make a few bucks, so they keep their eyes open, just like the rest of us.

As an example, I have collected a a certain brand for years now.
There were numerous comments made here about a fool and his money when I posted my purchases.
Now, a few years later I am pondering just who the fool was
The prices have more than doubled since then, but there are still some available out there at the price I paid years ago.

6 to 7 years ago, the market was still waking up, few buyers and sellers were knowledgeable, and near mint pieces could still be had for cheap. As both buyers and sellers become more educated, the chances of finding good stuff below market value decreases significantly.

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

DO NOT become a victim of Rad,DO NOT buy blades helter skelter.DO NOT buy junk that has to be extensivly refurbed.
DO make a plan to buy 10 of the best razors money can buy over time,is all you will ever need for the rest of your life,JMO

So I find this very interesting. As a complete beginner, what are the best razors? Is their a guide to what the best vintage blades were?

Originally Posted by Kpfeifle

So I find this very interesting. As a complete beginner, what are the best razors? Is their a guide to what the best vintage blades were?

The best razors are ones in good serviceable condition that are truly shave ready be they vintage or new that you can afford. Plug in "best razor" in the forum search box and be prepared to do a ton of reading.

Bob

Originally Posted by Phrank

Very nice, I enjoy the smaller W&B's occasionally....

Thanks, this will be my 2nd SR, looking forward to trying a near wedge big blade. I just deleted that post as it's not relevent to the topic haha

Originally Posted by BobH

The best razors are ones in good serviceable condition that are truly shave ready be they vintage or new that you can afford. Plug in "best razor" in the forum search box and be prepared to do a ton of reading.

Bob

And there is a "bad list" floating around somehwere with all the junk poor quality "steel" that cannot hold an edge.

Originally Posted by RedGladiator

And there is a "bad list" floating around somehwere with all the junk poor quality "steel" that cannot hold an edge.

The list is in the SRP Wiki, the list of what we refer to as, "RSO - Razor Shaped Objects". Here it is:

Brands of Straight Razors to Avoid - Straight Razor Place Library

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

DO NOT become a victim of Rad,DO NOT buy blades helter skelter.DO NOT buy junk that has to be extensivly refurbed.
DO make a plan to buy 10 of the best razors money can buy over time,is all you will ever need for the rest of your life,JMO

could not agree more with the above !! i wish i had all the $ i spent on numbers as opposed to quality when i started ... after 2-3 yrs i have been thinning down the herd to my favorite blades and a few other select pieces i want ..

the gem's or good blades are still out there but you almost have to find them marked wrong , crappy pics , or a seller who just found it in a box of junk they bought and dont want to do the research or go after the big profit ... i think with the internet and all the info sellers now research and think a 1800's razor is worth its weight in gold and list high to start looking for someone to bite !!

i surf ebay everyday and always laugh at every listing "RARE*** W&B***" when there seems to be 10 of them on there every day .. i think the prob with the restored razors is that now guys are taking olders razors with patina and soul and trying to buff them out like the restored razors but are using low grit sand paper and no knowledge of what they are doing to get that shine and extra buck !!

hones seem to be going higher ive noticed though .. i used to pick up my coticules in the $40-$60 range and just have to lap the dirt off them , just saw one listed at $1500 the other day , and now every unknown rock is listed as a possible ESCHER , or a friend of mine who "sharpens" razors thinks its a ESCHER but im not a pro so i cant be sure !! its all about the $$Bengerman's$$

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Fully 60% of the registerd members are not active,are tons of fly by nights that come in,make one post trying to ID Ebay crap they want to list and garner info.Than they are gone forever,maybe a cull is in order,no posts in say a year,no longer a member.

You kinda hate to think about ‘Culling’ if you get my drift, but there’s nothing wrong with or preventing the site from putting forward some ‘guidelines’..?

In other words possibly set some minimum participation ‘Rules’/ Bi-laws’ that are sort of ‘self-culling’.. ??

Jist a thought ala ‘..ounce of prevention ..?

I'm a long time ebayer - I was buying razors there before most auctions had pictures.

As far as trends go, it's mostly cyclical. There's something in the air or the water that drives prices up on certain things for a while, and then they drop again. I can only recall two major changes in the razor marketplace that have been sustained over any length of time.

The first was a simple correction having to do with how hard certain razors were to come by pre-ebay and post-ebay. Around 1997, you couldn't buy a razor with a celluloid handle sporting a nude woman for less than $150 on ebay. The same was true for a number of similarly uncommon razors. But once people started to figure out that such pieces weren't as rare as they'd first thought, prices started dropping.

The other big change had to do with the housing bubble and the subsequent recession that got underway in 2009. Prior to that, razors were selling much higher across the board than they are today. Prices have recovered somewhat, but they still don't approach the heady days of 2008. I went through a stretch where I couldn't seem to win an auction no matter how high I bid. And I watched one buyer (this was before ebay hid bidder identities) drop more than $40,000 on razors in two months. It was a bit boggling.