London, 1830: cost of razors

The last page of a treatise on straight razors printed in London in 1830 reports an ad published by the author to sell his razors and related items. A good converter that can "translate" 1830 prices using an index of "average earnings" (for UK) suggests how "affordable" the item would be to the average person. What the monetary value in the past is "worth" today, in 2009?

Here what I found:

Item	Cost (£=GBP)
razor "in black handle" (horn)	£312
razor with ivory handle	£374
razor with tortoiseshell handle	£436
strop	from £104 to £1165
roll of strop paste	£62, £104
olive-soap for shaving in pots	£83, £166, £416

Some thoughts:
1. maybe at that time barbers were a way to "share" razor costs (one razor for many persons), instead of something for rich people;
2. maybe that's why we find razors with lots of hone wear and handles with 3-4 different signatures (in the same family for generations);
3. maybe that's why there are treatises and manuals describing for pages how to choose a good razor;
4. maybe that's why razor sets are quite rare and almost always with extra-refined details; and even in this case during 1830's the "standard" was 7 blades but only one handle;
5. razor costs are not so terribly different from today (compared to Thiers-Issard, mastro Livi, etc..); maybe at that time vintage blades, as today, were a good alternative to new razors, and this could also explain why we find vintage blades with wooden scales;

Also, I use those numbers to try to accept the reality: I don't own razors with tortoiseshell scales :( ..and, very important, considering modern prices I should buy even more soaps from 0livia or strops from TM :p

That's a really awesome piece of information that you found there. Thanks!

Thanks for the reality check!! Really good info.

Interesting info.

Really fascinating, thanks.

do you have the original info? a photo of the catalogue would be nice.
there are many ways to convert to modern currency, so it'll be nice to have a column in the table with the original price.

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Originally Posted by gugi

do you have the original info? a photo of the catalogue would be nice.
there are many ways to convert to modern currency, so it'll be nice to have a column in the table with the original price.

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gugi is dead right.

I hope clavichord won't mind me uploading it for him...

A member here uploaded the document somewhere onto the site... I think he photographed his own original version, which I believe he got on ebay, which I believe was posted in the auction talk section.

Going by those prices the Hart razor is a bargain. :D

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Originally Posted by clavichord

[..] A good converter that can "translate" 1830 prices using an index of "average earnings" (for UK) suggests how "affordable" the item would be to the average person. [..]

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by gugi

[..] there are many ways to convert to modern currency [..]

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From the catalogue [that's not mine, and that's why I can't publish pics :shrug: ]:
Razors, in Black Handles . . . . 7s. 6d. each
Ditto Ivory . . . . . . . . . . . . .9s. 0d. each
Ditto Tortoiseshell . . . . . . . 10s. 6d. each [etc..]

Example of conversion. In 2008 £0 7s 6d from 1830 was worth:

£28.48 using the retail price index
£34.74 using the GDP deflator
£312.02 using the average earnings
£434.83 using the per capita GDP
£1,120.01 using the share of GDP

Here some suggestions coming with the online converter:

A Commodity. If your are asking about the "present worth" of buying a loaf of bread or filling the gas tank 40 years ago, are you thinking in terms of the amount of money you are spending today on such things? If so, use the price index of the average household called the CPI (RPI for the UK.) On the other hand, if you are wondering how "affordable" this would be to the average person, use the GDP per capita, or a wage or average earnings index.

As stated in the first post, I want to know how "affordable" the item was to the average person in 1830. Today £312 (conversion of the cost of one razor) is more or less the average pay for 6 days of work (£15,000-25,000 per year are average values that I found online for London, today). This would mean that in 1830 one razor costed at least about 6 days of work.

I was just thinking, that makes me wonder what "black handles" were made from. My first thought was synthetic, but looking at the other materials I'm more likely to guess horn. If it was horn, that would drive the price up a bit.

Whichever material it was, I'm a bit surprised that "the other" is not offered as an option. If synthetics weren't offered, it suggests to me that these were probably some high end razors.

We also know that Mappin & Webb made the "Shilling razor," and they are, at least today, pretty expensive/classy razors, so that too makes me wonder what sort of razors are being referred to in this document.

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Originally Posted by holli4pirating

I was just thinking, that makes me wonder what "black handles" were made from. My first thought was synthetic, but [..] I'm a bit surprised that "the other" is not offered as an option. [..]

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Ehi, my friend, synthetic in 1830? Celluloid started to circulate during 1870's.

EDIT: Also, I guess that at the beginning celluloid could have been more expensive than horn (just thoughts.. you know: new material, new vogue, etc..).

I heard it took a worker 2 weeks salary to buy a good razor, but according to this, it's 6 days. I guess it's in this ballpark.

how many cheeseburgers could one get for a new razor? I think that is the only relevant comparison

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Originally Posted by hoglahoo

how many cheeseburgers could one get for a new razor? I think that is the only relevant comparison

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I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today. :beer1:

Jimmy says,
"I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today".
__________________
Regards,

Jimmy
_____________________
______________________________

Jimmy,

I would never make that statement. It would make me sound "Wimpy" !! :rofl2:

J S
~~

By these prices I'm a lucky duck, I've never once spent more then $50 bucks for a razor EVER, just ask Lee, he knows my deal.

That's why these puppies were made to such quality, because for me to pay a weeks salary for a blade, it better be some Bill Ellis **** I tell you what.

btw great info guys, love this hobby, and this form.

Cheers
David

I find this interesting as well. I know Jimmy was tongue in cheek regarding the Hart razor, but viewing the information you've posted here in relation to the available "new" razors, the good Dovos, TIs, etc at $200-$300+ puts things into perspective.

Within the last year I read something that relates to this; I'm paraphrasing, but what I read mentioned about how in Roman times an ounce of gold would buy a higher end or well made from quality materials: a pair of sandals, a nice garment of fine fabric (think equivalent to a suit of today) and a nice belt. At gold somewhere around $1,000 U.S. today the writer's position was that an ounce of gold would buy about the same today, millennia later.

A fine razor in the early nineteenth century cost approx the same as a fine razor costs today. Makes sense to me.

Chris L

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Originally Posted by ChrisL

A fine razor in the early nineteenth century cost approx the same as a fine razor costs today. Makes sense to me.

Chris L

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This is exactly what I mean... it was a luxury good back then, but to compare it to now, we have to find a comparable good's price. It is expensive vs. a Dovo Best (obviously so- it is a much better razor), but cheap vs. a Livi (reasonably so, many Livi's are very extravagant... like the Tortoise shell razor model)...

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Originally Posted by khaos

This is exactly what I mean... it was a luxury good back then, but to compare it to now, we have to find a comparable good's price. It is expensive vs. a Dovo Best, but cheap vs. a Livi...

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I could be wrong, but I don't think the razors at that time were comparable to a Dovo Best. Based on the razors from the period that are still around, they seem to be high quality blades, and the workmanship and quality control seemed higher as well (though that could be because only the good blades of the era were treated carefully enough to still be around). Anyway, I think the comparison to higher end Dovo's, TI's and Hart's is a fair one.

sorry I will edit my post to make it clearer. I'm not saying it is comparable to a Dovo best- but if it were it would be expensive. I'm not saying its necessarily comparable to a Livi, but if it were, it would be cheap.

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Originally Posted by khaos

I am skeptical (surprise! lol) of this for two reasons. The firs tis that soap cost anywhere from 1/4 to over the price of the razor. This can be either because it was A LOT of soap, or because the relative price changed.

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I can't see how this could be reason for skepticism; this is just data and proportions between different data. Also, in the treatise olive-oil soap is described as something "special", the best solution to prevent irritations coming from other kinds of soap. The soap was prepared with parfumes (etc..), thus being a sort of top-quality product for that time. Also, prices of soap could explain why until middle-XXc. people made soap at home.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by khaos

I am skeptical (surprise! lol) of this for two reasons. [..]The second issue builds on this. Someone mentioned they were a luxury good. (versus a normal or essential good. The price of bread would be a good 1:1 correlation, but luxury goods fluctuate disproportionately to income levels...) I imagine back in the day, not everyone owned a razor, only barbers and rich people owned razors. We can't REALLY compare that to today [..]

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This could be true only if you are directly comparing prices of razors in 1830 and prices of razors in 2009. If we have a translation in £ of how affordable razors were in 1830, you can use this price for more refined comparisons with today's life or simply to put old prices in the context of the time, without translating everything in therms of "modern razors".
This is what we know: you needed to work at least 6 days (maybe 12, using different indexed) to buy a razor and - as i mentioned in the first post - this can explain some aspects related to the market of vintage blades in our days. We have proportions between different goods (razors, strops, strop pastes, soaps), and between different kinds of razors (ivory required an extra 20% and tortoiseshell an extra 40% of the razor scaled in horn). Last: since, as said by Khaos, "the relative price changed" and razors are for us a different object compared to 1830, just translate £312 in food [..no, hoglahoo.. this is not the same of cheeseburgers :D ].

nevermind I've been an idiot and am pulling one of my posts and editing the other...
The big thing I was getting at but never mentioned is this is for a particular brand of razor. Its not a buying guide, rather, an ad...

I think we need to look at the way the razors were made and the content of the steel. To my understanding, a manufacturer would buy suitable steel (I'm assuming he can't / won't forge his own steel.), have several men swaging the steel into blanks, then it's shaped, polished, marked, hardened, tempered, polished again, then sharpened. That's eight steps for just the blade.

The steel was high carbon content possibly with a high sulfur content. The blanks were cooked with bone, leather and charcoal to impart carbon before a brine quench. While pyrometers were in use, I'd bet that most heat treating was done by eye, explaining why some batches of blades take and hold an edge and some don't.

I contend that 60% +/- of razors produced were of the lower end variety. Make'em in bulk and sell'em in bulk overseas in America. While many have survived, the high end razors were few and far between, even when Victoria ruled the Empire.

But this is about cost. I don't know the source, but I think they left out the low-enders I mentioned. But, those who were just scraping by were shaved once a week for church, probably not by a barber, but by someone who had a razor on the street where they lived.

Attachment 31453

Please notice in that 1830 document from London the use of the word "razor-straps" but no mention of "strops" of any kind

Some say strap, some say strop. OED to the rescue! - Straight Razor Place Forums

:OT

Quote:

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Originally Posted by holli4pirating

A member here uploaded the document somewhere onto the site... I think he photographed his own original version, which I believe he got on ebay, which I believe was posted in the auction talk section.

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Yes, that was me. But it isn't the eBay specimen I photographed; actually, that 1802 copy is still available on eBay (or straight from Joslin Hall). My own pictures can be found through the Bibliography page in the Wiki.

Just now I found and interesting reference I didn't know to Kingsbury concerning bevel and edge shape.

</offtopic>

Converting historic prices to present day ones is a tricky thing. For one thing, income differences were much larger than they are now. I doubt overall average gives a useful perspective. Median income, or average income per class might be better.