The AoS staff, at least in my experience, is not knowledgable about straights (which speaks to your last post...that straights are not their high profit product). I ended up explaining a lot of straight razor info to the sales rep. Wouldn't it be nice if one day you walk into an AoS or any other shave store and do not see cartridges lining the walls? It is unfortunate that most straight razor small businesses can only afford to operate online (not that it hasn't served us well thus far). I'm always open to opening a mom n pop place right here in NYC....or scouting locations for Imperial Shaving 2!