Thread: are there different proraso soaps?

I was in target yesterday and decided to find the proraso products. Talk about a major effort. It's not in the shaving section of course. After an eternity of searching I finally found a target employee that actually knew what proraso was and took me to a "men's skin care" aisle, located deep within the confines of the "health and beauty" section. There was proraso pre-shaves, post shaves, mid shaves, . . . . well you get the idea. There was only one shave "soap" the other was the tubed cream.

I splurged and spent the $3.98 (u.s. funds) on the soap in the green plastic tub. I got in the car and opened it up. a nice menthol scent but the soap was VERY soft, more of a hard cream than an actual soap. I read the ingredients and noticed that it DID NOT list lanolin or aloe, which I thought were major ingredients in this soap. I know I've read that in a couple places but cant recall where.

Does proraso make 2 different kinds of "soap" in a tub like that?

As for the shave, I used the proraso this morning. Since the soap was so soft I treated it like a hard cream. I warmed up my empty bowl within my scuttle with the brush warming in the same water. I poured out the warming water and refilled the mug of my homemade scuttle, emptied the bowl and replaced it into the mug. I shook the brush out, recharged it with hot water from the sink, gave it a single hard shake and began to carefully massage the soap with the tip of the brush until the brush tip was properly loaded. I then quickly charged the brush under the running hot water and started working the lather up in the bowl.

MY "Professional Newbie" take on proraso soap from target?

The good:

1. The soap maintained moisture through the entire first pass and again through most of the 2nd pass. I only had to touch up the upper lip and chin.
2. I did NOT have to reload the brush with soap before the 2nd pass. I just quickly charged the brush with hot water again and worked up a 2nd lather. (I got that idea from one of Lynn's post about a cream)
3. I like the tingly feel of the euchalyptus and menthol
4. It out performs soaps like Williams, etc.
5. The soap gave an overall pleasant shaving experience

The Bad:

1. The lubricity wasnt the best (wasn't the worst either) compared to other store bought soaps such as Van Der Hagen (surrey)
2. After the shave my skin wasn't as soft or "silky" as I like it to be after a shave
3. I have to treat the soap like a cream and not a puck of shaving soap. (I don't like creams
4. My face was slightly more irritated when I finished than usual. (probably a sensitivity to the ingredients)
5. ANTIFREEZE. Propylene Glycol was a main ingredient in many industrial antifreeze prodcuts years back until they found they could use this in small quantitites as a preservative in certain foods without immediate negative effects. Now it's a food and cosmetics preservative.
6. Lather. It took me much longer to get the lather on my face that I wanted. It happend but I really had to work the brush on my face

Over all I think it's an ok soap. If there is a better version of it I'm sure it would be a better experience.

For me personally, Soaps with Aloe and Lanolin are better for my skin and provide a protection against irritation. Plus I prefer a soap with better lubricity.

To be honest I only use the preshave (which I love). It is not my favorite scent but it does an excellant job.

I've only used the green tube stuff, don't know if it's different than the tub but I'm pretty happy with it. It's no trumper's lime, but I do like it. I'm about half and half split on soaps versus creams, I like them both about equally right now.

-- Gary F.

The anti-freeze thing has come up before. It's not the same. Somewhere there is a thread at SMF discussing this ad nauseum. Chris Moss provided some info about the differences in the substances, just can't recall what they are tonight.

RT

Originally Posted by RichZ

To be honest I only use the preshave (which I love). It is not my favorite scent but it does an excellant job.

I was at the local pharmacy which had a few proraso products. I opened up a tub of the preshave and sniffed it out. Got to say I didn't like the smell that much and had no experience with any proraso before so I passed. I think I might try some now that I hear good things about it

While I was at it I picked up a tub of the soap, and I do enjoy it. I usually just charge up my brush (boars hair) with hot water and give 'er a few swirls in the tub. The results as such isn't the frothiest of lathers, abit more on the dense side, but I find it goes on and shaves well. The blade isn't sliding along as fluidly as it could, but the lubricity is good. Never have I needed to relather during a pass.


I don't mean to sound like a know-it-all jerk, but propylene glycol isn't antifreeze. Ethylene glycol is antifreeze; and, despite it's similarities to normal alcohol (ethanol), it is toxic if injested. Propylene glycol on the other hand is much safer. From wikipedia: "Propylene glycol is metabolized into lactic acid, which occurs naturally as muscles are exercised, while ethylene glycol is metabolized into oxalic acid, which is toxic.". If you look over some more of the ingredients list, there's some other compounds in there that I wouldn't want anywhere near my skin; or really, the air I breath. However, almost all the ones I see on there are just byproducts of soap making; and, well, soap doesn't work very well without them
Also, I don't know about yours, but mine contains lanolin. At least it's at the very bottom of the list though.

Originally Posted by rtaylor61

The anti-freeze thing has come up before. It's not the same. Somewhere there is a thread at SMF discussing this ad nauseum. Chris Moss provided some info about the differences in the substances, just can't recall what they are tonight.

RT

You're all free to do as you please. My decisions are based off the results of my wife's research. She has several papers and articles on the stuff including chemical composition, etc. Bottom Line, It's been used for anti-freeze until they changed to etholyne glycol and other substances. Additionally, if you drink a glass of it you'll have similar reactions as you'd have drinking a cup of anti-freeze on the market today.

The FDA has approved it's use in limited quantities because it's not as immediately damaging as other glycol products. Now that 90% plus of our consumabes are prepackaged we're ingesting more of the chemicals in these foods and cosmetics than the FDA based their determinations on.

It's all about you. If you're happy using the product, use it. I tried it once and won't use it again for several reasons. Anti-freeze being one of them .

I have a little green tub of Proraso soap from Target. I really like the menthol-eucalyptis smell. It feels sort of cool and refreshing and doesn't do a bad job of lathering up. I'll probably buy another one when this one runs out.

For those of you who don't want to believe that propylene glycol is anti freeze you can go to google.com and type in "define: propylene glycol"

One of the definitions you'll get is the following:

"a sweet colorless, viscous, hygroscopic liquid used as an antifreeze and in brake fluid and also as a humectant in cosmetics and personal care items although it can be absorbed through the skin with harmful effects "

Heck, if it were bad the government would protect me from it

Originally Posted by ToxIk

I was at the local pharmacy which had a few proraso products
[...]

ToxIk, mind to share where you found that Proraso stuff? I've been looking for it but haven't found anything so far (locally).

Redwoood