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Since any soap lasts me months rather than weeks I guess the price diff is fractions of a pence. For the tiny premium involved the extra performance and top quality ingredients are a worthwhile investment in shaving enjoyment and skin health.
Yeah..That..At first my purchases were pretty much directed to artisan soaps. Little by little I found myself drifting to mass produced ones - mainly MWF, Tabac, LEA, Cella, Haslinger and the cheap Portuguese creams. Either my technique has improved greatly or my initial soap selections were misguided, because I now getting as just good or better shaves from the cheapos at a faction of the cost.
If it's seriousness you want fromIt's mostly the ingredients that push prices up, most of the exotic ingredients are extreamly expensive. These ingredients add a luxurious feel to a soap.
Like @nick_s also pointed out, you will get better post shave qualities to. Mass produced soaps remove this in the form of glycerine to sell to fragrance companies. We leave it in and with some soap makers myself included neutralise any free hydroxide with conditioning oils, which is called in the artisan soap world as Super Fatting. Some of the commercial soap makers try to achieve the same post shave qualities with cheaply massed produced chemicals, not quite the same.
nothing wrong paying a little bit more to keep the artisans going giving us a bit more choice
I have tried most of the US & UK artisan makers with the exception of Wickhams (which I will be trying soon hopefully) and found that none of them compare to the blue collar European soaps like Tabac, MWF, Cella, Speick et al. Saying that artisan soaps are 'improved beyond recognition' is a ridiculous statement.
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