Who's afraid of Virginia Woolfat?

NatJag said:
From a few posts previous with tallow and palm being the main ingredient in the same batch, suggests the batch numbers are irrelevant. Not helpful for quality control and potential issues with batches.
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Those were all palm based soaps. The Kent pucks just got old stock labels w/old ingredient list. Confirmed by puck color and changed scent.

They will probably either do a recall or refund. Either way, it was a daft decision by either MWF or the packer to ship them out with old labels.
 
PLANofMAN said:
Those were all palm based soaps. The Kent pucks just got old stock labels w/old ingredient list. Confirmed by puck color and changed scent.

They will probably either do a recall or refund. Either way, it was a daft decision by either MWF or the packer to ship them out with old labels.
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So it is. I must've missed that comment from donnie.
 
pjgh said:
Illegal, I would have thought.
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I think that falls under the "only if you get caught," clause. But yeah, somebody is probably going to be facing hefty fines, loss of licensing, etc.

Not a situation I'd want to be in.

Paul @Connought probably knows more about the potential repercussions than we do.
 
NatJag said:
So it is. I must've missed that comment from donnie.
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Aside from myself Eurofighter also bought a MWF and a Kent from batch 9265 and was unable to tell the difference between both. He's not being used the tallow one as much as I have (he said it was a few years since he used the tallow one) but I am well versed with the old tallow one. Nonetheless he should have been able to tell the difference.

pjgh said:
... that does lend some credence to the possibility I outlined that not all of any given batch might be dud.
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The guy on B&B shaved with one from the bad batch and found it performed well.

www.badgerandblade.com

Mitchells Wool Fat Shaving Soap is no longer Tallow based

As a devoted 3017 soap user, I did something I haven't done in years for the sake of MWF science....opened and lathered a puck I don't plan on using from start to finish immediately. MWF batch 8923. 3 test lathers, applied to face (no shave), RR Beehive Synthetic, Semogue 830 Boar and Simpson...
www.badgerandblade.com www.badgerandblade.com
 
I got an email from Kalie at Kent Brushes

I just asked for a refund, I didn't say the new shaving soap was inferior. I'm guessing many have contacted them to express their dissatisfaction with the new formulation.

***

Good morning,
We are sorry to hear of your dissatisfaction with your Kent purchase,
We contacted Mitchells on 31st May 2023 to confirm the rumours of the formula change and confirm the formula they were using for our branded soap was still including Tallowate, and they confirmed this as below:

‘The rumour is true, the base (soap noodles) used in the creation of the shaving soap will no longer contain tallow (made from Bovine and porcine bi-products), but that isn’t the wool fat element of the product, and absolutely will always contain Lanolin, the Wool Fat, which is intrinsic to the brand.
Our delivery of the new Ingredients is due into us this week, and so any further orders that you place with us from now will be the ingredients as attached which we will need to have new labels prepared for.
The quality and consistency remain at the forefront of all we do, and the change in base formulation, brought on in part by changes in the use of some common preservatives, will not detract from performance or the feel whilst maintaining a more consistent availability of supply and stability of the market.’

We currently have over 4000 units in stock, we have not recently placed and will not be placing any further orders for some time, so we were happy that our current stock, based on Mitchell’s reply, was made using Tallowate.
Kent Brushes are feeling very let down by Mitchells, and we are now sending the current batch away for testing. You are welcome to return the product for a refund, or if you would like to wait for the results before returning, I am happy for you to do so; the full results will be available to all of our customers.
Rest assured; we are doing our best to find a new supplier that will use Tallowate in the formula,
We appreciate your frustration in this matter and thank you for your understanding whilst we obtain the facts of our current batch,
Kind Regards,
Kalie

****
She also posted this up at B&B

Good morning everyone,
I work here at Kent Brushes, and we are looking into this issue with our SB2 Shaving soap immediately. We contacted Mitchells on 31st May 2023 to confirm the rumours of the formula change in their own product and confirm the formula they were using for our branded soap still included Tallowate; they confirmed our soap was not yet affected as they did not have the ingredients in stock yet.
We are now sending the current batch away for testing, and I will update you with the results as soon as soon as we have them.
We appreciate your patience whilst we look into this problem,
We are disappointed that we may not have been given an honest reply when we checked this out last week,
Thank you for your understanding,
Kalie

***
 
I just saw that email on "the other place" and it does rather read like (they think) Kent 9265 is tallow. I guess they'll know more from that testing they're commissioning. That will determine the "if they get caught" clause. It also poses an interesting question as to who would supply them with a tallow soap - might it be the folks who supply DR Harris. But will it contain lanolin? Might it out-Mitchell Mitchell's themselves?

EDIT: That thread continues with ...

That thread on the other place said:
URGENT UPDATE

I've just been notified by Kent that Mitchell's has informed them of an error.
Batch 9265 is the new formulation and they forgot to inform Kent of the change and incorrect labelling.
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Busted!
 
I liked this part of the post from the other site:-
'they also mentioned that they did not expect that there would be such disappointment with the change of ingredients our product and their own.'
The online shaving community may be small, are we representative of the masses that use this stuff, or the only ones that are concerned about tallow (and duff pucks). I do know people that use DE's purely from an ecological point, probably don't really care about brushes sizes / types, scents and ingredients of soap and cream. Or even producing a decent lather.
 
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Whenever I encounter the shaving soap in the real world, it'll be in one of those kinda whimsy gift shops that sells scented candles, crafty cards and all manner of cozy house tat. There'll be a strong presence in the soaps, both liquid and hard soap. At the side, there might be a tiny display of traditional wet shaving kit with a puck of MWF and an Edwin Jagger badger brush and razor combo.

To be frank, I think that's their market ...

Don't underestimate the number of times the shaving soap will be bought with good intentions from these kind of places or included in gift packs or what-not. Fathers' Day coming up. Suddenly the entire Dad poulation is a wet-shaver for the satisfaction of finding a gift.

Actual wet shavers probably account for very little of that. Actual wet shavers that actually shave with MWF even less. Actual wet shavers that actually shave with MWF but will probably not do so here after ... even less. But, via Kent it will now have blipped on their radar.
 
pjgh said:
Whenever I encounter the shaving soap in the real world, it'll be in one of those kinda whimsy gift shops that sells scented candles, crafty cards and all manner of cozy house tat. There'll be a strong presence in the soaps, both liquid and hard soap. At the side, there might be a tiny display of traditional wet shaving kit with a puck of MWF and an Edwin Jagger badger brush and razor combo.

To be frank, I think that's their market ...

Don't underestimate the number of times the shaving soap will be bought with good intentions from these kind of places or included in gift packs or what-not. Fathers' Day coming up. Suddenly the entire Dad poulation is a wet-shaver for the satisfaction of finding a gift.

Actual wet shavers probably account for very little of that. Actual wet shavers that actually shave with MWF even less. Actual wet shavers that actually shave with MWF but will probably not do so here after ... even less. But, via Kent it will now have blipped on their radar.
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I think they must shift a lot of units. They still have over 4000 units of 9265 left. How many did they have to begin with? I was under the impression it was 10,000 per batch.
 
From B&B

So good news! I have just been down to the warehouse, and we have approx 1000 of last year's batches of soaps (tallow). It seems the newest stock from this year's order is the 9265, and only one box has been sold of this (annoyingly, this shouldn't have happened, but I'm glad in a way as we are now aware of the situation with the formula) this means I can exchange soaps for those of you who have received 9265 from us and those of you who might want to stock up before they are gone now have the opportunity,
Thank you to all of you who have been so kind whilst we got to the bottom of the issue, and I really hope Mitchells take note of the change not being for the good of the shaving community!
Best wishes,
Kalie
 
Hi all,

I also ordered and got my 9265 tallow (or not?) soap from Kent last week before even knowing about mwf reformulation :). Needed a puck to put in a used kent wooden bowl that i found in ebay. Used it for 5 shaves til now and yesterday i used my old mwf that i have grated long time ago just to compare them (before reading here the wrong labels story as well!). In my eyes, they seem the same. I am not a "mwf expert" but i could definitely see the update in tabac reformulation for example.

Seems like all the non-artisan tallow-based soaps will end up to loose their tallow very soon. My guess is the next one will be dr harris / cyril salter (which anyway they are getting hard to find in the market. Windsor refill is in shortage pretty much from everywhere).
 
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