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First go with Arko

steveclarkus

Goose Poop Connoisseur
Thanks to a generous PIF from @Big_T (thank you!) I received an Arko shave stick.

As many of you already know, I am fairly new to DE shaving and I have not had much success with shaving soap creating enough slickness and protection for my lower neck.

So far I have tried 3 shaving soaps: Proraso (white), Col Conk almond, Williams (I shredded a puck of it with a cheese grater), and now Arko.

I don't really understand the complaints about Arko's scent (to me it just smells like soap).

Anyway: I use cream shave/gel on my lower neck as a pre-shave. Because of the pre-shave product, I don't rub the shave stick directly on my face. Instead I peel off a bit of the soap into my bowl using a vegetable peeler and lather it using my brush.

All of the soaps I have tried seem to produce a very nice lather and work fine for my face--just not my lower neck. For my lower neck, I seem to need the pre-shave. (I could use the cream shave/gel alone, but lathering the soap is more enjoyable.)

So the nice part is that I can use the cream shave/gel as a pre-shave for my lower neck, end up using less of that product per shave, and enjoy shave soap without irritating my neck. Best of both worlds!

I like all of the soaps I have tried, including Arko.

My favorite soap so far, though, is the Col. Conk almond (it has a nice scent that the LOTH likes).

I doubt I am going to get anything more expensive than any of these soaps. It's a shame that Williams seems to have been discontinued; I quite like it (I don't understand the complaint about the Williams soap scent either; I don't mind it).
ARKO GOOD
 
I purchased an Arko shave stick. I have yet to use it as the scent does not escape from the packaging.

Someone said in one of my posts about acquiring Arko that it smells like a urinal. Dont know why that person would have said that. Maybe they had a bad batch of Arko ?

So since the scent is being described as like soap - or a clean scent, would you describe it as a barber shop scent ?
It's not really like a urinal cake. Do you remember the stuff the janitors in elementary school used to mop the floors? Arko reminds me of that for some reason. You've got some citrus and citronella and something else that is slightly industrial and soapy.
 
@NorthernSoul

Its been sooooo long since I've been in elementary school. I cant remember that scent that you are describing.

I dont mind the citronella scent - the scent that comes out of a burning candle that you would use in the backyard to keep the bugs away. SOme people dont like it. I enjoy the scent myself. It always reminds me of a lemon scent.

Unless I am way off base here and citronella is not the scent I think I am describing here.
 
It's almost as if the love or hate for Arko's scent is like the love or hate some people have for cilantro.

Some people can't stand it and say it tastes like soap. It doesn't taste anything like soap to me. (Cilantro, not Arko.)

(I wonder if these, uh, [for lack of a better term] "dislikes" are related...)
 
It's almost as if the love or hate for Arko's scent is like the love or hate some people have for cilantro.

Some people can't stand it and say it tastes like soap. It doesn't taste anything like soap to me. (Cilantro, not Arko.)

(I wonder if these, uh, [for lack of a better term] "dislikes" are related...)

I like Arko but I don't like cilantro. Not sure where we're going with this though.... :letterk1:
 
The anti Arko people need to check this French site.

The ingredients are very good.


A ► No risk identified to this day.

B ► Limited risk
 
It's not really like a urinal cake. Do you remember the stuff the janitors in elementary school used to mop the floors? Arko reminds me of that for some reason. You've got some citrus and citronella and something else that is slightly industrial and soapy.
Didn't the janitors use pine disinfectant, same as hospitals?
 
It's not really like a urinal cake. Do you remember the stuff the janitors in elementary school used to mop the floors? Arko reminds me of that for some reason. You've got some citrus and citronella and something else that is slightly industrial and soapy.
That’s the vibe I get from it too. Generic floor cleaner. The kind that comes in a big 5 litre plastic drum. I used to mop floors with the stuff and it smelled exactly the same.

They sell Arko at a local pharmacy so I’ve had the ‘joy’ of smelling it first hand. I should really try it one day but whenever I go to buy it I can’t quite bring myself to it.
 
When I absolutely, positively have to get the wettest, slickest and thickest lather possible I lock the bathroom door, grab an extra towel or two, and lather Arko using the Marco Method. It never lets me down ... I mean the 3 cubic meters of wet foam physically won't let me back down to the floor for a few hours.
 
Nothin' like a little shredded Arko to spruce up that salsa [for the literal people in the crowd: We all know Arko is soap and we're not actually eating it]
 
I've enjoyed Arko from the get go when I started down the DE razor road... to me smells like soap and I also like coriander (as cilantro is known in UK and Thailand).

I have just got some Mitchell's Wool fat soap in... confirmed it face lathered just fine so have grated up Arko stick and the MWF 50/50 and packed it in to a couple of those plastic twist-up containers for what should be a quite fabulous shaving stick - my new 'WoolKo' stick.
 
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