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Geo F Trumper Rose Soap, What am I doing wrong?

Are the soaps you are using potassium palmate first or sodium palmate first that you are having difficulties with ?
As apparently one is easier to lather than the other ?
 
Are the soaps you are using potassium palmate first or sodium palmate first that you are having difficulties with ?
As apparently one is easier to lather than the other ?

The Rose Trumper Is sodium palmate. Honestly I love the smell but I don’t think the lather it yields is worth the effort [emoji3525]
 

Lefonque

Even more clueless than you
It is sad in some ways if they don’t respond to users. GFT has been an important name in shaving but making a product that is not meeting the need of their base clientele is going to effect there standing.
Some of the old manufacturers of shaving products have moved to a marketing strategy rather than servicing existing customer base. I sometimes wonder if the people who run such companies no longer have a passion for the products they sell or more they are about brand promotion.
 
I recieved a reply from Trumpers today .Their response was to the effect that they were happy with their soaps performance and had good response from what I assume to be were customers .I made clear in my email peope seemed content with the performance of the creams and that it was the hard puck soaps which were appearing to leave some customers unhappy.They did at least respond.
 

Lefonque

Even more clueless than you
Not listening to customers experience is a slippery slide. Thank you for sending an email even though it was to no avail. Oh well I will not be buying their hard soaps again after disappointing results with GFT soaps. If they are happy with their customers base so be it. In reality my boycott of their products won’t make a dent in the profits of such a long standing company. If their customers are happy in the truest sense good luck to them. As it stands their soaps are not for me.
 
Kinda bummed to hear that Geo. F isn't what it used to be. I literally grew up with the stuff - it's what my dad used and what I used for years. It's been close to 20 years since I used it last though - I had a beautiful silver shave set that I bought at Geo. F. Trumper's in Mayfair on my honeymoon that got stolen. I had a "whatever" attitude after that and until recently just lathered a "traditional" soap (Savon de Marseille, Aleppo, etc.) on my face with my hands. I'm brand new to the shaving-as-a-hobby thing and thought I would start with my old favorite, Trumpers Sandalwood. So yeah - that sux.
 
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Been catching up with thread the past few days. I used Trumper’s almost exclusively for 15 years with a cartridge razor. When I started expanding my razor horizons I also tried new soaps, and was stunned to realize that pretty much EVERYTHING works better than Trumper.

But I did watch the two videos and this morning I dug out a well-used puck of Trumper’s Rose and decided to match it to my Muhle pure badger. Turned on a stopwatch as well. I squeezed out the brush into the mug after 2:15 of loading, then reloaded until 3:30, then worked it in my mug. I picked up my razor to shave just shy of 7 minutes after picking up the brush. I got the “B+ lather” mentioned in the SuperiorShave video for the first pass. 2nd pass was C-. 3rd pass was pathetic, so back to the tub to reload for another minute or so. Face lathered that load and got back up to B.

This is giving my flashbacks to my day job. I am a very experienced engineer that now mostly does biz dev - working with customers to define the product that we are going to develop for them. Customers often make challenging requests. The Engineering Team never wants to say something is impossible, they are optimistic by nature, and also very hesitant to call something impossible when it is really just extremely difficult. But we make commercial products, so price and schedule are also really important to our customers. So when Engineering says “I think maybe possibly we could do this with enough time” I have learned to just tell the customer “we can’t do that, let’s look at other options.”

Same situation here. Is it literally impossible to generate good lather from Trumper’s? No. But will I continue to tell people that Trumper’s doesn’t lather? Yes, absolutely. Every other soap in my den could have generated the same or better lather in less than half the time.

But it does really smell nice, I’ll give them that! :)
 

never-stop-learning

Demoted To Moderator
Staff member
Wednesday 20210421
Razor: Swing DE (Sweden) (TiBam "Antique" Ti Handle)
Blade: Wizamet Super Iridium (6 and Retired)
Brush: Rudy Vey "The Favorite" (Shavemac 24mm 2-band Silvertip)
Lather: Geo. F. Trumper's Limes
Aftershave: Gabel's Lime
20210421_135720.jpg

Was able to build a very nice lather and get an excellent shave! :cool:
 
Wednesday 20210421
Razor: Swing DE (Sweden) (TiBam "Antique" Ti Handle)
Blade: Wizamet Super Iridium (6 and Retired)
Brush: Rudy Vey "The Favorite" (Shavemac 24mm 2-band Silvertip)
Lather: Geo. F. Trumper's Limes
Aftershave: Gabel's Lime
View attachment 1255107
Was able to build a very nice lather and get an excellent shave! :cool:
Lucky you. Is it the potassium palmate first formulation you have then ?
 

never-stop-learning

Demoted To Moderator
Staff member
Lucky you. Is it the potassium palmate first formulation you have then ?

Nope - Sodium Palmate. Forms a very thin and sudsy lather that dries out almost immediately if I use it like my regular soaps.

My GFT lathering process:

1. Select a brush with good backbone. Boar works really well. I can also make a good badger work. Soak whichever brush has been selected.

2. Scrape ~1/2 tbs of the GFT soap into the bottom of your shaving bowl. Add a small amount of hot (not boiling) water to soften the soap.

3. Remove brush from soaking. Small flick of the wrist. The brush will still be fairly wet.

4. Load the brush from the GFT puck over your shaving bowl. Capture the overflow water and suds in the lathering bowl.

5. Whip up a "lather" in your shaving bowl.

As an aside, if you apply what you have now to your face, it will be the foamy, thin stuff that dries out and is fairly unusable. Got to follow with the next steps to get the lather that GFT is capable of providing.

6. Step 5 should permeate your brush with the "almost a lather" as described above. Now load your already "loaded" brush vigorously from the puck and face lather. Load more soap from the puck than you think you would ever need.

7. After each pass, swirl the brush around in the lathering bowl, reload from the puck (loading more soap than you think you should need) and face lather for the next pass.

Result: Really nice lather that is slick, cushioning and has very good post shave face feel.

GFT is the only soap I have that requires the extra steps that GFT needs. Once you get the steps down, it really isn't too much of a hassle to get a good lather out of GFT soaps. Not my daily soap, but I do like the scent. Nice as an occasional soap.

Plus, it was a challenge. ;)

Hope this helps and YMMV. :)
 
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I've been doing this shave as a hobby thing for over a decade and the Trumper hard soaps have always had a bit of a reputation in the community as hard to lather.

Things I used to see in the discussions that start over the Trumper hard soaps usually include the following - Trumper doesn't actually produce their own soap base, the old tallow-based product was divine, and stick to the creams if you must own one of their products ( or search for a NOS tallow based soap from before the reformulations ). I do own a few Trumper creams and they are pretty good to me even though I typically prefer hard soaps. Another thing I see mentioned, but I'm not sure is still true is that the 3Ts ( Trumper, Taylor's, and Truefitt ) all used to use the same shave soap base, but like I said I don't know if that was true then or if it is true now.
 
I have used three Trumper’s soaps: Coconut Oil (2), Rose, and Limes. Coconut Oil and Rose lathered just fine. Limes was abyssmal, but I persevered and used the puck. I have another puck of Coconut Oil and I’m sure I will enjoy it, but I will never buy another puck of GFT soap. There are so many other products which provide a better lather.
 
Your mistake was that you bought a GFT soap, they are miserable after the last reformulation. Once being, in my opinion, one of the top tier soaps they are nowadays mediocre products.
 
I have used three Trumper’s soaps: Coconut Oil (2), Rose, and Limes. Coconut Oil and Rose lathered just fine. Limes was abyssmal, but I persevered and used the puck. I have another puck of Coconut Oil and I’m sure I will enjoy it, but I will never buy another puck of GFT soap. There are so many other products which provide a better lather.

I’m with you. I will happily buy the cream for a stronger punch of fantastic scents with oh-so-easy lathering.
 
Sadly a GFT Coconut that my wife bought for me was one of the worst soaps that i had ever used (and by that time i had tried about 200 different soaps).
I say this thing is not a shaving soap at all due to the inability to produce a decent stable lather. Honestly i've tried every trick i know and after about 20 different experimentation's , i grated the thing and added a ton of vegetable glycerin and used it as a bath soap.
 
The trick is to use a SLIGHTLY damp brush, loading heavily for a good while and adding TINY drops of water SLOWLY, this is the opposite of a thirsty soap and the resulting paste will become a rich, dense, creamy and stable lather.
 
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