Has anyone tried the Second Nature safety razor? (Henson look-alike)

[MovingToMars]

So I just saw an ad for this Second Nature razor ($27 USD without the base) and it looks pretty similar to the Henson. The head isn't an exact clone, but the description mentions space aluminium, tight tolerances and how the razor should last a lifetime. (Déjà vu much?) I can't seem to find a proper review though.

Has anyone tried this razor?

Here's a product video:

 

[MovingToMars]

Update: DO NOT BUY THIS RAZOR.

Even though this 'green' and 'positive' company cloned the Henson AL13 1.0, they got rid of the Tungsten ring and changed the setup so standard DE-blades don't fit anymore. (Unless you want to cut bigger holes in the blades, which seems dangerous to the point of stupid and I'm not sure the blade wouldn't move anyway.) Instead, you have to order their own blades because those are the only ones with the correct holes perforated in them. The razor arrived with 1 blade included and the blade looked misaligned in the sense that the perforation wasn't dead centre; one tab was slightly longer and sharply squared because only the other side looked cut right. It's safe to say that this isn't A-grade quality. (I didn't try the blade, because I was halfway through unboxing when I figured out the Second Nature safety razor could only be used with Second Nature DE-blades and I immediately applied to return the item.)

Now, here's the really big surprise (not). Second Nature offers a 'convenient' subscription service so you 'don't have to go through the hassle of visiting an actual store' ever again! They will ship their DE-blades to you every month through one of their subscriptions starting at the low, low price of €8 euros (currently $8,69 USD) for 2 blades per month. Yeah, you read that right. €8.- for 2 blades. And according to reviews, people keep on trying for months to cancel their subscriptions with no success. Strange, right? But these guys aren't heartless capitalists taking advantage of other people's hard work, other people's inventions and struggling young people who want to save the planet, of course not! Due to the complaints, they recently changed their super great policy and if you absolutely don't want a subscription you can now also place a one-time order for a single pack of 10 blades, if you were so inclined, for the low low price of €30.- euros ($32,59).

Apparently, they're hoping that kids these days don't know that you can actually get a pack of 100 DE-blades for 8 bucks.

$32,59 for 10 blades is highway robbery. Plain and simple. And 8 bucks per month for just 2 blades adds up to 96 euros ($104,30 USD) per year for 24 blades... I don't even know what to call that. I'm gonna go with 'shameless'. I'm absolutely fuming.

So this brand, Second Nature, copied Henson's design for a safety razor, and combined it with the standard DE-blade that they copied from the original Gillette that was patented over 120 years ago, but they deliberately changed the perforation to screw their customers out of a variety of choices between sharp and smooth blades and they're selling their own blades of unknown quality for roughly 5000% of what you'd normally pay. (Like they actually had R&D costs.) If they ever go out of business, your 'lifetime' razor is useless. Second Nature conveniently forgot to mention this piece of information in the description of their razor, by the way.

There are many great green initiatives out there, but this isn't an honest price for an honest product. I'm going to check if this is even legal in The Netherlands. To be continued.

 

[luvmysuper]

Thread is cleaned up and closed except for the OP's observations about the razor.
This thread was a minefield of politics.