How not to plow through shaving cream?

[Mredison]

So I got a bright idea today and squeezed an entire tube of proraso into an old moisturizer tub. The idea was to make it easier to load soap onto the brush. It loads easy alright; probably a little too easy. Within about three good hard swirls of the brush, I'd scooped up about 1/4 of the cream in the tub. It felt really nice and everything, but at this rate I'll go through a crate of tubes per month.

Any tips on how to load the brush without decimating the supply?

 

[Face&Head]

If face lathering just put the appropriate amount of cream in your palm and load the brush from there. You can start the lather in your palm as well.

 

[JaDo]

You can use your finger and scoop some out then A) smear it in the tips of the brush and face lather*, or B) smear it on your face in streaks, then face lather.

You could also gently swirl the brush on the cream, just skimming a little bit of cream - then face lather or bowl lather.

But, I know what you mean. I recently loaded some cream the same way and had absolutely decadent shaves with obscene amounts of lather.


*or bowl lather

 

[eth]

Why do you do multiple swirls? The number of swirls does not matter, the amount of product you pick up does. Some products take some effort to pick up, thus many swirls, others do not. Proraso from tube is very soft, and takes no effort to load when you put it in a tub. Don't swirl; dip, and do a little twist if necessary. Just lift up your brush and see how much you picked up.

 

[Oblique Human]

Why do you do multiple swirls? The number of swirls does not matter, the amount of product you pick up does. Some products take some effort to pick up, thus many swirls, others do not. Proraso from tube is very soft, and takes no effort to load when you put it in a tub. Don't swirl; dip, and do a little twist if necessary. Just lift up your brush and see how much you picked up.

+1

 

[Mredison]

Thanks for the tips guys. ETH, you raise an excellent point about the swirls. I've been using hard soaps lately, so I think I absent-mindedly treated the cream like a puck playing hard-to-lather.

 

[LegionPrime]

I use the Bigelow and I just squeeze it right into the brush. About 1/2" of it makes plenty of lather for a good 2-3 passes easy.

 

[Sunflake]

I use the Bigelow and I just squeeze it right into the brush. About 1/2" of it makes plenty of lather for a good 2-3 passes easy.

+1 or if for some reason you just like it in a bowl like AOS creams, just gently dip the tips in the cream.

 

[Vickers]

How long did it take to rinse the brush thoroughly clean?

 

[Foyle]

I squeeze right from the tube but there's no way I'd a get a good shave from only 1/2" of product. I can get a lot of lather that way but the lather lacks substance- at least for me. (I do have pretty hard water though). For the maximum cushion and glide I probably use 2 inches worth out of the tube. I have plenty of lather left over after my shave that gets rinsed down the drain, but I also have a good shave. If I skimp on the product I tend to get nicks and the shave just ins't as good overall. Sure, I'm using up product faster but I got into this to have good shaves, not make a tube if cream last 6 months. For me loading soaps and creams heavily equals a good shave. Skimping on product to make it last longer equals bad shaves.

 

[Mredison]

How long did it take to rinse the brush thoroughly clean?

Ha, a long time

 

[LegionPrime]

I squeeze right from the tube but there's no way I'd a get a good shave from only 1/2" of product. I can get a lot of lather that way but the lather lacks substance- at least for me. (I do have pretty hard water though). For the maximum cushion and glide I probably use 2 inches worth out of the tube. I have plenty of lather left over after my shave that gets rinsed down the drain, but I also have a good shave. If I skimp on the product I tend to get nicks and the shave just ins't as good overall. Sure, I'm using up product faster but I got into this to have good shaves, not make a tube if cream last 6 months. For me loading soaps and creams heavily equals a good shave. Skimping on product to make it last longer equals bad shaves.

Right, I keep forgetting I don't shave my whole face *LOL* You may be spot on with needing more than a 1/2" stripe, I can easily see needing 1"+ if you're doing 3 passes on your whole face. I also don't think that we have hard water where I'm at, I have recently started testing out Williams and I am starting to get lather in the cup after only about 10 seconds of loading. Sometimes I think "YMMV" should be the default sigline around here.

 

[Rustonrazor]

I squeeze right from the tube but there's no way I'd a get a good shave from only 1/2" of product. I can get a lot of lather that way but the lather lacks substance- at least for me. (I do have pretty hard water though). For the maximum cushion and glide I probably use 2 inches worth out of the tube. I have plenty of lather left over after my shave that gets rinsed down the drain, but I also have a good shave. If I skimp on the product I tend to get nicks and the shave just ins't as good overall. Sure, I'm using up product faster but I got into this to have good shaves, not make a tube if cream last 6 months. For me loading soaps and creams heavily equals a good shave. Skimping on product to make it last longer equals bad shaves.

I load a lot of product as well and I still don't use enough to be more expensive than that other way of shaving.