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Where is the Tallow?!

Just received a few pucks of Tabac shaving soap. I got the refill pucks.
I've read through the ingredients list on the back of the box and I am not seeing tallow or tallowate listed anywhere. Have they changed the formula?
Where did you buy them from?
 
Haslinger was very successful in transitioning to a vegetable based formula. I've 3017nd both versions of Haslinger and cannot detect any loss of performance whatsoever. Hopefully Mauerer & Wirtz will follow Haslingers lead and continue to provide customers with a top notch product.

As long as they are putting this effort into their shaving soap I sure wish they would being back Sir Irisch Moos.

Well, I never tried the Haslinger tallow formula. I did try the vegetable based formula and was not impressed. It was not that easy to load and lather, it was not that great at protecting my face from the blade and the post shave conditioning was lacking. The good things about the formula were that it was very slick (10/10) and the residual slickness was good (9/10). It did not dry out my face, but neither did it leave it feeling great. Overall, I rated the new Schafmilch formula 48/60 which is 80%. That places it as minimally acceptable in my evaluation. Of my collection of over 200 soaps, I have evaluated 13 that ranked even lower.

Tabac tallow formula was one of the few traditional hard soaps that I recommended. I rated it 57/60 (95%) which I consider to be excellent. Even though it is a hard soap, it lathers easily. The slickness and cushion are excellent. The post shave is quite good, even though it is not up to the standard set by some artisan soaps. Thus, I will be interested to see if the revised formula lives up to the standard set by the tallow formula.
 

luvmysuper

My elbows leak
Staff member
C&S reformulated, but did not drop the tallow.

You are correct. I should have said more rightly "reformulated". Sodium Tallowate as the first ingredient was replaced by Sodium Palmate as the first ingredient. The end result is the same, a formulation change made things worse.
Their website now lists Sodium Tallowate as first ingredient again, so maybe a lesson learned.
 

martym

Unacceptably Lasering Chicken Giblets?
So maybe I am no longer looking like a hoarder and may now be viewed as a visionary?
B536F68E-79AB-45B4-B379-5E8ED06E4776.jpeg
 
You are correct. I should have said more rightly "reformulated". Sodium Tallowate as the first ingredient was replaced by Sodium Palmate as the first ingredient. The end result is the same, a formulation change made things worse.
Their website now lists Sodium Tallowate as first ingredient again, so maybe a lesson learned.

Sodium tallowate is the name of the sodium salt of tallow. However, it will contain a variety of fatty acid salts as tallow contains several fatty acids. Stearic acid, oleic acid, and palmitic acid are the top three by weight. In the overall soap formula, the percentages of these three fatty acids play a major role in the performance. All of the highly rated soaps in my den have some form of stearic acid or tallow as the primary fat.
 

luvmysuper

My elbows leak
Staff member
Sodium tallowate is the name of the sodium salt of tallow. However, it will contain a variety of fatty acid salts as tallow contains several fatty acids. Stearic acid, oleic acid, and palmitic acid are the top three by weight. In the overall soap formula, the percentages of these three fatty acids play a major role in the performance. All of the highly rated soaps in my den have some form of stearic acid or tallow as the primary fat.

I'm certainly no soap expert, and never hope to be, what I do know is that I have seen numerous examples of changes made to major brand name soaps that resulted in performance drops.
Certainly while some soaps remained "just as good", a large number didn't.
In the grand scheme, whether tallow is first, third, seventh or not an ingredient at all is ultimately beside the point.
A once great soap was changed, and then became just another mediocre performer like so many of its cousins.
Tabac may wind up being "just as good" without tallow, but it was already really good with it.
Like other soaps mentioned here and elsewhere on the forum, there are plenty of examples where reformulation wasn't just as good, it was considerably worse.
I guess that in a nutshell is what I was trying to convey.
 
They very well may make a top notch non-tallow performer, there are other established soap companies doing it, some which are making soaps that rival anything ANY company is putting out.
I'm just a little saddened to see another tallow source drop off the map.
I'll shift my purchases to those makers who are still producing tallow soaps till they all dry up (which seems inevitable) at which time I'll either switch to an alternative besides tallow, or grow a fantastically long Rip Van Winkle beard.


+1 and I have been in the "Get off my lawn and leave tallow in my soap" club for a long time.

My stash consists mostly of unobtanium tallow based soaps. I have several pucks of AoS, a few pucks of Valobra hard soap, several pucks of C&S, and many many pucks of Haslinger tallow. Oh, I also have one unmolested stick of SIM. Not sure if I'll ever have the strength to use that one. I've got enough hard tallow soaps to last the rest of my life.

I almost pulled the trigger on a couple pucks of Tabac yesterday. Ultimately I passed because I have never been a fan of the scent and, well, I'm just so well stocked on soaps I love that I decided to leave a couple in the wild for a true Tabac fan. I hope the new formula is a success but I fear the worst.
 
Well, I never tried the Haslinger tallow formula. I did try the vegetable based formula and was not impressed. It was not that easy to load and lather, it was not that great at protecting my face from the blade and the post shave conditioning was lacking. The good things about the formula were that it was very slick (10/10) and the residual slickness was good (9/10). It did not dry out my face, but neither did it leave it feeling great. Overall, I rated the new Schafmilch formula 48/60 which is 80%. That places it as minimally acceptable in my evaluation. Of my collection of over 200 soaps, I have evaluated 13 that ranked even lower.

Tabac tallow formula was one of the few traditional hard soaps that I recommended. I rated it 57/60 (95%) which I consider to be excellent. Even though it is a hard soap, it lathers easily. The slickness and cushion are excellent. The post shave is quite good, even though it is not up to the standard set by some artisan soaps. Thus, I will be interested to see if the revised formula lives up to the standard set by the tallow formula.


"Even though it is a hard soap, it lathers easily".

Overall I havent found the hardness of a soap to be a factor in its ease of lathering. I guess I never considered hard pucks more difficult to lather but I've been using them for so many decades that it could just be a function of my experience. Soft artisan soaps were not widely available prior to the internet. Oddly I often struggle for the first few shaves with some of todays very soft artisan soaps. They contain such a high level of water that I have to drastically alter my technique, but I tend to be a bit of an outcast here because I prefer hard soaps and dislike the current trend of artisans soaps that are, imho, overloaded with oils and butters. Again, I'm sure thats a factor of my age / experience growing up with hard soaps like Old Spice, Williams, and Colgate.

Regarding Haslinger being difficult to lather. Of course their are a lot of factors going into lather production. I was always able to get a good lather from Haslinger, but then I made a small adjustment to my technique and ever since the lathers I get are among the best I've experienced.

Cheers and lets hope Tabac gets this right!
 
@RayClem, I remember when we first met me saying that I was perceiving a move away from tallow. You were well into your exploration of artesian soaps and from your perspective the opposite was happening.
 
My Tabac stick doesn’t list ingredients on the plastic container. I bought it a couple of years ago, but just a FYI as the ingredient list is on the box And not on the container.
 
8-10 years?
That's dangerously low!
But in seriousness, there's bound to be an opportunity to share some "Vintage Tabac" with newer members (or folks who only looked ahead 10 years or so).

:lol:


Stop with the "vintage Tabac"!! So far I've controlled my impulse to hoard Tabac, but comments like that will push me right off the cliff and I'll wake up tomorrow with a freezer full of Tabac sticks. :eek2::eek2:
 
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