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Comment by c22 | Hacker News Reader

I realized in my thirties that if I had just dropped $1000 on a pallet of razor blades when I turned 18 I'd have saved a couple times that. Way better returns than the actual "investment" that money ended up in.

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I bought a $30 corded hair trimmer and switched to a buzz cut (I was starting to bake anyway) and a full beard. I use maybe one double edged razor blade or disposable razor per month for the edges of my beard, that's all.

I haven't calculated the savings over the last 6-7 years, but it has to be a lot, compared to shaving daily and going to the hairdresser.

I can't grow a beard. Five days in and I give up. I do buzz my own hair though. It's super easy if you just use the same guard all over.

As a fellow bearded and balding guy, it's not real hard to use different guards, but the motions are new and using two mirrors to cut your own hair are awkward at first. You have to be ready to accept a short single guard buzz cut for your first 3-4 attempts. Having good clippers helps too.

Don't give up, it takes time. If I shave off everything, it takes around 2 weeks before it's pretty good, and a month before I'm actually happy with it. But now that I have it, maintenance is super easy, I just keep the edges under control and trim any stragglers and stray hairs.

All beards look scraggly as they grow at first, you need to give it time to properly fill in before you give up. If you can, let it grow wild for a month, resist the urge to cut or trim. Then you can start adjusting it.

The most important tips I got were to set the bottom edge right above your Adam's apple, make it mostly a straight line and feather it out, so you don't have a hard edge. Feather in the sideburns as well. For the cheeks, I prefer to keep them natural or just lightly trimmed, but it depends on how hirsute you are.

I buzz my head without the guard, to the shortest possible setting. I did shave my head for a while, but I decided it isn't really worth it.

> Don't give up, it takes time.

It also takes the right genetics. Some of us will not have a real "beard" regardless of how much time we give it.

I switched to a safety razor 10 years ago, and ordered 250 science (not shaving) grade blades.

I still have about 150 blades left. The pack cost me <20USD including shipping from US->EU.

That’s funny. I have been using the same Gillette Sensor for 20 years. Off brand blades were available locally in the USA, but those dried up. Via eBay, I ordered Gillette branded blades “made in Germany” for a fraction of the cost of local Gillette blades. I figured the EU was not ripped off as bad as the USA for razor blades. Maybe that is not the case?

That razor recently broke, so it’s off to eBay again to find a replacement, since I have a box of blades. I refuse to pay for rip-off blades.

You're probably buying fakes, IIRC a study found the majority of name brand razor blades on eBay are counterfeit. Amazon has a counterfeit razor blade problem too, but I don't know the prevalence.

Probably, but if his face can't tell the difference, it's not a problem for him.

Until he gets hep C ( /s kind of )

The recent off-brand ones available in the US will rust if left in the shower. The "German made" ones don't, just like the OEM Gillette.

Got a link, brand, or model number for these "science" grade blades? I've been an on-and-off DE shaver for some years, and I've never heard of this option. I settled on Feather blades myself.

Also interested in link here. Also purchased large size feather blades a couple years ago still on the same box but running low.

I too use a DE safety razor and chose Feather blades after sampling an assortment. Is GP asserting there's something even better?

It wasn't stated that the blades were necessarily better, but the fact these "science grade" blades were chosen over name brands implies there may be some benefit. This was totally new to me, and it sparked my curiosity.

I guess they're taking about American Personna Super blades, which are commonly referred to as "Lab Blues". They're about 12 cents a blade when you buy them in packs of 100, which makes them one of the cheapest blades around.

There's lots of discussion on shaving forums about exactly why they're called "labs", but as far as I know they're just regular double-edge blades.

I also prefer Feather. They cost about twice as much, but work much better on my tough stubble.

I imagine they're referring to the blades marketed for cutting up samples to put under a microscope. They're commonly sold in packs of 250.

Examples:

https://www.fishersci.com/shop/products/razor-blade-uncoated...

https://www.emsdiasum.com/microscopy/products/preparation/bl...

yes but storing a pallet of razor blades isn't easy and from 18 - 28 (when you would be using these razors) you are going to move a lot, due to work, college, just general renting. So moving a pallet each time is probably inefficient.

It costs money to save money.

Someone told me that mid-rich people often group together to have a grocery accountant who will do their bulk shopping for them and it ends up costing them less than a supermarket prices for superior products.

In Park Slope we have our food coop, which is co-owned by 16,000 of us and does just bulk buys of everything we need. We also voulenteer to work 3 hrs a month (I do childcare).

Our groceries are the freshest, localist, most responsibily sourced and affordable in NYC 20-50% off other stores.

FoodCoop.com

Thx for sharing this. Really cool. Where I live, I'm pretty sure we don't have a coop...but I want one!

We do about $50MM in revenue a year and also provide startup capital, training and voulenteer labor to help folks start their own.

Drop by for a tour and say hey if you do.

Could you please tell more about this grocery accountant? Sounds super interesting. How does it work? Thank you.

Razor blades are small. Assuming parent poster shaves every single day of that ten years, and each blade only lasts for two shaves, they'd need about 1830 blades.

That's 19 boxes of these, which probably fit in a shoe box.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Derby-100-Extra-Shaving-Blades/dp/B...

Given that he mentioned dropping $1000, I'm guessing he's talking about cartridge blades (e.g. Gilette Mach III), that cost a couple of bucks each and take up probably 20x as much space when packaged. Still not that much actual space needed. A small moving box would probably hold decades worth; definitely if stripped of the outer packaging.

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