Analyzing The Wet Shaving Market in 2023

Educating the masses = Big $$$

Looking forward to that Super Bowl ad on Sunday!

Thanks all, I appreciate it. I hope everyone gets paid what they're worth too!

Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

Debating whether to stay out of "politics" on the forum, but this is laughable

The person trying to underpay employees and squeeze every drop out of them is finding... employees aren't giving quality work? Shocker!

You get what you pay for.

Maybe so, maybe not...

The manager asked me an absolute soft ball question last night during my interview about how to do something and I thought she was joking. Apparently she wasn't and there are people applying for senior roles that cannot answer the question she asked, which is like basic stuff....

The recruiter then followed up on this by telling me they had 2 people who applied for senior IT roles who could not answer some basic, fundamental IT questions.

In other words, there seems to be some people in the labor market overvaluing their talent for jobs they not suitable to be working in...



Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

Debating whether to stay out of "politics" on the forum, but this is laughable

The person trying to underpay employees and squeeze every drop out of them is finding... employees aren't giving quality work? Shocker!

You get what you pay for.

Maybe so, maybe not...

The manager asked me an absolute soft ball question last night during my interview about how to do something and I thought she was joking. Apparently she wasn't and there are people applying for senior roles that cannot answer the question she asked, which is like basic stuff....

The recruiter then followed up on this by telling me they had 2 people who applied for senior IT roles who could not answer some basic, fundamental IT questions.

In other words, there seems to be some people in the labor market overvaluing their talent for jobs they not suitable to be working in...



Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

So, did you get the gig!?

Debating whether to stay out of "politics" on the forum, but this is laughable

The person trying to underpay employees and squeeze every drop out of them is finding... employees aren't giving quality work? Shocker!

You get what you pay for.

Maybe so, maybe not...

The manager asked me an absolute soft ball question last night during my interview about how to do something and I thought she was joking.  Apparently she wasn't and there are people applying for senior roles that cannot answer the question she asked, which is like basic stuff....

The recruiter then followed up on this by telling me they had 2 people who applied for senior IT roles who could not answer some basic, fundamental IT questions. 

In other words, there seems to be some people in the labor market overvaluing their talent for jobs they not suitable to be working in...



Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

So, did you get the gig!?

Hopefully, so we can get some raises around here. We're still only paid what we're worth.

There are a lot of fake it till you make it types out there. I’m sure you’ve heard of the Dunning Kruger effect. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%...ger_effect

Let me analyze the thread analyzing the market.
Alot is guessing and conjecture. Only the true merchants can tell you how the market is. Spitballing shavesoap, ASL, balm, razor markets is kind of like day trading using week old newspapers to make your bets. And as a merchant, thats really all it is, using your money to bet that a customer somewhere might want to buy something you have. If you don't sell, you lost that bet.
Analyzing the market from a merchants perspective.
If you don't have piles of cash laying around to supply the customer with titanium tubs that their great grand children can reuse, if you don't have the cash to pay an artist to draw a nude nubile girl riding a dragon bareback through Krokus flowers, if you don't have the cash for water proof stickers that can be peeled from that titanium tub for reuse, if you don't have the fat stacks of cash to push your product up from your own website, on google searches, ebay searches, forum chatter, u-tube channels, you will not get a return on your shave soap investment. You have to have cash reserves for the collaborations of the leading scent makers to make one of a kind numbered shavesoap releases. And then, you might need to grab another stack of cash to buy a building, renovate it, then fill it, and hire up some employees to run it Because, if you can afford all of the above, and run a melt-and-pour operation, you will be highly successful and be asked to guest speak at your sponsored shave meet-up and men will impale themselves in battle defending your high-end melt-and-pour shavesoap.
I share dominicr ideology in only producing the staples of shaving. Promoting a new line of shavesoap just to kill it 12 mos later is a dick move. When designing and marketing my product I used the best ideas and practices employed by soapers like Dom and Rod with the singular idea that performance is what matters most in a shave. And that performance is what should push that soap to a person's bathroom sink. As a merchant, I severely underestimated the market in that regard. The fact that users of this forum didn't recall my product as an example of how the shavesoap market performs when doing their analysis is a prime example of how stacks of cash NOT invested in all of the above mentioned marketing in this industry can affect your memory recall of available quality products. To surmise if ebay/etsy/amazon doesn't have you in a top 10 is reflective of this advertising and marketing niche.
So I guess another way to "analyze the market" would be to just scan top 10 lists, social media, websites and user mentions from a maker as to how much cash they are shoveling into their advertising furnace to garner your attention because staying relevant in label design and lengthy ingredient list is about all that matters. Performance of a product in the market really seems to matter far less.

Let me analyze the thread analyzing the market.
Alot is guessing and conjecture. Only the true merchants can tell you how the market is. Spitballing shavesoap, ASL, balm, razor markets is kind of like day trading using week old newspapers to make your bets. And as a merchant, thats really all it is, using your money to bet that a customer somewhere might want to buy something you have. If you don't sell, you lost that bet.
Analyzing the market from a merchants perspective.
If you don't have piles of cash laying around to supply the customer with titanium tubs that their great grand children can reuse, if you don't have the cash to pay an artist to draw a nude nubile girl riding a dragon bareback through Krokus flowers, if you don't have the cash for water proof stickers that can be peeled from that titanium tub for reuse, if you don't have the fat stacks of cash to push your product up from your own website, on google searches, ebay searches, forum chatter, u-tube channels, you will not get a return on your shave soap investment. You have to have cash reserves for the collaborations of the leading scent makers to make one of a kind numbered shavesoap releases. And then, you might need to grab another stack of cash to buy a building, renovate it, then fill it, and hire up some employees to run it Because, if you can afford all of the above, and run a melt-and-pour operation, you will be highly successful and be asked to guest speak at your sponsored shave meet-up and men will impale themselves in battle defending your high-end melt-and-pour shavesoap.
I share dominicr ideology in only producing the staples of shaving. Promoting a new line of shavesoap just to kill it 12 mos later is a dick move. When designing and marketing my product I used the best ideas and practices employed by soapers like Dom and Rod with the singular idea that performance is what matters most in a shave. And that performance is what should push that soap to a person's bathroom sink. As a merchant, I severely underestimated the market in that regard. The fact that users of this forum didn't recall my product as an example of how the shavesoap market performs when doing their analysis is a prime example of how stacks of cash NOT invested in all of the above mentioned marketing in this industry can affect your memory recall of available quality products. To surmise if ebay/etsy/amazon doesn't have you in a top 10 is reflective of this advertising and marketing niche.
So I guess another way to "analyze the market" would be to just scan top 10 lists, social media, websites and user mentions from a maker as to how much cash they are shoveling into their advertising furnace to garner your attention because staying relevant in label design and lengthy ingredient list is about all that matters. Performance of a product in the market really seems to matter far less.

I get you. We're 7 years in and Sharpologist has mentioned us publicly ZERO times.
I'll add that our soap and scents can go up with ANY on his list.

I was trying to get folks who are in the trenches involved here olschoolsteel  and sorry for not tagging you. I went with my head and a quick look at the DFS merchant list. I obviously didn’t get everyone but that wasn’t my intent. I just wanted to get the ball rolling. And here you are. Your perspective is important. Clearly it’s not enough to have a great product and good looks. (Tell me about it). It’s unhelpful to say there’s a huge market out there because it’s virtually impossible to reach the entire market and probably undesirable too. I don’t know every artisan or merchant but from what I do know there are very few if any that have truly broad market access/appeal. Most target some form of niche or niches. Also need a business model that works. I worked for an oilfield service company a number of years ago that had come up with an innovative solution for drilling rigs. The business model they came up with was optionality. A customer could buy the system outright for $6M or they could rent it for as long or short a number of days as they liked for obviously less money per day. That business model made the principals, who’d mortgaged their homes to finance the business, wealthy men. It’s not always the mousetrap.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to condescend or tell you anything you don’t know. I’m just trying to get discussion going that everyone might find interesting. Exchanging ideas and sowing seeds.

No sign of slowing and have been very happy with my employees both in retention, in house promotion policies and with new employees. I get multiple responses when looking for folks. Demand has not slowed. I pay extremely well, and provide many perks.

Not in wetshaving industry fwiw.

Congrats Shane. You’ve always seemed to operate the right way and I’m excited to see what the future holds for you. Wish iou were still up here in the good half of CA…