Most Popular/Selling Shaving Soap Maker?

Big brand soap maker would have to be Proraso.

The most popular ones I see based on shave pics are (in no order):

Barrister and Mann
Catie's Bubbles
Declaration Grooming (Formerly L&L)
Stirling

It also kinda goes in waves cause at times there are certain artisans who have the spotlight for a month or so depending on what they're doing or if a few people review it and kinda snowballs.

We sell enough to have a handful of employees who help with shipping and wrapping/ labelling soap.  Mandy and I make every product (save the hardware) ourselves though.  We are considering either hiring someone to help with bath soap,  or possibly even having it made by someone who can triple mill the soap (provided they can make it of the same quality).

 I would assume we are at least in the top 5 in sales as far as artisan soap makers go, based on conversations with others in the industry.  That said, I don't think anyone is getting wealthy doing this yet.   If we didn't live in an area with low cost of living,  we'd either go out of business or significantly raise prices.  Mandy and I just really love doing this (most days). I still hold hope that this will continue to grow and maybe we'll be financially stable,  or maybe even considered semi-wealthy one day.  There are still  millions and millions of men and women who don't even know what wetshaving is,  much less have ever heard of Stirling Soap.

 For now we work long hours for less than we were making previously (I as a warrant officer in the Army and her as an IT employee for a government contractor). We don't want for much, though,  and we're happy with our quality of life.  We'll keep doing this as long as those two conditions are met.

Well, I for one, hope you continue to grow and flourish because I don't want you guys to ever stop doing what you're doing! You make fantastic products and provide the best customer service anyone could ask for. Thanks for that!

Well said Jeff!  I couldn't agree more.  For the money that Stirling charges and the quality of their soaps, aftershaves and other products - the best bargain out their IMO and great customer service to boot.  I wouldn't be surprised if Stirling was number 1 in sales - certainly close.

Nobody would know the answer to that question. Below are the artisans I suspect are among the top sellers, but in no particular order.

Stirling
Barrister and Mann
PAA/Crown King
Soap Commander
Razo Rock / Italian Barber

While I am sure Razorock sells a lot, they do not physically make their own product vs the other 4 you mentioned who make and sell their own product.

Now the funny thing is that each of the brands you mentioned are known to have a couple of people behind each company. I know a couple of them have a staff beyond the makers themselves. But in order to be respectful and keep what I was told private, I would prefer to refrain from saying who I know has employees to help them with the increased scale of the business.

That is correct. We don't make our own soap, we have partnered with artisan soap makers in Italy for our production. While I have made soap many times and spent weeks assisting to make our soaps at the workshops in Italy, I personally don't think I could do a better job than our partners. The partner with the least amount of experience is going on 3 generations of soap making in their family. All these workshops are outfitted with custom made equipment, some of the equipment is 30-40 years old, some of it starts in the baking industry and then is heavily customized for soap making.

I can't comment on quantities for other artisans but I do have some good insight (which I can't share) from conversations I've had with other soap makers. I can tell you our annual production/sales are in the mid five figures but our soaps are also wholesaled to other stockists, many of which are in Europe.

I doubt anybody in this business is getting rich, it's too small and niche for that. Companies like Proraso are making 3-4 million soaps/creams a year but they are working on very small margins as the majority of it's sales are done through grocery stores in Italy.

Although shaving soaps are a consumable, they take a long time to consume. Most people, even heavy every day shavers aren't using much more than 3-4 jars a year. Some guys shave all year with 1 triple milled puck.

The one thing you can do in a niche area is try to produce something a little more special and then charge a really high price for it. I think some of the newer soap artisans have taken this route and decided to keep production smaller but make a much larger margin per unit, ala Martin de Candre model. Is it better to sell 50K jars a year and make $1/jar, or, sell 1000 jars a year and make $50 a jar? It depends on your goals.

The same question can be asked in the razor business. Sometimes, when product is ultra niche, it's much smarter of a business move to go very high end. Wolfman is a great example of this. If you only want to sell 200-300 razors a year, it's possible to get $500-800/razor with the right finishing and attributes. If the business is only supporting 1 person, that may be enough. I have seem artisan tobacco pipe makers that make 60-70 pipes a year, and sell them for $2-5K each.