No more badger brushes for Art of Shaving

Jeff,

I have become a real softy in my old age.
I believe that cruelty to any creature is untenable.
I was once an avid fisherman and gave that up completely years ago when I saw a pail of beautiful but very dead smelt that I helped to kill.
When I was a teenager I shot a beautiful little leopard frog with an air pistol. I vomited. I have not killed an animal since then.
Just this spring I hired a specialist to remove, alive, a racoon family and an invasion of squirrels from my attic. My soft headedness cost me $1,600.00. Those coons are mean people but they deserve to live.

There is only one kind of animal that I might kill but we are wisely not permitted to discuss politics here.

Besides, I am nuts about the synthetic brushes. If I ever hear of anyone being cruel to a synth I will probably turn  to face lathering.  I dread that day.

Mickey

Jeff,

I have become a real softy in my old age.
I believe that cruelty to any creature is untenable.
I was once an avid fisherman and gave that up completely years ago when I saw a pail of beautiful but very dead smelt that I helped to kill.
When I was a teenager I shot a beautiful little leopard frog with an air pistol. I vomited. I have not killed an animal since then.
Just this spring I hired a specialist to remove, alive, a racoon family and an invasion of squirrels from my attic. My soft headedness cost me $1,600.00. Those coons are mean people but they deserve to live.

There is only one kind of animal that I might kill but we are wisely not permitted to discuss politics here.

Besides, I am nuts about the synthetic brushes. If I ever hear of anyone being cruel to a synth I will probably turn  to face lathering.  I dread that day.

Mickey

Im getting old and softy too.I do agree with you that cruelty is untenable.However , in China , theyre going to keep killing dogs , badgers and every other creature that they can.

Jeff,

I have become a real softy in my old age.
I believe that cruelty to any creature is untenable.
I was once an avid fisherman and gave that up completely years ago when I saw a pail of beautiful but very dead smelt that I helped to kill.
When I was a teenager I shot a beautiful little leopard frog with an air pistol. I vomited. I have not killed an animal since then.
Just this spring I hired a specialist to remove, alive, a racoon family and an invasion of squirrels from my attic. My soft headedness cost me $1,600.00. Those coons are mean people but they deserve to live.

There is only one kind of animal that I might kill but we are wisely not permitted to discuss politics here.

Besides, I am nuts about the synthetic brushes. If I ever hear of anyone being cruel to a synth I will probably turn  to face lathering.  I dread that day.

Mickey

Im getting old and softy too.I do agree with you that cruelty is untenable.However , in China , theyre going to keep killing dogs , badgers and every other creature that they can.

They'll keep killing dogs, badgers and every other creature that they can so long as people in this country continue to buy their products. I've made a concerted effort to not buy Chinese products when possible. There are times when it isn't possible. This computer. My cell phone. iPad. iPod. And badger brushes. I have one more knot to get and it will be an Envy Shave Luxury Silvertip. I'm guessing it's made in China. But after I buy that knot I won't be buying anymore knots as I am now set with 4 each of badger, boar and synthetic. But I do look at all labels and if I see Made In China, I put it down and move on. I recently bought some Nike sneakers. Some of the ones I was considering were Made In China. The ones I ended up with are Made In India.

Jeff,

I have become a real softy in my old age.
I believe that cruelty to any creature is untenable.
I was once an avid fisherman and gave that up completely years ago when I saw a pail of beautiful but very dead smelt that I helped to kill.
When I was a teenager I shot a beautiful little leopard frog with an air pistol. I vomited. I have not killed an animal since then.
Just this spring I hired a specialist to remove, alive, a racoon family and an invasion of squirrels from my attic. My soft headedness cost me $1,600.00. Those coons are mean people but they deserve to live.

There is only one kind of animal that I might kill but we are wisely not permitted to discuss politics here.

Besides, I am nuts about the synthetic brushes. If I ever hear of anyone being cruel to a synth I will probably turn  to face lathering.  I dread that day.

Mickey

Im getting old and softy too.I do agree with you that cruelty is untenable.However , in China , theyre going to keep killing dogs , badgers and every other creature that they can.

They'll keep killing dogs, badgers and every other creature that they can so long as people in this country continue to buy their products.  I've made a concerted effort to not buy Chinese products when possible.  There are times when it isn't possible.  This computer.  My cell phone.  iPad.  iPod.  And badger brushes.  I have one more knot to get and it will be an Envy Shave Luxury Silvertip.  I'm guessing it's made in China.  But after I buy that knot I won't be buying anymore knots as I am now set with 4 each of badger, boar and synthetic.  But I do look at all labels and if I see Made In China, I put it down and move on.  I recently bought some Nike sneakers.  Some of the ones I was considering were Made In China.  The ones I ended up with are Made In India.

Trust me , we are on the same boat.I have been thinking and Ill totally switch to synthetics soon , keeping with me some old badger brushes.

But , once again ,wether we buy from them or not , they are going to keep killing badgers.Maybe not as many as now but they would as they have always done.

I hope to be wrong and badger wont become an extinct species soon.

It's hard to believe AoS had no clue about the controversy with badgers in some parts of the world. Also, what do they mean they are going to look at developing alternatives to animal hair? Do they not realize those alternatives already exist? It's not like they were "developing" brushes to begin with, as I'm pretty sure they outsourced their brush making to Muhle, but I don't believe they have ever admitted it, just that they are made in Germany or by a German company. To be fair, I respect their desire to remove badger brushes from their line of products, I just don't believe they are being genuine. I do still love their Sandalwood shaving soap!

I think maybe what they're hoping with "developing alternatives" is to start using synthetic knots and claim to be all innovative and vegan and etc., even though synthetics have been used for a while in our little niche. that said, I don't think we're AoS target market...I think they want the average Joe who walks by their store in the mall or whatever and sees the coolness of old school shaving and breaks out a boat load of money for their products.

Yeah, the average Joe that's going get swindled paying $200 for a brush with a $10 knot. Poor guys...

It's hard to believe AoS had no clue about the controversy with badgers in some parts of the world. Also, what do they mean they are going to look at developing alternatives to animal hair? Do they not realize those alternatives already exist? It's not like they were "developing" brushes to begin with, as I'm pretty sure they outsourced their brush making to Muhle, but I don't believe they have ever admitted it, just that they are made in Germany or by a German company. To be fair, I respect their desire to remove badger brushes from their line of products, I just don't believe they are being genuine. I do still love their Sandalwood shaving soap!

I think maybe what they're hoping with "developing alternatives" is to start using synthetic knots and claim to be all innovative and vegan and etc., even though synthetics have been used for a while in our little niche.  that said, I don't think we're AoS target market...I think they want the average Joe who walks by their store in the mall or whatever and sees the coolness of old school shaving and breaks out a boat load of money for their products.

Funny. I was one of those guys walking in the mall with my wife and as we went by she said to me, let's check it out. So we had the salesperson give us a demonstration. We walked out with the medium size sandalwood travel kit containing shave cream, pre shave oil, aftershave balm and a small pure badger brush. She said it was a Christmas present. It was $60. I'm a cheap bastard and was kind of like "That's too much money for this." But we got it anyway. That was the weekend after Thanksgiving 2015. Since then I jumped into the deep end and haven't stopped until recently. But, the only thing I've bought from AOS since then was a full tub of the Sandalwood shaving cream which I absolutely love. I've been back in there to smell the other shave cream scents but none of them have moved me enough to buy them.

People in the Third World don't have the dubious luxury of driving to some snobby grocery store to buy "organic" goods. Life there is short, nasty & brutish and any protein that can be used is. Having spent time in the Third World and seen abject squalor I understand perfectly well why they do as they do, just as out forefathers did. It's called survival. Whether we buy brushes or not the Chinese will eat badgers. P&G is merely taking a PC position to calm the triggered hand wringers.

Its been confirmed by a AoS Utah store manager (we have 2 in the whole state...) that this is true but they dont know when the changes are going to happen.He thinks before Christmas , which seems kind of logical but also could be by the end of November (kind of a Black Friday deal for the badger brushes).

He also told me that brushes would go for 50% off or even more to clear up all the inventory since they cant be returned to the maker (most of them are made by Viktoria , others by Muhle and Vulfix , I think).

He didnt know who would be the maker of the new AoS synthetic brushes either how many models would be offer.

We shall see , but in the case the brushes would go for a 50% off , I think Ill score a silvertip one (Viktoria made) since , for that price (around 100) would make them a more than a decent brush for the price.

Are they going to sell ridiculously overpriced synthetic brushes instead now?