Using Samples - Duh

Using soap samples has been a challenge for me. 

I face lather and don't care for lather bowls.  I recently discovered that i can scoop some of a sample and "paste" it into the edge of the sink, add hot water to the sink as I always do and load a brush onto the "pasted" sample. 

Its not the same as loading a brush directly from a tub, but it works quite well when using soap from a small sample container.

I don't know why it's taken me this long to discover this way of using sample soap.

Makes sense if you're not going to use a bowl. After all, the sink is just a big bowl.

Do you just leave it there until it’s gone?  I suppose you could even put several different samples up. Interesting but I wouldn’t go near that technique. My wife would have something to say about it 

I put out enough for one shave.  What’s left gets washed or wiped away.  Happy missus

I guess this is about like I've seen guys put soap into a loading bowl, but you don't need another item. 
Yep that's a nice hack of sorts, in a good way.

Um,... just smear it on your face. Then you can, you know, face lather.

I bowl lather, but I still do not like using samples. They are great for evaluating whether you will like the scent or not, but I have difficulty developing the same lather from a sample than I get when loading directly from a tub. The exception to this is creams, croaps and very soft soaps that cannot be loaded directly from a tub without the risk getting too much soap. For those, I scoop out enough soap for the shave and press it into the bottom of my bowl.

This year I’ve transitioned to being a dedicated scoop smear in bowl then bowl lather so samples work as well as anything. I just had a really bad run of nasty stuff growing on soap in the tub leading to disposal of about a dozen soaps some basically brand new. Very disappointing. I figure the less contact with soap surface in the tub with brush and water etc the better. I’ll still lather off the puck with hard soaps like Tabac or MdC. Not a fan of impromptu science experiments.  If I were to try this smearing on the sink technique I would wipe down the sink with a bleach wipe first.

This year I’ve transitioned to being a dedicated scoop smear in bowl then bowl lather so samples work as well as anything. I just had a really bad run of nasty stuff growing on soap in the tub leading to disposal of about a dozen soaps some basically brand new. Very disappointing. I figure the less contact with soap surface in the tub with brush and water etc the better. I’ll still lather off the puck with hard soaps like Tabac or MdC. Not a fan of impromptu science experiments.  If I were to try this smearing on the sink technique I would wipe down the sink with a bleach wipe first.

This!