SOTD by u/curbside_champ

u/curbside_champ posted on 2024-06-28 14:21:56-07:00 (Pacific Standard Time). Reddit Comment (See markdown)

June 28, 2024 – Frugal Friday

  • Brush: Green Boar Brush
  • Razor: Schick Injector
  • Blade: Schick Injector Blade
  • Lather: Red House Farm – Prairie Dog
  • Post Shave: Thayer’s - Original
  • Fragrance: Duke Cannon – Old Glory solid cologne.

Yesterday I deeply upset another member, u/putneycj, with my frivolous water usage. I want to apologize and make it up to him in the most frugal way possible. Today I used precisely 1 cup of water for the entirety of my shave from brush soak to final pass.

  • The Lather: Since this is frugal Friday I wanted to make sure I used only what I needed and what was the cheapest item of that variety in my den. To that end I started by soaking my tiny little green boar brush (given to me by u/2SaintsDude) in 1 cup of warm water. You can currently find what I believe is this brush (there is no branding) on Walmart for a whopping $0.79. While this was happening, I measured out 1 g of soap into my cheapest “shaving bowl.” I went straight from the soaking and right to lathering so as to conserve the precious little water I allotted myself. This soap lathers beautifully though even with the worlds cheapest brush.
  • The Shave: After looking at current pricing, I determined the Schick injector to be my cheapest razor in my den and equipped it with its cheapest blade. I shaved using only the original brush soaking water and used that same water to rinse after I finished.
  • Aftershave/Frag: My cheapest aftershave by ounce is definitely Thayer’s Original. Not only is the bottle massive by comparison it costs only $8. My cheapest Frag has to be Duke Cannon’s Old Glory Solid cologne. Its cheap and seems to last forever.
  • Theme/Challenge: I used the cheapest of everything in my collection. Bowl, brush, razor, blade, aftershave, and frag. Please see the cost breakdown and analysis for how much I saved.
  • Cost Per Item:
  • Soap: I used 1 g of soap and at $.1058 per gram that is $.11
  • Aftershave: To determine my actual aftershave usage I decided to go by weight and weighed the bottle pre and post shave as well as weighing a 5 mL sample of the aftershave to get a proper conversion (13 g / 5 mL). Using that I found that I used 2 g (.76 mL) of aftershave at $.032 per mL or $.02.
  • Frag: I tried using weight to determine my frag usage, but the difference in weight was immeasurable on my cheap scale. As best as I can determine it was less than .5g and I will split the difference between that and 0 with an estimated usage of .25g. This makes my Frag ($13.33 per ounce) for the day cost $0.12.
  • Brush: At $0.79 and likely to get no more than 100 awful shaves, I estimate about $0.01
  • Razor: Schick Injector razors can currently be found for 29.99 on Murphy and McNeil. I will give it a 10 year usage estimate and make its cost per daily shave $0.01.
  • Blade: Having never used an injector blade to its maximum I have to estimate the lifespan for me to be approximately 30 shaves. At about $0.68 per blade that brings the days blade cost to $0.02.
  • Bowl: The bowl set me back $10 but due to the fact it is stainless steal and unlikely to ever need be replaced the cost calculation per shave is effectively $0.
  • Water: I used 1 cup at $2.93 per 748 gallons for a grand total of $0.00024. More importantly I hope putneycj is appeased with this water ~~frugality~~ conservation.
  • Cost Analysis: The up front cost for the items used for today is approximately $142.79 with a large portion of it being the purchase of blades in bulk. By purchasing it in that way, however, the total cost for todays shave comes down to a measly $0.29 or . 1 cartridge easy costs 10 times that price and that doesn’t account for the canned goop, aftershave, and frag that would be used with it. I am quite happy to be saving so much money with my shave today and with my current stock I should be able to have this cheap of a shave for the next 20 years. Obviously I plan to live longer than that so I will continue to stock up and keep the savings going longer.
  • Acknowledgement: This tub of Red House Farm – Prairie Dog was won in a PIF put on by u/grindermonk

I have video proof, but since I can’t have my voice or face in the video for work reasons I’ve deleted the link. I never expected judges to watch my whole videos and only look to see that I did what I said and give a contrast to todays frugal shave. Sorry whoever judged yesterday’s, and just so you know the water gets reused on agriculture so it is not wasted.

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This SOTD is part of the challenge
  1. Lather Games 2024