Most Used Gear for 2018

I have two full calendar years of tracking gear usage in an excel sheet. I've been going through the 2018 results this morning and there weren't too many surprises.


Soap Brand: Mystic Water (17%)

Soap Scent: It's a tie with 18 uses each (5%). Mystic Water Leather & Smoke and Wholly Kaw Merchant of Tobacco (to be honest, I noticed the MoT soap was disappearing quickly and when the "donut hole" started to appear, I used it much more often in anticipation of finishing my 1st tub of soap).

AS Brand: Chatillon Lux...no surprise on that one (31%)

AS Scent: L&L Grooming After the Rain (6%) - this was a surprise at first. But, then I realized I traveled more this year than I have in years past and After the Rain has become my travel AS. The next highest was Stirling MITA...this stuff felt so good in the hot summer months!

Razor: Rockwell 6S (21%) - absolutely no surprise on this one. My next highest-use razor was the Rex Ambassador and it was used about half as much as the 6S

Brush: Wild West Brushworks (greenish cream color) 24 mm tuxedo


The biggest surprise to me was the soap category. I wasn't surprised about the most used brand or scent but what caught my eye was the number of "0" in the "# Times Used" column. The majority of them are samples and I'm ok with that...I mainly buy samples to test the scent. But there were about 40 tubs of soap that didn't get used this year.

One of my "wet-shaving" goals for 2019 will be to disperse with the soaps I have that are not getting any use and to use up the soaps I have in the den. I'll make a couple of exceptions but I plan to limit my purchases in the upcoming year.

So what was your Most Used Gear and do you have any goals/resolutions for 2019?

Rex Ambassador.
BTRC soaps and asb’s of course.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Rex Ambassador.
BTRC soaps and asb’s of course.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I acquired the BTRC balm (An Affair) and have been using it more often due to the weather...great stuff

I'm also a tracker. I like how pivot table reports can show ongoing totals of which products are getting used. Really not that much work to set up and keep updated.

Most used brush: A tie between Plisson #12 HMW (34) and  Plisson #10 2-band (34)
Most used soap: Long Rifle Voyageur (62)
Most used aftershave: Wholly Kaw King of Oud (77)
Most used razor: Gillette Single Ring (243)
Most used blade: Kai (179)

Top 5 soap brands: Eufros (68), Long Rifle (67), WK (56), Mystic Water (54) CRSW (41)

I sold off a lot of excess from my den this year which almost covered all of my purchases. Next year I will not have much to sell, but also doubt I will purchase much in the hardware department.

I did not keep a log this year (after keeping extensive logs in 2015-2017), but I am planning to keep a simplified one in 2019.

My guess:

1. Razor - Wolfman WR1 - 0.67 - Used it for a month and then some

2. Brush - For the second year in a row - a lowly Cashmere Brush with whipped dog handle, most used natural hair brush - Declaration Grooming + Dogwood 26mm B4

3. Soap Brand - No clue, really, none

4. Aftershave - 100% certain about this - Barrister and Mann Reserve (finished full cool, lavender sample, fern sample, almost finished full classic). Next would be chattilon lux AS/Salve

5. Blade - hmm, excluding straights - Wizamet Iridium Super (second would be Personna 74 or Kai)

Micromatic Open Comb, Gem PTFE blades, Body Shop Maca Root soap, Plisson synth brush.

I also use Excel for a shave log, now mainly for notes on good vs bad things. In prior years, it tracked usage. But in June of 2018 the Christopher Bradley razor by Karve Shaving Co landed in the mail box and has been used over 170 times!! Second is my Slim, at 67 shaves. Only the pre-War Tech joins them, all other razors (around 10) have been sold or given away.

Blades, soaps, and brushes rotate amongst my favorites, with only a SynBad brush getting reached for more often than the other synthetics.

Goals: continue to use up soaps I have before buying new ones, no purchases of blades unless single tuck or two as I have 4 brands in bulk already, no brush purchases as I honed the brush collection down to what I really like and enjoy, and no razor purchases until Karve Shaving releases the open comb plates. I have my eye on the B plate.

I would like 2019 to be full of enjoyable shaves with no expensive purchases! As discussed in another thread here, many of us spend and acquire at a staggering rate when many originally got into traditional shaving to save money.

I'm also a tracker. I like how pivot table reports can show ongoing totals of which products are getting used. Really not that much work to set up and keep updated.

I'll be setting up a new spreadsheet tomorrow. I don't know much about the pivot tables but just a quick Google search and now I'm really excited to set up the new spreadsheet!

I'm also a tracker. I like how pivot table reports can show ongoing totals of which products are getting used. Really not that much work to set up and keep updated.

I'll be setting up a new spreadsheet tomorrow.  I don't know much about the pivot tables but just a quick Google search and now I'm really excited to set up the new spreadsheet!

I didn't know anything about pivot tables before this effort either. Or photography, using a dremmel or a host of other things haha. Funny what rabbit holes a hobby can lead to!

I'm going to try and keep a spreadsheet in 2019.

I never paid attention to what I use most often but it'll be interesting to see this time next year.