Today’s Shave- Face-off between Personna Lab Blue and AccuThrive Prep Blade
Today’s face-off was made possible by a generous donation by an anonymous donor. Thanks to whomever made the donation.
If you do not want to take the time to read some of the history of these blades, you can skip down to the review section.
Both the Personna “Comfort Coated” Lab Blue and AccuThrive Prep Blades were manufactured by AccuTec Blades in Verona, VA. The company also has a facility in Mexico. AccuTec was once a part of American Safety Razor Corporation. The company traces its roots back to 1875 when Star Razor released the first safety razor. The company has operated in Verona, VA since 1954. It is the sole producer of razor blades remaining in the USA.
American Safety Razor Company was formed from the merger of Gem and EverReady. Later they merged with Star Razor to form American Safety Razor Corporation. As years passed, they acquired Pal Blade company, bringing the Pal, Treet and Personna brands to the fold.
The fortunes of the company went through various transitions being acquired by Phillip Morris and later Energizer Holdings which also owned Schick/Wilkinson Sword. In 2015, Energizer decided to spin off the personal care products as Edgewell Personal Care. However, the plant in Verona, VA primarily produced products for industrial, laboratory and medical uses. That facility was purchased by investors who renamed it AccuTec blades. However, due to the previous association with Personna, many products continued to be marketed under the Personna and Pal brands.
Fast forward a few years and AccuTec decided to rebrand its medical blades under the AccuThrive brand and industrial/trade/laboratory products under the AccuForge brand. However, they will still continue to sell some products under the Personna and PAL brandS. The “comfort coated” description is also being changed to Microcoat. I do not know if the actual coating process or thickness has changed.
I always believed that the blades produced for laboratory use commonly known as Personna Lab Blues and the Hospital Use blades commonly known as Personna Med Prep blades differed only in the extra cleaning and packaging steps needed to insure the blades were safe for hospital use. Since the Med Prep blades are four times more expensive than the Lab Blue blades, I doubted that the extra cleaning steps would affect blade performance enough to compensate for the difference in cost. However, there are a number of shavers who claim that the Med Prep blades are significantly better for shaving than the Lab Blue blades. I plan to put that claim to the test with today’s face-off shave.
*********************************** Blade Review Starts Here******************************
I began today’s shave with the Voskhod blade in the Karve C-plate Stainless razor. After a few strokes, I replaced that blade with a fresh AccuThrive Prep blade. I installed a Personna “Comfort Coated” lab blue blade in my Karve C-plate brass razor. I started by using the stainless razor to shave the left side of my face and the brass razor to shave the right side.
As expected, the Voskhod blade was still mid-sharp with moderate blade resistance with my two-day beard. The Med Prep blade was significantly sharper with minimal blade resistance. Unfortunately, the Lab Blue blade was horribly dull. It tugged painfully at my beard. The blade did become sharper as the coating wore off, but the sharpness on the WTG pass was a 2 level. The Med Prep blade was so superior that I decided to abort the evaluation of the Lab Blue blade and finish the shave with the Med Prep.
The prep blade was sharp enough to achieve a near-BBS shave, but when applying witch hazel after the shave, there was significant feedback on both sides of my face, not just the one where I started with the Lab Blue.
Thus, I am rating the AccuThrive Super Med Prep blade as 4.5 on sharpness, but only 4 on smoothness. I am rating the Lab Blue blade with the same 3 sharpness / 3 smoothness rating as the previous evaluation, but I was tempted to rate it even lower since the WTG pass was so uncomfortable. The only way I can use the Lab Blue blades would be to cork them or strop them before use. They are not worth that effort since there are many alternatives that do not require this extra step.
Thus, for those who insist upon a “Made in USA” blade, I would recommend the AccuThrive prep blade. They are a significant improvement over the Lab Blue blades. However, they are rather expensive. There are plenty of alternatives from other countries if “Made in USA” is not a requirement.
After evaluations are complete, I will be including any remaining Lab Blue blades in a PIF. They are just not suitable for my beard.
The evaluation spreadsheet has been updated with the results of today’s shave.
The shave on Sunday will be with the Jaguar 8094 platinum coated blades. Although Jaguar is based in Germany, I understand the blades are produced by Lord in Egypt. The Lord Platinum Diamond Edge blade performed well, so I hope these will as well.
