You said save MILLIONS ?!
You will find lots of info on the internet about savings gained by switching to (or starting out with) classic wet shaving, but very few are specific, and none offers any comparisons that are applicable to South African men and local products. This is why I have done a comparison shaving a few weeks with a popular 3 blade cartridge, their razor, a can of shaving gel and a can of shaving foam. I did the same with a shaving soap, safety razor and a brush. I have used a baseline costing by averaging offerings on the internet and supermarkets, and using pricing on our site.
I used an electronic scale to measure the weight of the soap and can after every shave, and recorded the result, as for the razors, I used them every day, cleaned them by stroking each tool away from the cutting edge for 5 cycles after every shave, and used it until it started pulling my stubble. The 3 blade cartridge lasted 8 shaves and the safety razor six, at a cost of R40 vs R 1,25 for each item individually I could already see where we were heading with blade cost alone.
The soap went a similar route; I used an average of 9 grams for every shave with the canned gel product, and 6 grams of the canned foam product, and an astounding 0.5 grams of shaving soap. I used this information to calculate how many cans and bars of soap one would use over a lifetime.
I suspect one would get an even wider difference when a very close two or three pass shave is a requirement, as one does not leave the foam/gel on a shaving brush or in a bowl, you rinse your hands before you shave and the excess lubricant is lost, this happens again on the second and third passes. Not being able to get the foam 'back in the can' is a killer for the economy of the canned stuff. When using a bowl and brush I could do a second and third pass with the same lather.
All the blades for 50 years of shaving fits in a shoe box!
The results were spectacular to say the least, 578 cans of shaving cream vs 31 large pucks of shaving soap. R 700 000 vs R 3200 if you keep on using the canned stuff bought periodically rather than going the brush and soap route and buying all your stuff now.
For this comparison I assumed you started shaving at 20 for half a decade, 6 days a week. I used the average inflation rate recorded in SA from inception until now. Sure, some blokes shave less that this, but some shave 7 days a week also The savings might drop for some and escalate for others, but the ratio's will remain similar.
The verdict;
Buy yourself a safety razor, brush and bowl, when using these tools you can buy all basic consumables you need for the rest of your life for around R 6 000. Keep on using your three, five or six blade razor and cartridge system with gel or foam products in a can and you will fork out R 2 300 000. This equates to a total cost ratio of 1:390... I know very well statistics and figures can be manipulated to create desired effects, but I don't think even the Gupta's statistician will be able to manipulate these figures into something that gets me to buy a 'mainstream product' ever again.
All of a sudden forking our a couple of grand on a fine handmade razor or brush does not bother me at all; I see it as rewarding myself for being very clever!
Some more info on this subject on our webpage.