A tale of two Palmolives...
European vs.
American Palmolive shave lather.
By Giovanni
Abrate
The Colgate-Palmolive company recently discontinued
production of its venerable Palmolive shaving cream, a product that had been in
production for nearly a century. Its latest (and, as it happened, last) version
came in a rather dull-looking white and red plastic tube and sold in the local
drugstore for a couple of dollars.
In Europe, Palmolive shaving lather is still very much in production and can be found, in a stylish green tube, in every European Country. The Italian market is even more interesting: in Italy there are two versions of the Palmolive shave lather: a regular version, similar to the standard European cream and a cooling version with menthol.
The Italian standard lather comes in a red box, the menthol lather in a green box.
Italian Mentholated cream
Italian classic cream
The European Palmolive lather is made in Belgium.
I decided to do a quick, hands-on comparison between
the discontinued American Palmolive cream and the current European one.
Let’s look at the differences:
Color: the American cream has a yellowy greenish color that is really quite unattractive; the European cream has a cooler, bluer green tint that looks, to me at least, much better.
Scent:
the European cream has the typical Palmolive
scent. It is distinctive and, in this case, it has a perfumed undertone
that is
quite pleasant. The American cream has a variant of the classic
Palmolive scent, which has an acrid, almost industrial-type of odor.
There are similarities, but the American cream is, in my opinion, much
less attractively scented than its European counterpart.
The important characteristics, however, are in their
shaving performance, so I decided to do a side-by-side shave and compare the
results.
Lather: in this area the European cream wins
hands-down: the lather is richer, thicker and takes less effort to whip up. The
American lather gave me a slightly uncomfortable “tingle”: not quite an
allergic reaction, but it was not totally pleasant. The European cream gave me
no hint of that and felt cool and rich on my face.
Lubrication: both creams are quite good, especially
considering their low price. The European cream felt and performed better than
the Americam Palmolive.
Beard conditioning: both creams were about equal in
this area. They softened the beard and the following shave was very close and
clean.
Skin conditioning: here the American cream fell short: I still had a slight discomfort, perhaps a hint of razor burn. The European cream left my skin relaxed and smooth. Much better than the American product.
Conclusions: even though it was inferior to the European Palmolive, I actually liked the American Palmolive lather: after all, it performed well and for very little money. I like the classic Palmolive scent, even when it is a bit roughly rendered, as was the case with the American Palmolive cream. The slight discomfort to the skin that I encountered when using the American cream quickly disappeared with the application of a good aftershave balm.
The European cream (in this test I used the Italian “normal” cream) is really a much better product: great scent (to me), excellent, rich lather and superb skin conditioning. It is still being made with palm oil, like the original formulation. The American lather did not have any palm oil in its formula. I love the Italian mentholated version even more, but, in truth, I do love every shaving product that contains menthol and the cooling effect it generates.
1940's Palmolive Shave Cream
There are also other versions of Palmolive shave lather in production, like the Lemon scented version in the lime-colored tube shown in the picture below. This cream is made in India and is quite good and refreshing.
The
right thing for the Colgate-Palmolive company
to do would be to distribute the European shaving cream in North
America: it is a
truly excellent product and they could do so and still keep the price
low, thanks to their widespread distribution network.
I doubt
whether they’ll do that, however, since they seem to be abandoning the
traditional wetshaving market in the U.S.
In the meantime, for those of us in the U.S. who
want to use the excellent European cream, there are some vendors in Europe
that will ship to the U.S. or it can be purchased right here, at our Barbieria
Italiana, together with the Italian mentholated version and several other
Italian and European shaving products.