Edit: as below, this has been discontinued

This is an emergency last-minute review, as Joe over at Italian Barber has informed us that Cacao is going the way of XXX very very soon.

Like the original classic RazoRock soap, this is a marzipan / sweet almond scented shaving soap, along the lines of Cella and Vitos. It’s quite the pleasant scent, if you like that sort of thing. Strength wise, it started off very nicely, however seemed to fade rather quickly. Not just over the course of a pass, but subsequent layers of lather put on between passes was also noticeably weaker than the previous applications, to the point that it was rather weakly scented at best by the end of the shave.

On the other hand, the lather performed admirably. It’s a very soft soap, and loaded up easily, and lathered nice and thick with just a bit of water. It could have used a tad more lubrication, but it wasn’t far off at all in that regard either. All in all, it gave a great shave, and had superior moisturizing properties as well.

9/10 Scent Pleasantness

7/10 Scent Strength

9/10 Quality of Lather (reflects new scoring as outlined here)

Overall, I’m going to say it’s a rather strong 8/10. In comparison to the most obvious competitor, I think it shaves better than Cella does, but Cella’s scent holds up better. Also, in comparison to the classic RazoRock, I haven’t tried it myself, but I’ve been told that they perform quite similarly. From what I can tell the main difference is just the inclusion of the Cacao Seed Butter in this version, and frankly, there’s not really much of that included anyways (2nd last ingredient on the list).

Cost: As I write this, there are 24 150mL tubs available left for $5.99 on Italian Barber.

Gear used:

Ingredients: Water(l’eau), cocos nucifera (coconut)oil, stearic acid, palmitic acid, potassium hydroxide, propylene glycol, myristic acid, peg-150 distearate, parfum(fragrance), simmondsia chinensis (jojoba) oil, tetrasodium edta , theobroma cacao(cocoa) seed butter, menthol