The Copenhagen Report

Most weeks, the Tjek section of Politiken makes for an interesting read. One focus of the section is on comparing a number of similar products sold in various shops around Denmark, and assessing which one represents the best value. 'Value' in the check section is typically a fairly holistic measure, encompassing price - but quality is really at the heart of it. The range of products that have been put to the Tjek test is quite broad – recent examples range from the mundane - like table salt (who would have known there was much of a taste difference between different types of sale, but Tjek made a convincing argument that there indeed is), the distinctly Danish, like packaged fish (mackeral, for the most part I believe) in tomato sauce, to this weeks featured produce - shaving cream.

Tjek really is a pretty useful endeavour, because frankly without investing a lot of time, effort and energy, it's pretty hard to assess most products in any detail, especially when it comes down to examining what sorts of additives they contain, and so forth. Which is where this weeks assessment of shaving cream was pretty revealing.

So let’s talk about shaving cream.

Now personally, I'm a big fan of 'Brig' shaving cream, which can be bought in Netto for a whopping 8 kroner (or approximately 1 Euro). This has always struck me as a far better value than the widely available alternative, Gilette (at about 5 times the cost). Comparing the two, Brig to me has an equally pleasant scent, does what it is supposed to do (ie. foam) - and a can of it seems to last forever. And really, who can quibble with the price?

So it was revealing to read Tjek to see how Brig rated, and how the alternatives stacked up. Brig was among the cheapest, but points were awarded for organic contents, no perfume, and non-harmful additives. I should also add at this point that I’m a huge fan of organic and non-perfumed products – soaps, etc. As more and more of these relatively natural products enter our apartment, the alternatives seem to become progressively less appealing - in many cases, at least. Especially when it comes to unnaturally flowery smelling perfumed soaps and detergents, and such.

So, Brig shaving cream it turns out, received a score 3 out of 6, handily outscoring Gilette (which managed a pitiful 1 out of 6 and was red-flagged in all categories).

But the clear winner was Anglamark Shaving Cream, available at the supermarket SuperBrugsen for 26 kroner - the only shaving cream to score 6 out of 6 – as it was the only shaving cream to contain absolutely no offending additives. As for Gilette, well, don't believe the advertising hype. There you have it.

Oh, be warned, the assessment did not get into niche categories such as 'best shaving cream pie' - should you be looking for just the right way to celebrate the winning goal in a future football victory, or such.