Close shave with a sharp talker

Will King loves talking about the King of Shaves - it's impossible to stop him. Photo / Supplied

Will King is the sort of geezer who could talk the beard off Moses.

He's a one man barber-shop chorus; promoting himself and his King of Shaves brand as the Richard Branson of shaving, and likening it to the iPod, the iPhone, in fact the whole of Apple in one breath.

There's even promise of a Susan Boyle moment later this year.

The fast-talking Brit is here next week on a visit downunder.

The challenger brand has been in New Zealand since 1997, but he's out to spruik a razor handle.

While most punters don't get too worked up about the tools used to scrape off their facial fuzz in the morning, it's clear why Will King and the rest of the shaving industry does - it's worth an estimated $30 billion a year.

In New Zealand supermarkets sell about $50 million of shaving products annually. The gorilla of them all, Gillette, has more than 60 per cent of the market.

King loves talking about his company - it's impossible to stop him - but he spends a good part of a phone interview from Sydney talking about the opposition.

There's a fair degree of respect for Gillette but he's not overawed by the Proctor and Gamble subsidiary which, alongside Schick Wilkinson Sword, has tied him up in patent battles for five years.

When King of Shaves eventually was able to launch its Azor handle two years ago, it went for a four-blade configuration, deliberately opting out of the "blade-count arms race".

Handles were being powered up with batteries, cartridges loaded with suspension, lube strips, trimmers, open architecture to facilitate stubble draining and five or more blades.

King reckons shaver savvy forced the industry to step back from the brink of a blade escalation that could have reached double figures.

"The whole blade-count arms race has dialled back now because the consumer is wised up to the fact that a 20-bladed razor won't give you any better shave than a four or five."

The Suffolk-raised 44-year-old started King of Shaves in 1993, selling shaving oil. He started mixing essential oils in his kitchen sink and achieving sales of just £300 ($640). Now his privately owned company has sales of more than £30 million worldwide, half made up of handles and blades, the rest oil, creams and gels.

A women's range, Queen of ... has just been launched in Britain. Its release in other countries will depend on its takeup there.

King crusades on the cost of shaving, accusing his rivals of slapping unreasonable margins on cartridges.

Last year reports in Britain surfaced of a Government probe into the price of shaving products after revelations of mark-ups of more than 4000 per cent on cartridges. The high price of refill packs mean some are specially tagged to prevent shop lifting. King of Shaves cartridges cost about 30p to make and sell for about £1.25.

He says Gillette's Fusion cartridges cost as little as a third of that to make but are sold for as much as £3, although they have two more blades.

In NZ a supermarket price check shows a similar price differential - Fusion cartridges $6.50 each, King of Shaves $3.70 each - with Schick falling in between. Home Brand cartridges are $1.12 each but they have just three blades.

King says his sales and marketing budget is about 30 to 40 per cent of sales. "That's a punchy number but the visibility on it has gone virtual rather than real," he says.

"There aren't so many cheer squad girls. What we're doing is using social media channels generally over what I'd call normal experiential channels."

Hence the looming Susan Boyle-style internet sensation.

The trend towards more facial hair is making the market a little tricky.

"We're currently in what I call a hairy, beard, goatee facial hair managed environment but these are cycles we go in and out of."

There was heavy individual trending where men wanted to be their own masters, driven by the i-Generation rather than celebrities.

"We're right now in a 'man' phase in terms of grooming and that will cycle through to a clean-shaven look.

"Or we'll all grow beards and I'll go out of business - who knows."

CUTTING IT FINE

Will King's shaving trend tips:
* The world is going through a "hairy yet managed" phase.
* The i-Generation is far less led by what celebrities look like.
* Razor makers have stepped back from the brink in blade-count escalation.
* Hardware - the razor handles, will continue to be relatively inexpensive, locking shavers into expensive cartridge systems.
* The market:About $30 billion worldwide
* $55 million in NZKing of Shaves boss says beards are back and the 'blade-count arms race' is over