Be Better Guys

Irish Spring new Legendary Classic Scent Body Wash

You’ve probably known Irish Spring bar soap forever.  Hell, my dad used it and turned me on to it when I was, what, 7?  Recently Irish Spring has joined the crowded shelves of men’s body wash.  And their new “Legendary Classic” scent is meant to compete with Old Spice’s growth in this market, as well as AXE, which has been in the body wash field for the better part of the 2000s.  Overall the wash lathers richly and rinses without leaving your skin overly dry.  It could use more moisturizing components to it, as do all the widely-available body washes on the market.  For the money, this is a solid product.  My only knock on it, and all of the Irish Spring products of late, is, like the AXE products, they are very heavily perfumed.  My wife commented to me that while she thought the scent was fresh, she also thought it was too strong for what she is used to on me from regular bar soap and she thought it was too reminiscent of laundry detergent (not sure that jives with the marketing jargon on the bottle ‘born long ago in the rugged hills of Ireland’).  When you select a body wash in this price range, they all perform similarly and your real deciding factor is scent preference.  Most don’t use many, if any, all-natural products (for those, prepare to pay $15 and up for soaps using pricier ingredients). But in this price range, Irish Spring Body Wash is certainly a solid-quality product.  $3.99 for 15 oz, available widely at retail stores and drugstores.

Irish Spring is also making a more aggressive play into the deodorant space, with three new scents – Original, Icy Blast, and “Legendary Classic“.  Like the Body Wash, all three deodorants/antiperspirants lack a “natural” smell, rather going for more of that fresh, clean detergent-like scent.  What I didn’t like was that I applied the Original Antiperspirant/Deodorant on a 50 degree day and within an hour, was schvitzing from the pits as if I didn’t have any product on at all.  My t-shirt was doused under my arms and I wasn’t too pleased about that.  Same problem with the Icy Blast Deodorant (no, it doesn’t have antiperspirant in it but come on, it didn’t do much to keep me contained!) So while we can endorse the Body Wash, the deodorants could use some more time in the lab getting their formulas right to be effective.  I’m not a big schvitzer (sweaty guy, for those of you who don’t speak  Yiddish), but maybe I am and the other products I use contain it better.  $3.99 for 3 oz, available widely at retail stores and drugstores.