I usually buy the tubs from Barrister and Mann, I find their shaving soaps to be of a significantly higher quality than Sterling, but I never considered getting a buncha samples instead... I wonder if I could reheat them and use them in a tub? I have a small shaving mug for soaps I used before getting stuff from B&M, but I usually just put my brush directly into the plastic tubs.

Also, are you sure the B&M samples are equal to one forth of a tub? That doesn't sound right. The samples are small lil pucks, I think the tub may contain far more than 4.

As a wetshaver from the EU, I can give another view regarding samples: You can consider yourself lucky that in this hobby, where most top-notch artisans are US-based, they often offer samples. Over here in Europe, almost every soap tub is a blind buy, just judging by scent notes and other wetshavers' reviews - unless it's a european artisan like E&S Rasage, who offer nice little samples of their soaps and aftershaves. But unfortunately, "try before you buy" is simply not happening over here in most instances. If you want to buy samples, a british or american vendor is your best choice and even then you might end up paying a lot more than you hoped for thanks to duty fees.

Perfume or the fragrance community in general is comparable to our hobby, but there you have the luxury of trying out scents in brick and mortar stores or getting 2 ml sample spray bottles. A lot of scents are just expensive for the luxury factor and the brand name, others are more fairly priced but it's still "you get what you pay for". I don't expect extreme longevity from a 20€ perfume, but one for 150€ should better have some staying power to justify that price tag. I think a lot of this goes for every hobby: well established brand names can charge more than newcomers, popular brands often cater to a more mainstream audience, there are some "hidden gems" here and there and also some things were the hype was simply unjustified.

But overall, I sincerely agree with your take that this hobby won't save any money. Sure, if you do it like my grandpa's generation and just always use the same soap until it's empty, just own one razor where you only need to replace the blades and use only one brush until the bristles fall apart - then it's a money saver. But despite our best efforts to comfort ourselves with that "traditional" wetshaving will save so much money, it won't when you get seriously crazy into this hobby. I openly admit that one year I spent close to 700€ in soaps, aftershaves and razors and it's something I'm definitely not proud of...

Very nice comparison, and good observation about the price mismatch with BaM