Birchbox Man Subscription Box Review – August 2015
Birchbox Man is a monthly grooming and lifestyle subscription box for men.
My Subscription Addiction pays for this subscription. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes).
This month every Birchbox Man box included a bonus Virtual Reality Viewer.
The Subscription Box: Birchbox Man
The Cost: $20 a month ($16.25 a month with annual subscription)
The Products: Men’s grooming and lifestyle products.
Ships to: US only
Check out all of my Birchbox Man reviews and the Men’s Subscription Box Directory!
Each box comes with a card detailing the items included.
Birchbox Man + River Virtual Reality Viewer – Value $10
FYI – if you subscribe by August 10th, you will get an August box, with the bonus Virtual Reality Viewer.
It works with most smartphones (we had to adjust it a bit to fit an iPhone 6 Plus).
Here are the instructions for putting it together:
And you’ll need to download the free River VR app to go with it.
My husband Eric and I just tried it – and I didn’t realize how awesome it would be! We just did the wave and the travel videos. (Also – it’s just fun watching someone else try it too!)
Hanz de Fuko Natural Shampoo – 1 oz? Value $2
Hanz de Fuko Natural Conditioner – .5 oz? Value $1
Neither of these items have sizes listed, so I’m estimating on size/value. I love that this line is both paraben and sulfate free. The scent isn’t too masculine either – I may be keeping these!
Mayron’s Goods Junk Stuff – 1 oz Value $6
Just in case the name of this product left any questions, they also included the description on the tube “Stuff for your junk, junk for your stuff.” According to Birchbox, this can also be used for treating eczema, bug bites, and even sunburn.
Baxter of California Hydro Salve Hand Cream – 1 oz Value $6.80
This is another item I am tempted to keep for myself! I really like the formula – it’s very moisturizing, and a little lighter than most other hand salves I’ve tried.
FYI – this box should have included one more sample, but the Supergoop! City Sunscreen Serum was missing from the box. (In my experience Birchbox has great customer service, so I don’t anticipate any issues getting the sample/or some type of points refund).
Coalatree Nomad Backpack – Value $29.99
This was our sample pick for August. (I love that Birchbox Man now lets you pick your lifestyle item in the box – it makes the $20 a month cost much less risky!)
The design of this pack is very slick. It fits in the tiny zip up pack when not in use, and when it is unzipped into a backpack, that zip up pack becomes an interior pocket.
Verdict: I think this is one of the best Birchbox Man boxes we’ve received in a while. The Virtual Reality headset was such a fun bonus item, the sample sizes are generous, and the backpack is a really useful item. The value of this box is about $56 (not counting the missing Supergoop! serum).
What do you think of the August Birchbox Man box? Have you tried the Virtual Reality viewer yet?
Written by Liz Cadman
I absolutely love the backpack! The VR glasses did not fit any of our phones, so useless to us. Is anyone else sick of getting shampoos and conditioners and face washes? While I love the lifestyle items, I’m NOT loving the samples. May have to quit this sub.
Birchbox costumer service is really awesome. I’ve had Birchbox man for my husband for months now and we both love it! Trust me he is no suit and tie guy either, the complete opposite but he still loves it! We’ve never gotten something that won’t be used. Anyway we also encountered a little mix up with sample choice this month, we reserved the backpack but they accidentally packed the mugs. Before we ever even got the box to know about I received an email from them letting me know they had made this mistake. They had sent the backpack as well outside the regular monthly box in a bigger box along with everything else. That was pretty awesome of them to tell us about it and instead of taking out the mugs and fixing it they just let us keep both! The value was amazing this month, the rest of our box was the exact same and the “Junk Stuff” is very interesting! I also had reserved the Pocket Knife as an add on so he really loved everything this month!
My brother chose the backpack, but received the underwear instead. He of course doesn’t care, but I was thinking of emailing them to ask why he didn’t receive what he chose (I gifted the subscription to him). Sounds like it may be worth a try!
We chose the backpack and got the underwear and they immediately got it out to us overnighted. The men’s section seems to have slightly better customer service.
Okay, so I’m going to sound like a dum-dum here, but what exactly IS a virtual reality viewer? Anyone want to explain to technologically stunted girl over here?
Also, Alanah, you mentioned that your guy isn’t super fancy & you were worried about getting stuff that he wouldn’t use. I know you said they asked this type of questions in the quiz, but did answering them keep you from receiving fancy schmancy stuff? I think I want to get a 3 mo sub for my hubs, but he’s the exact opposite of a suit & tie fancypants. Have you been happy with the items you received? Has your guy used the products?
Well I was basing my reservations that Birchbox man might be too fancy off of previous reviews on MSA… this will be our first month of Birchbox Man so hopefully they take the survey questions into account. They asked about his grooming habits, hair length, if he’s more outdoorsy or suit and tie… so it sounds promising!
My dude likes cologne but otherwise is a nerdy tech guy who has a beard no stache and wears jeans and tees most of the time. He likes picking out his monthly item and he likes cologne samples and he tends to at least acknowledge he will use the other stuff. Mostly the men’s box is all about the big item.
I had a great experience with Birchbox this month:
We didn’t receive the item we selected (also the backpack), however…BB Men’s customer service team was absolutely above and beyond amazing.
The initial package we received was the Das Boom sample (smells like juniper, pine, and cedar…very strong but a perfect summer item), the Baxter hand salve (tempted to steal it myself too!), the Supergoop (I did steal this one), and a cologne sample that he wore to bed last night and smelled yum (he doesn’t mind cologne samples and trying new scents so we don’t mind when they are included). The full size item was a pair of super soft underwear.
When I emailed to ask about the mix up with his item choice, they went above and beyond. I mentioned off-hand in my email that I had not done my sample choice in time (my own fault), but that we had for his account. Not only did they assure me that they would be sending him the backpack (effectively receiving the $31 pair of underwear as an extra now), but she offered to send me the Stila three piece set with zip case even though it was my fault! The Stila set arrived via overnight shipped yesterday, awaiting the backpack still, AND they credited me 50 extra points on the account. Talk about superb customer service!!!!! $51 between the lip set and the underwear and $5 worth of points!
Birchbox was my first subscription service way back when they started and mid 2013 when they were going through some changes and customer service hadn’t been superb I cancelled my account. I only restarted it this June just to see if the quality had returned to it’s previous level. Then I promptly subscribed for the Men’s box for my fiancé. I am beyond impressed with how amazing they were this month handling the missing backpack pick. It convinced me to go ahead and do a longer subscription length on the women’s box because I can trust they will fix any issues that could arise.
The men’s box has been great, but still doing that month to month as he can be harder to please and I don’t want to overload him with a year of samples he may not use. I keep trying to convince him they will be great for traveling and that he gets the big item pick every month…and given the customer service he just saw I’m pretty sure he’s convinced too. Besides, in the four years of living together, he likes all my face scrubs and exfoliators and toners I buy, so he should slowly be won over!
I chose the backpack as this month’s item too. It’s of a nicer quality than I expected, so that was a nice surprise. As far as smaples, all of mine were different than the ones you received (two V76 products, Ursa Major Face Wash, the tiiiiny Supergoop lotion tube, and some noxious cologne). Kind of a ho-hum month in my opinion.
I’m kind of torn if I’m going to stay with Birchbox or not. Their curation of products seems to have become a bit stagnant IMO. I get that they’re trying to drive people to their site and to purchase the full-size counterpart of the samples they carry. But I’m seeing repeats and month after month of products from the same few companies in my boxes. There’s a lot of new sub boxes in the same space all vying for the same dollars. Creative curation is the key to a sub box of any type staying viable long-term.
The Supergoop tube is tiny, but you don’t need a lot when using. My dude and I both love all the products I have from them, I think if you’re out in the sun you could be pleasantly surprised!
I agree that they need some variation from multi-purpose body wash type items, I think it’s harder to find men’s unique samples as overall routine is more basic. I wish we had gotten the “Junk Stuff” as it’s a unique item…but because my overall experience with customer service mentioned above was so fantastic this month, I really can’t complain.
Oh, another tip, change up your questionnaire every so often and you might find you get a little more variation. I think the men’s box is really more about the one large item and a little branching out discovery wise for brands more than the women’s box is…but I’ve found changing my women’s profiles on different boxes every so often gives me a little bit of a different experience too.
This review totally made me order this for my SO. Sometimes I think Birchbox is a little too fancy for him – he doesn’t wear a suit to work, he has a full beard and long hair. But the profile I filled out for him asked me about all of this which is great… so hopefully Birchbox will work for him! I hadn’t signed up til now due to my reservations but the virtual reality viewer did it for me. He’s going to LOVE it!