Whether you have a full neck beard or just a sweet-looking mustache, you have to trim it regularly to keep it looking good.
The problem is trimming your beard gets beard hairs all over the sink and those are a major hassle to clean up. Your beard trimmings also end up clogging the drain, which is both a major and expensive hassle.
So, in this blog, we’ll layout the five most popular techniques for keeping beard hairs off the sink when grooming your facial hair.
How to Keep Beard Hairs off the Sink
You can keep beard hairs off the sink when grooming your beard or mustache by using a beard hair catcher, laying out towels, newspapers or paper towels or using a beard trimmer that includes a vacuum, among other techniques.
Here are the five most common techniques for keeping beard trimmings off your sink.
Use a Beard Hair Catcher, Apron or Bib
One of the most effective ways to keep beard hair trimmings off your sink is by using a beard hair catcher. These are lightweight accessories that are worn around the neck when grooming to catch the trimmings as you cut them. The trimmings are then caught in the catcher for easy disposal in the trash.
This saves time because there is less cleanup as well as prevents sink clogs. It also makes disposal easy because all the hairs are caught in one place in the catcher.
There are essentially two types of beard hair catchers, aprons and bibs. The first utilizes a sheet of vinyl that comes with suction cups that you can stick to the wall or your mirror. You place one end of the vinyl around your neck, you press the suction cups against the wall and then hang the other end of the sheet of vinyl on the suction cups.
The other type of beard hair catcher is the patent-pending self-supported By Jove Beard Hair Catcher. This beard hair catcher is all one piece without any parts, such as suction cups, to lose or break.
You unfold it, place it around your neck and it includes an integrated tray that catchers your beard hairs as you trim them.
We recommend this type because it is all one piece with no parts to lose or break, doesn’t require any set up, you can move around while wearing it and it’s much quicker to put on and take off.
Trim Over a Towel, Paper Towel or Newspaper
If you don't have a beard hair catcher, you can still prevent beard trimmings from getting all over your sink by placing a towel, a group of paper towels or an unfolded newspaper over your sink and countertop.
If using a towel, you’ll want to go outside and shake it out to try to get rid of the trimmings before washing it. With paper towels or newspapers, you would simply crumple those up with beard hairs inside and throw them away.
Using paper towels or newspapers is not our most recommended technique because they are not environmentally friendly. You need to use a lot of paper towels to cover your entire sink and counter area and then they get thrown out. And, frankly, who has newspapers around anymore anyway.
If you want to utilize this technique, the towel would probably be the most eco-friendly. The downside is it is difficult to get embedded beard hairs out of a towel and not everyone can easily go outside to shake a towel out after grooming their beard. It also becomes potentially expensive and bad for the environment if you wash your towel after each session.
Let Beard Hairs Fall and Clean Up After
This technique sounds good but ends up being difficult and sometimes costly in practice.
First, no one wants to waste 10 minutes cleaning up every time they want to do a quick trim before a zoom call or date.
But, if you want to go this route, there are small vacuums and brushes you can buy that will help you gather up the beard hairs after the fact and throw them away.
Some guys also simply brush their wayward beard trimmings into the sink and then have all of the trimmings go down the drain. This is a short-term hack that gets the job done in the moment but will ultimately clog the drain.
And, according to Forbes Magazine, the average cost to unclog a drain professionally is $230. This ranges from $100 on the low-end to $360 to deal with more complex sink clogs.
This technique is the most hassle and the most expensive.
Trim Your Beard While in the Shower
This is a very popular technique and probably our most recommended if you are not going to use a Beard hair catcher. This method traps all the hairs in shower and washes them down the drain.
This technique has a few advantages. It keeps all the beard hairs contained in your shower away from your floor and sink. You are also already showering anyway, so you might as well take care of your beard at the same time. This is definitely a solid option.
There are a few downsides to this hack, however. The first downside is that while shower drains seem to be able to handle a higher volume of hair without clogging, eventually shower drains will clog as well if they become blocked by head and beard hairs.
The second downside is that trimming in the shower is not that convenient when using a combination of scissors and an electric trimmer or when you also want to apply products to your beard. You want to know that not all electric trimmers are shower safe.
Also, supposedly steam-free shower mirrors are usually small. So the combination of a tiny mirror, limited space to move and the difficulty of using multiple trimming products in the shower is a limitation.
The other downside of this technique is that more often than not you’re going to want to just do a quick trim. Maybe you’re getting ready for a date and notice some wayward beard hairs sticking out or you just want tighten things up before going out. In other words, you’re not always going to be taking a shower when the need to trim your beard comes up.
This is where a beard hair catcher comes in particularly handy for quick trims.
Buy an Electric Beard Trimmer with Vacuum
Vacuum Beard trimmers are just that. These are simply regular electric beard and nose-hair trimmers that suck up the trimmings as you groom.
These devices are certainly a viable option. The reviews are mixed on how well they work. Some guys swear by them others don’t.
We’ve found that how well vacuums work depends on your style of beard and your techniques for trimming.
If you are doing very light grooming without any detail work, then these can be helpful.
However, we found most guys employ a number of techniques and use a variety of products when trimming their beards and mustaches. This means they use a combination of beard trimming scissors, combs and electric trimmers.
Beard trimming scissors give you the most control and allow you to be most accurate and detailed when grooming. It is also recommended to comb out your beard regularly, particularly as and after you trim.
Electric beard trimmers with vacuums provide no help to catch the beard hairs that make a mess when using scissors or when you comb out your beard after a grooming session.
Conclusion
Grooming your beard doesn't have to result in a sink full of hair trimmings, clogged drains are a major cleanup session afterward.
While each of these techniques has its advantages and disadvantages, we definitely recommend the By Jove Beard Hair Catcher as the quickest and easiest way to trim your beard without making a mess.