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I want to tell you about my friend, Ray Dupont, now that he has announced that he will be soon be leaving us.

I placed my first order from Classic Shaving in 2004, and got a nice note from Ray afterward along the lines of, "It's nice to see someone so high-tech who's interested in traditional shaving!" Ray knew me from my gadget segments on the "Today" Show, and we struck up a friendly email correspondence, consisting mainly of me peppering the poor guy with lots of questions about safety razors, brushes, creams, blades, and all the other factors I was trying to get a handle on as I made my way through the newbie flail.

Ray spent a lot of time patiently explaining how to get the best out of the various wetshaving products he sold (as well as a lot of products he didn't), and his advice was a godsend to me. I didn't know it then, but this was something Ray did, and had done for many years, with scores of young men.

He taught us how to shave.

For the last couple of centuries, one of man's most treasured memories has been the day his father showed him how to use a razor. But my generation was fathered by the generation who first began using the then-new disposable razors and canned foam and wound up dreading the painful shaves they received from this degraded system. And as these disposable commodity items began replacing high quality razors and fine shaving brushes, the tradition of a father teaching his son to shave fell by the wayside.

That's where Ray came in. By establishing Classic Shaving as a place where men could still find quality straight razors, safety razors, shaving brushes, and traditional shaving soaps and creams, as well as the expert advice they needed to get up to speed with all of these things, he gave guys a chance to reclaim shaving as a pleasant, enjoyable ritual that started the day with a close, comfortable shave and a wonderful scent lingering on the skin, the way it had been before the whole thing got dumbed down.

At some point, Ray brought up the idea of my doing a segment on wetshaving. He said it would be a great way to show people that traditional shaving was alive and well, and that the ritual could be much more effective and enjoyable if done properly. And, of course, that cool old-school safety razors, shaving brushes, and barbershop shaves made great holiday gifts..

To be honest, I didn't think NBC would go for it. As excited as I was over the vastly improved shaves I was getting with all this retro gear, I knew my producers wanted me to focus on the cutting edge of high-tech gadgets, not throwback products like safety razors and badger brushes. But Ray kept bringing the idea up, so I pitched it to the show, and to my eternal surprise got the green light in January for a February segment.

Ray was the best kind of resource someone like me could hope for. In addition to his expert advice and his invaluable help in distilling all of the information I wanted to get across down to a five minute segment, he offered to provide "Today" with everything we needed for the segment, and wound up shipping several thousands of dollars worth of straight razors, safety razors, upscale badger brushes, dozens of tubs and tubes of high-end shaving cream and hard shaving soaps to the studio. He even suggested that we feature a live demo of a traditional barbershop straight razor shave, and arranged to have a professional barber come to the studio for the segment.

Ray poured his heart and soul into the segment, and spared no effort to help make sure that those five minutes on national television would be filled with the best shaving products, the most helpful advice, and the most straightforward information about the topic he loved most. He saw that this was a chance to spread the word to an audience of millions that shaving didn't have to be a chore -- that it could actually be a sublime pleasure, as it had been for generations before ours.

I want to bring up something that says everything you need to know about Ray Dupont: at no point did he ever ask for a plug for his business, even though it would have been well within his right to do so, since he was supplying all the props and even bringing in a barber to put on a shaving demo. But in all of our discussions and planning, he made it abundantly clear that the segment's focus should be on wetshaving -- not on him, and not on his business.

Let me tell you something. I've been doing this a long time. I've written about in magazines and featured on TV thousands of products I felt deserved recognition as being a cut above. The really good stuff, as well as the people who design, make, and sell it. And I have never encountered anyone as selfless and modest as Ray Dupont. But I can tell you that he did all the heavy lifting for that segment and deserves all the credit.

Needless to say, the segment was the biggest hit of any that I've done for the show. Ray made a hell of a big wave, and it raised everybody's boat -- manufacturers, his competitors, the whole industry. He did a year's worth of business in the week following the segment, as did every wetshaving retailer I know. For awhile there, vendors were sold out of razors, brushes and creams, as the manufacturers across the pond had to ramp up production to meet the sudden demand. And sales have continued to grow, as interest and awareness of traditional wetshaving has flowered all over the world. This is all his doing.

When it came time to shave this morning, I couldn't help but think of where so much of what I know about shaving (as well as the sheer tonnage of stuff I've bought from Classic Shaving) came from. So in tribute to a friend, I used a Ray-approved rig -- a Merkur Vision DE razor, a cake of his new Lilac-scented shaving soap, a Dovo travel brush, and to finish things off, some Taylor's Shaving Shop aftershave balm. And of course, I got a fantastic shave. But then I always do when I follow his advice.

Through his tireless efforts to promote awareness of traditional shaving products and practices, by the peerless example he has set both personally as well as with Classic Shaving, and by the many ways Ray has enriched the lives of so many of us with his kindness, intelligence, generosity, and unwavering professionalism, he is leaving the bar far higher than where he found it. Ray Dupont can justly look upon the worldwide wetshaving boom of 2005 as just one of the many triumphs in the life of an extraordinary man.

I've met very few like him, and I will miss him terribly.