(Screencap: YouTube)

When last we heard from Dollar Shave Club, a razorless Dennis Crowley was wondering if the subscription service e-commerce startup was a "meme/hoax," as he had signed up but not yet received his "fucking great" razors. Now in an effort to "own the bathroom," DSC is launching a new product, but this one, folks, is for your butt.

Business Insider reports that today DSC announced a new product called "One Wipe Charlies," which are quite literally the wet wipes that you use to clean up an infant, but for the butts of grown men. Apparently toilet paper is a $9 billion industry, and DSC is hoping to tap into that market (sorry, Charmin).

"Great things happen when your ass feels fantastic," DSC's CEO Michael Dubin told Business Insider. "We want to service your face, ass and everything in between." Are we sure this is a line of butt wipes and not a full-service massage parlor?

DSC surveyed a group of men and found that 51 percent of them use butt wipes on the reg. A perfunctory canvassing of one mostly-dude IRC room revealed something shocking: guys really, really do like butt wipes. "Butt wipes are a marvelous luxury," remarked one participant.

Now please enjoy this video of Mr. Dubin talking to you about poop. Disruption!

The "pre-launch" page for new startup called Harry's features a handsome image of a razor emblazoned with an "H" logo and the slogan, "RESPECTING THE FACE AND WALLET. SINCE LIKE...RIGHT NOW." Sign up to learn more and you'll be directed to what looks like a package deal on shaving supplies, including the historically-themed "Truman Handle" and the "Winston Shave Set" How mid-century! But why not just label it the Don Draper special?

According to a source, Harry's is actually tied up with the marketing experts at Warby Parker. Jen Rubio, head of social media at the eyeglass retailer, shared the site on her Facebook page with the message, "Remember in 2010 when I said Warby Parker was going to be big? This is kinda like that."

Betabeat also heard that Warby Parker put $4 million into the company and the name. We've reached out to the company and will update the post when we hear back. Warby recently raised $41.5 million funding from American Express and J.Crew CEO Mickey Drexler and is rumored to be discussing a partnership to hip-up Google Glass.

UPDATE 3/7: As Ben Kessler points out in the comments (below), Warby Parker cofounder Jeffrey Raider is listed as the cofounder and "co-CEO" of Harry's on LinkedIn. None of Mr. Raider's fellow Warby cofounders--Neil Blumenthal,  David Gilboa, or Andrew Hunt--currently lists Harry's on their LinkedIn profiles.

UPDATE 3/11: Another tipster directed us towards a Form D filing that appears to be tied to Harry's. Mr. Raider, Andy Katz-Mayfield, and Thrive Capital founder Joshua Kushner* are listed as directors on the form, which was filed last August. On his LinkedIn profile, Mr. Katz-Mayfield lists himself as a the cofounder and co-CEO of Harry's. The form indicates that the company raised $2.25 million toward a $4 million equity round from two investors.

Harry's already has some competition among the seemingly endless list of subscription startups, including the lower-brow humorists at Dollar Shave Club, which raised $9.8 million to sell discount razors.

Vishal Sapra, who works in global business development at MRY, also shared it on Facebook, with the note: "ATTENTION Gentlemen: my brilliant pal (and Vikas Sapra's housemate before I replaced him) Will Freund, a Gilt.com veteran, is going to change the way we shave! For a smoother, cheaper, and cooler shave, check out Harry's! Still in prelaunch so he welcomes your feedback! Start sharing and get some free man goodness!"

On his LinkedIn account, Mr. Freund is listed as a VP of creative production and sales operation at Gilt Groupe.

Stay tuned for a new deal on the FDR beard trimmers?

*Disclosure

(Photo: Twitter)

The trouble with producing a wildly successful viral video is that everything you do afterwards is going to pale in comparison--and now the folks at Dollar Shave Club appear to be learning this the hard way.

The Santa Monica-based company sends you "fucking great" razors for a premium of $1-9/month. In startup parlance: It's like Birchbox, but for razors! The company's hilarious video went viral in March, and to date it's netted almost 5 million views. But not everyone is happy with Dollar Shave Club's customer service, including one of New York's most celebrated tech founders.

"Hey @dollarshaveclub, I signed up Day One (in March!) & still haven't gotten anything? Is this a real service or just a hoax/meme?" tweeted Foursquare cofounder Dennis Crowley earlier today. Snap!

"I had to email them a bunch of times to finally get my blades months after I signed up.@DollarShaveCLub ‪#terrible‬ cust exp," replied a user named Mike Calvey.

A quick search for "Dollar Shave Club" on Twitter unearths a few disgruntled users eager for their shaving products, but those tweets are mostly eclipsed by hype surrounding the viral promo video.

Former TechCrunch editor Erick Schonfeld has a different theory as to where Mr. Crowley's blades may have gone off to: "I just started getting mine a few weeks ago. you've got earn your way into the club. Many apply, few are chosen :)."

We've reached out to Dollar Shave Club to ask if they've had any manufacturing or shipping troubles that could delay orders. We'll update when we hear back.

UPDATE:

A rep for Dollar Shave Club responded: "DSC sent Dennis his blades this am. No manufacturing or shipping problems, just a few orders here and there that slipped through the cracks back in March at the big relaunch."

Me. and Mr. Jones (minus me)

In the past couple weeks, two startups from Science (the Betaworks of Los Angeles!) have tried to break into the New York City market, so it seemed like high time we gave Mike Jones, the CEO of Science and former CEO of MySpace, a call.

The Betaworks comparison refers to the fact that Science, which raised $10 million last November, uses its capital to "take deeper equity relationships" in startups than a typical VC firm, Mr. Jones said over the phone, noting similarities to Obvious Corp. and Idealab as well.

Science both launches its own companies and is intimately involved with the operations of the businesses it invests in. Like Betaworks, Science also eschews the i-word—i.e. "incubator"—opting for the more Hollywood-appropriate "studio."

The incubator studio has added a number of companies to its portfolio already, including monthly subscription services Dollar Shave Club (razors), Whittlebee (kid's clothes), and MeUndies (self-explanatory), as well as peer-to-peer marketplaces Dog Vacay (an Airbnb for dogs) and Eventup (an Airbnb for spaces) and Uncovet, which TechCrunch likened to a fancier Fab.

Indeed, it's hard not to look at the Science club and see its startup influences. "There's certainly new business models being created and in certain cases we like to apply those business models to segments of the market that they haven’t necessarily been applied to," said Mr. Jones. "We don't shy away from that by any means. We obviously really like subscription commerce, but we were not the first people to do subscription commerce."

However, he noted, in many cases the subscription service pioneers that come to mind--like Shoedazzle and Birchbox—weren't first-to-market either. "We all fail to talk about Columbia House and people that really understood this model—even Guthy-Renker for instance, the master of this stuff."

Mr. Jones said Science gravitates towards, "businesses that have really high user-value, which typically means they’re in a role of facilitating transactions between users. Generally, we’re not focused on content-only business, like it’s just not part of our DNA."

What about Los Angeles overall? If New York startups are characterized as being too lightweight on the tech side, what do people say about L.A. companies? "One of the general stereotypes for L.A. that you might hear is that L.A. startups are typically very revenue-focused," said Mr. Jones. "I think that’s fairly true and I think one of the reasons for that is that in L.A. not a lot of large technology companies have big technology teams. [So] there’s not a lot of acqui-hire ability. Because of that, a lot of the companies that get built in LA. are focused on revenue and building sustainable businesses."

Mr. Jones's answer sounded a little like responding "I work too hard," when an interviewer asks about your weakness. After all, isn't the inability to monetize the worry about of companies coming out of the current boom? He insisted that's not the case. "You could easily take the opposite view and say Instagram was not focused on revenue, it was focused on audience. Facebook built a fantastic business with a lot of revenue, but one could argue that if Facebook had focused on revenue in the early days, it would have diminished their ability to become the big audience business they are today."

How does a tech scene function in a town fixated on the entertainment industry above all? According to Mr. Jones, it's a unique opportunity. "I think when you look at companies like BeachMint and Shoedazzle and Honest Company where you have celebrity talent that’s really spending time and leveraging their audiences into launching new companies that’s certainly interesting and can be a strategic advantage for L.A.-based businesses, so I love that."

In this case, the "talent," Mr. Jones is referring to is Kim Kardashian for Shoedazzle, Jessica Alba for Honest Company, and everyone from the Olsen twins to Jessica Simpson for BeachMint.

But Mr. Jones swears it's not just about the fame game. "We’re also seeing a lot of ecommerce companies coming out of L.A. and I wouldn’t have said previously," he said. "Being in L.A. for a long time and doing a lot of investing in L.A., I’m seeing higher-quality businesses and concepts coming out of L.A. than I’ve seen in the past."

So is everyone there sick of reading Alley vs. Valley headlines? "No, not at all. At the end of the day, I think each market has things that make it competitive. I love the financial services companies coming out of New York. Silicon Valley is a monster. We don’t compete against Silicon Valley. There’s no one that’s the next Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley is the next Silicon Valley. It’s fantastic and we should all love it."