How can you tell if something is really on sale?

Disclosure: Affiliate links.

Shitty picture taken with my shitty phone because my shitty computer is in the shop.

Way back when I was a university student in Canada, I had a part time job at a luggage store in the mall. We always had banners hanging from the ceiling that would enrage certain customers, because they said things like:

up to 80% off!

or

60% off! *select items

One brand of luggage we sold was pretty shitty--the largest piece was worth about $40. But it was always "marked down" to that price by something like 60%. Legally that meant that we had to display that shit for a certain amount of time at the "regular" price before it could go "on sale." (I realize the scare quotes are getting excessive, but I think they are warranted here.) So we would display it inconspicuously in some back corner of the store for a few weeks, while I would do my best to politely discourage people from buying it. At the "regular" price, it cost the same as several much better quality options. Finally we would put up a 60% OFF SALE! sign up and mark it down to the proper price--and then repeat the whole process with some identically shitty luggage in a slightly different color.

The point is that even though the "regular" price was kind of bogus and a total rip-off, there were laws in place to prevent us from immediately putting it on the floor at the lower price and calling it a sale. But recently a bunch of American stores have been caught doing exactly that, including Nordstrom Rack, Kohls, J. Crew, Macy's, JC Penney, and Bloomingdales. I don't know if it's that US laws are less strict (though some of these retailers have faced lawsuits), or if the companies just decided to go ahead and engage in this kind of deceptive marketing/pricing because why not. This BuzzFeed article on the problem is quite good.

I suspected something like this was going on with J. Crew Factory, because they send me weekly "40% off! *Prices as marked" emails, and everything is always the same price as usual. (The key word for recognizing an actual sale is "extra," as in "Extra 30% off everything with code NOTSCREWINGYOUTHISTIME." This fake sale pricing seems to be especially a problem in outlet stores.

So the moral is that it's a good idea to always comparison shop and not to be seduced by a big percent off sticker, because chances are these companies will keep trying to fuck us over whenever they can. 

I've been thinking about how this lesson might apply in particular to beauty shopping, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on the matter. One thing that has occurred to me is how much range there is in the "regular price" of drugstore products (thanks to Michelle for reminding me that I'd been meaning to write about this). For instance, I bought the lipstick above, Revlon Super Lustrous in Berry Haute at Target at their regular price of $4.99. Meanwhile, CVS sells the Super Lustrous line for $8.99 a piece. Now, CVS constantly has sales, especially if you have their store card, and right now they have a BOGO 50% off deal on all Revlon products. But even if you bought two of these lipsticks as part of that sale, you'd still be spending more than you would at Target--and they just suckered me you into buying two things instead of one. It may just be pricing based on volume, so that Target sells more product than CVS and therefore can lower the price (though my local CVS is always packed with college women and most things are sold out--the pricing seems to be national). Another problem with simply concluding that one should always shop at Target (or the equivalent) and never at CVS (or the equivalent) occurs if you are like me and live in a city center and have a hard time getting out to the suburbs where all the big box stores are. Maybe that extra few bucks is worth the hour you'd have to spend on the bus or the extra gas or whatever.

I'll stop rambling now and ask you to add whatever thoughts you have in the comments. As usual, I advise you to comparison shop and be suspicious of marketing. And I always try to be sure that when I post about a deal on here, it's an actual deal, but always feel free to point out if there's ever anything shifty going on. 

(An aside: Berry Haute looks like a pretty purple in the bullet, but on my lips it turns into a much less interesting pinky-mauve. And it's not as moisturizing as Cherries in the Snow. Not a bad lipstick, but still a little womp womp.)

Is your 3 or 4 or 5-free nail polish really free?

By now you've probably read the NYT article about nail salon and human trafficking/exploitation (if not, get on it). There's been lots of interesting discussion stemming from the article as well. I would recommend, as usual, skipping the Jezebel commentary on the topic, in which the author goes apeshit in the comments - as she's been doing in the comments of other articles, including ones she didn't even write herself (I am hesitant to link from here to such ridiculous antics, but let me know if you want some directions to the train wreck). But Wondegondigo has a thoughtful discussion, for example.

As part of describing the poor working conditions of salon employees, a link in the NYT article pointed to a study done in 2012 on 3(+)-free nail polishes that showed that many of them still included the chemicals that they were supposedly free from (including formaldehyde, DBP, and toulene). In fact:

"Toluene was found more frequently, and in higher concentrations in products with toxic-trio related claims than in traditional products. Ten of the twelve products with “toluene-free” claims did, in fact, contain toluene."

You know that I am not overly concerned about "chemicals," but if these particular ingredients, which do pose potential health risks when used frequently or in the wrong way, are a concern for you, well . . . maybe you should still be concerned. Or you should be extra careful to paint your nail in a very well-ventilated space.

It was nice to see that the Zoya they tested in that study did turn out to actually be 3-free, so I can blissfully go on loving my Zoyas.

Zoya Dream

L'Oreal's FTC settlement for deceptive advertising of the Youth Code/Génefique lines (from Truth in Advertising)

I hope we all assume that most skincare advertising claims are bullshit of some kind or another, but I guess this goes beyond slippery, confusing marketing language into actual deception. A jar of goop that can manipulate your genes? I seriously hope not. Or if so, I would like to rub the gene for being able to do math on my face or find some lotion that will kill my hereditary anxiety.

Oh, and L'Oreal doesn't have to pay a cent as the result of this settlement, despite having made well over a billion dollars from selling this crap.

Why BB Cream is Bullshit (from Beauty and the Bullshit)

Yay, Rowena is back and blogging. One of my very favorite blogs. Here she explains why labeling products as BB creams (or CC or whatever) is marketing bullshit.

BzzAgent Review: Curel Intensive Healing Cream (Part I)

Disclosure: I received this product free for review from BzzAgent.

I got some little tubs of this stuff to try out recently. Let me tell you: this is some utilitarian shit. For some reason I feel like this is the kind of cream that your grandmother brings home from the hospital. I don't know where I'm getting that image from, but there it is. It's there to do a job. No frills. It's absolutely unscented, for one thing.

So usually in a review of something like this, I get into the ingredients. The ingredients here are definitely workhorses. No nonsense, tried and true. How many cliches can I fit into one post? Let's find out! Here are the ingredients:

Water, Mineral Oil, Petrolatum, Glycerin, Microcrystalline Wax, Cetyl PEG/PPG-10/1 Dimethicone, Hydrogenated Castor Oil, Glyceryl Dilaurate, Paraffin, Dimethicone, Cetyl PG Hydroxyethyl Palmitamide, Magnesium Stearate, Isopropyl Myristate, Magnesium Sulfate, Glyceryl Oleate, Ethoxydiglycol, DMDM Hydantoin, Methylparaben, Butylene Glycol, Eucalyptus Globulus Leaf Extract, Propylparaben

Those are all your basic ingredients designed to moisturize and leave your hands feeling smooth. I'm not going to analyze them one by one, but I don't see any problems here. If you don't like petroleum products for environmental reasons, then I guess that's your thing, fine, but mineral oil is a good moisturizer that rarely causes allergic reactions and is non-comedogenic. Glycerin I've talked about before. The formula for this stuff is pretty similar to this cream designed for babies, except that this Curel one includes preservatives, which I am glad for, since it's packaged in a jar/tub.

Ugh, jar packaging. Another thing I've complained about in the past. What is the point? I guess it makes it seem more medicinal? Or heavy duty? I don't know. It's definitely trying to create some psychological association for you, because it would be more stable and less prone to contamination in a squeeze tube. This cream is thick, but it's not so thick that it wouldn't dispense perfectly well from a tube.

But on to the actual test.

I've been using this stuff for a little over a week. I wouldn't say that I have "extremely dry skin" at this point in the year, but I have some dry and/or rough spots, like the bottoms of my feet and my nails and cuticles. So that's where I tested it.

I'll spare you photos of my feet, but here are my nails an hour or so after removing nail polish and then doing my usual whatever around the house. I might have washed a couple of dishes, but mostly I just fucked around on my computer.

My nails and cuticles are pretty dry and just all-around shitty. That is their normal state.

What does "dermatologist tested" mean? (from Beautiful with Brains)

Spoiler: Nothing.

Do I need this? Special Pregnancy Polish

Here is the latest installment of "Do I Need This?", a series about new and trendy beauty products (or just those that might be unfamiliar and baffling to both of us). I'll offer my experience and opinion about whether or not I think the product under consideration is worth shelling out for. Obviously, you don't need ANY beauty products, so the answer is always going to be no, a little bit. But is it going to change your life (or face)? Is it going to make things easier? Are you going to notice any difference at all if you use it? That's what I'm getting at. You may disagree with my verdict, because we all have different bodies/faces/brains/desires, but I'll try to give you a starting point at least.

Short answer: Fuck no.

Don't Bother With ProActiv (from Slate)

Here's an excerpt from this article on why ProActiv is overpriced at best and a scam at worst:

Marcotte: I suspect a lot of people are wary of buying skin care products sold on TV, but they sign up for Proactiv because the ads do a good job of implying that it is better than anything else on the market for clearing up acne. Is it?

Romanowski: No. They use standard (effective) technology, but their products are not better than the stuff you could buy at Target or Wal-Mart. Anti-acne products are over-the-counter drugs regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. Manufacturers are limited in the technologies and claims they can use.

Is BB Cream just trendy tinted moisturizer?

In some cases, apparently, yes. The new Covergirl “BB Cream” is exactly the same as their CGSmoothers Tinted Moisturizer. Exact same ingredients list, new name. So watch out.

Is BB Cream just trendy tinted moisturizer?