6 Lessons Learned In Beauty in 2013

Hey Everyone!

I just wanted wrap up this year in beauty a little bit differently. Instead of doing my favorite products and blah blah blah, I thought telling you about what I learned this year in beauty would be a bit more...fun....or interesting...or messy. You call it, gerl!

In no particular order of importance:

1) Never endorse a company or website you have never ordered from. NEVER.

 I know with all the MAC collections that were released this year, people were scouring for lipsticks, blushes, highlighters, etc. So when I found out that you could order MAC limited edition and regular stock items from Belk Department Stores online, www.belk.com, I thought it would be good idea to let people know. I've been a Belk customer for a lifetime, so I trusted that the online was just as good as store. I tweeted about it and my tweet got favorted a couple of times.

 I placed an order of the Riri for MAC fall LE lipsticks on Belk.com a couple of weeks later, since they were miraclously available. I placed the order, I got a confirmation of order sent to my email, but I week later, I had not received a shipping confirmation. Turns out that Talk That Talk was on 'back order'. But when I placed the order, it was not. I spoke with someone in customer service that told me that the color was on back order and to wait for shipping confirmation.

 ANOTHER WEEK passed, no comfirmation. So,I call customer service and was told that I would not be receiving TTT or any other color I ordered from that collection because it was sold out. The warehouse and online service are not on real time, so if it says its available online, it might not be available in the warehouse. Long story short, no lipsticks, I was offered a 20%off coupon to use online (no thank you!) as a lame compensation and that was lesson learned...NEVER endorse a company or website you have never ordered from.

NEXTTT!!!!!!!!

2) I am OVER the Limited Edition product chase!

 Maybelline, MAC, Wet N Wild are just a few companies who pulled major stunts with LE collections. I get it, limited edition=limited numbers. The buzz was crazy over certain collections and the companies ate that up. Plus, some LE collections never even made it to some regions.

 Maybelline Holiday 2013 with the matte Color Tattoos?...never even made it to my area.

 Nude Awakening 8 pans from Wet N' Wild?...They sent two of each pan in the display, Total of four a store.

 Stunts pulled. I am not wasting another tank of gas or another month of Saturdays chasing palettes and lipsticks. Its not fun when you can't find something or its sold out and you have to resort the hussle of Amazon and Ebay to finally retrieve that limited edition gold. Or leave the 4th Walgreens that week looking for eyeshadow that you just read on IG was only were released at CVS. I will just allow the universe to shift in my direction and if I come across a product I'm looking for, I will receive the blessing!

3) Mascara goes bad.

Mascara goes bad. Cheap mascara goes bad. Expensive mascara goes bad. When they do, it irritates your eye, making the day miserable. Take a sharpie, put the date on the mascara, then at around two months, throw it away. Or you will forking out $30 for a prescription eye cream over a $7.75 mascara. At least I still have my sight.

4)Let's talk $10+ mascaras at Walmart, Target, CVS and other drugstore and mass market stores.....why?!

So you are saying that the10th new mascara your company has released  this year that suppose to lease with give me clump free,bombshell, butterfly lashes.  For only the retail price of $9.99 at Walmart? oh.

5)Don't compare yourself to people on the internet.

I watch several different You Tubers who can post up to five or six hauls a week. No shade. High end, Low end...doesn't matter.  Comments are always on fire about the way they shop. Welp, here's the thing, it's their money and they can spend it as they please.  But that doesn't mean that your drugstore, coupon clipping ways are any less than theirs. You are not them and they are not you! Don't compare yourself to people on the internet because you don't know how their lives really are!! You don't know what is hiding behind stacks of palettes, and they doesn't know what lurks behind your three palettes.  Watch and enjoy or don't watch and save your sanity.

6)Shop your stash.

I've been preaching the Shop Your Stash gospel for years. Whether you have the ends to shop or you are scraping by, go through your beauty stash every while and then. I uncovered just last week, two brand NEW mascaras, from the last beauty clearance sale CVS had. What was that? Before the summer started? Foolishness!! But I got new mascaras, and eyeshadows and lipsticks I forgot about without stepping in a store. I love shopping my stash!!