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How Best To Budget Your Beauty Dollars – Part I – Products

As an esthetician you would likely expect that I’m beauty products junkie, but really at the end of the day I prefer to spend my beauty dollars wisely so I thought I would share information on must have products and services and those that you can just save your dough and skip out on!

Products You Can Skip All Togethertoo many beauty products

One of the best ways to budget your beauty dollars is to eliminate items that are unnecessary in your regimen all together. Here are a few you can completely cut out!

Throw Away The Toner

There were days that we HAD to have toner to restore our skin’s PH level after washing but cleansers have truly come along way and because of that, you can toss out your toner! By pitching it you’ll be saving precious time and money. Now, it’s not hurting your skin in any way so if you absolutely love the way it makes your face feel you can keep it but it has truly become a step you can skip.

Anything On An Autoship Program

autoship noRecently with the rise of your neighbors selling you products I’ve had a ton of you telling me that you’re spending $80-$250 MONTHLY on autoship programs! Just think how much money you’d free up if you just chose to skip purchases that required autoshipments!!! If you were spending $80-$250 a month in our location, you would look AMAZING but odds are, spending that on autoship products is actually making just minor improvements in your skin. So dump those products that require autoshipment and spend those blessed beauty dollars elsewhere.

Don’t Waste Money On At Home Microdermabrasion Or Micro Exfoliating RollersRF Roller

Most of these at home advanced exfoliating kits either don’t work or are just a fancy way to scrub your face. You can save some serious money by not wasting your beauty bucks on these devices! The microderm products are generally vibrating machines with a face scrub and don’t do much if anything to improve exfoliation and they are very EXPENSIVE. Buy a quality exfoliant and you’ll find your skin to look better than ever. The Micro Exfoliating Rollers are completely ineffective, don’t waste your precious time or money on these machines.

 

Products You Can Skimp On A Bit

stretch-dollars

There are a few products that I’m not that picky about, the products that you can skimp on a bit and save a few beauty dollars and here they are!

A Basic Cleanser

cetaphilIf you have relatively normal skin you can buy a more basic cleanser and save yourself some money. I also find choosing a cleanser to be a very personal process. From cream cleansers to gel to foaming you should find something that you’ll really like (and use) and keep buying it. I personally spend a little more in this category because I tend to have acne issues but if you’re normal to combination you could easily use something over-the-counter like Cerave Face Wash or Cetaphil.

A Moderately Priced MoisturizerNo La Mer

If you’re spending a fortune buying Le Mer moisturizer or Chanel Regenerating Cream, here’s a tip…they aren’t worth all of that money! Your moisturizer can be a place to go a little less crazy on. If you want to truly renovate the skin, I recommend using quality serums instead, they have a much greater result and usually even cost less than these high end creams. You can buy a quality moisturizer for $40-60 that can really have a positive effect on your skin and if you are just a girl who uses cleanser and moisturizer with no other serums you should probably be spending about that much. My favorite moisturizers in that category are SkinMedica’s Ultra Sheer Moisture and Rejuvenative Moisture and SkinCeuticals’ Daily Moisture. However, if you are a big serum user, you could even get away with a basic moisturizer like Cetaphil or Cerave and do just fine by spending less than $20! If you REALLY DO WELL with amazing serums, you can get away with skipping moisturizer all together! If I’m following my regimen properly at home I find I only use moisturizer about once every 10 days or so…

 

Products Worth Spending The Money On

There is a whole world of great cosmetic products out there, a sea of serums and endless choices in face washes, moisturizers and more. Which ones are worth spending a few extra dollars on for a quality product? Read on and find out.

A Quality Antioxidant Serum

2011-skinceuticals4-300_3I’m a big believer in using antioxidants to prevent aging, sun damage and hideous brown spots. One place worth spending extra money for a quality product is in this category.  Cheap antioxidant products tend to be ineffective (and therefor a waste of money) or they themselves oxidize rapidly making them ineffective after a few weeks or months of having the bottle open. Stick to a quality antioxidant and you’ll see a benefit from the start to the finish! My personal favorite antioxidant for daytime use is Skinceuticals CE Ferulic or Phloretin products. They may cost you more but you’ll definitely get the benefit from them and quit frankly, it takes forever to get through a bottle of product.

An Effective ExfoliantOffects-Exfoliating-Polish-1

After the age of 28 we don’t shed our skin as quickly as in our youth, causing us to appear dull and wrinkled, one beauty product well worth spending a few bucks on is a quality scrub or chemical exfoliator. For the record, St Ives doesn’t count as a quality product! Cheap exfoliants either use rough beads/sand to give you the scrub effect or cheap glycolic or salicylic acids to do the same. The outcome is a scuffed up face that doesn’t look any better! Try using a high quality scrub like ZO Skin Health’s Offects Exfoliating Polish or a great Retin A prescription and have a product that truly works to make you look great without spending a fortune.

A Truly Sunblocking Sunscreen

sunscreen funnyWhen you’re shielding the sun from your face in an effort to prevent aging, using a cheap sunscreen is totally doing yourself a disservice. Most over-the-counter sunscreens lack a key ingredient for top-notch sunblocking, zinc or titanium, and instead focus on chemical-based blockers that die off as fast as 90 minutes. Quite frankly, that SPF100 you purchased thinking you were doing the right thing is not working as well to prevent age spots as the SPF 30 products we sell in my office! If you’d like to read more about how to shop for a great sunscreen read more here.

A Sunless Tanning Product That Won’t Make You Orangenot orange sunless

Being a red-headed, fair-skinned girl makes me a great shopping candidate for sunless tanners. I have tried a ZILLION of these potions in search of a less expensive product that won’t make me orange…so far, I haven’t found one! Quality sunless tanners last quite a long time, in a single summer, I may purchase 2 bottles of potions and that’s enough for an entire summer for me. The advantage of a good sunless tanner is the fact that they don’t make you orange, you can get color in a single application and quite frankly they smell significantly less stinky! To read about my favorite sunless tanning options, check out this blog.

There Are Times To Spend Extra On Your Face Wash

no zitsIF YOU HAVE ACNE, face wash is a place you should go ahead and buy a quality product! By spending just a few more dollars on a great face wash you can seriously knock down those pesky zits. The nicer cleansers tend to last quite a bit longer as well. For acne issues my favorite cleansers for the face are ZO Skin Health’s Offects Exfoliating Cleanser and Obagi’s Clenziderm Face Wash.

 

 

Jennifer Warmann-Bloss

-Jennifer is a blogger, mom and owner of Elemental Esthetics in St Louis, MO

 

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