She Said Beauty March 2012 Box

This box is the first offering from the latest (or one of the latest, at least) beauty box to come onto an already somewhat saturated market. The company is called She Said Beauty and the boxes are priced at £9 per month plus £2.95 postage and packaging. 

Of all the boxes I've tried, I think this box has the prettiest colour scheme. I'd prefer if it had a proper lid rather than the flip top. The magnetic closure is pretty weak so it opens very easily. The box is also a bit flimsy compared with others; mine was kind of falling apart.

I was pleased to see something other than shredded tissue paper (my cat gets that stuff everywhere). 

As with other boxes, inside there is a card with some information about the company and the products in that month's box.

Onto what's inside...

First up is a skincare duo from Comfort Zone.

 The combined size of these samples is 10ml. The full sized kit is 50ml and costs £52.95.

Both these products feel very greasy. The Recover Cream feels like an oily balm; it's got a very thick consistency and the Recover Concentrate basically feels like an oil. The blurb says these products are full of antioxidants and vitamins. I'm happy to give them a go but I'm not excited about these products.

[EDIT: This cream has dried out and we will apparently be given replacements from the company so I will update on that when I've received that!]

Next up is a trio of haircare products from Aveda. This little box of samples is so sweet! 

The kit comes with a shampoo, conditioner and Style-Prep Smoother all from the Smooth Infusion range. The samples are 10ml each with the full sizes costing between £15.50 and £18.50 each

The samples are teeny so I'd imagine I'll only get one use out of each. Honestly, I'd have preferred one larger sample because one use isn't enough to see how well a product works, is it?

The only make up item in the box is a Collection 2000 Cream Puff matte lip cream. I've owned a couple of these in the past but this time I received the shade Cotton Candy. I'm pleased with the shade because I know this range does offer some super pale shades which would have been really unflattering on me. 

This is a full sized product and it smells delicious. My only issue with the inclusion of this product is that it hardly falls into the 'luxury' bracket. She Said Beauty clearly state on their website that the box will contain five luxury samples. Collection 2000 Cream Puffs are priced at £2.99 for 5ml.

Next up is my favourite product from the box. I'd already seen some blog posts about what was in this box and most of them had received a black Orly mini (called Goth, I believe) which I wasn't interested in at all. I've tried Orly polishes before and quite liked them. It just so happened that I'd had my eye on this shade for a while!

The shade is Ancient Jade and it's a beautiful pastel blue/green - somewhere between duck egg blue and turquoise or something like that. I'm rubbish at describing colours so expect a Nails of the Day post with this soon!

This is just a mini bottle which costs £5 in places like Boots. I think £5 is a ridiculous price to pay for 5.4ml of polish when they full sizes can be purchased online for somewhere between £5 and £6. I've pictured it next to the nail file it came with so you can get an idea of the size. 

Finally, the box included a sample of Premae's Harmony Face Balm. Mine was actually open in the box which was a bit annoying. The packaging on this one is very flimsy. A full sized pot of this balm will set you back £18 for 50ml. 

I'm not entirely sure how to use this. I guess I should put it on my face but again it feels very greasy so I'm not sure how much it'll work for me! It smells very herbal and apparently contains Indian mango butter. I feel a bit 'meh' about this, to be honest. 

As a little extra, they included a 'tea bulb' by Jing. We've not used this yet but I'm excited to see how it blossoms!

All in all, it's an okay box. I'm glad they didn't go all out with lots of full sized high end products in this box. I think anyone who would prefer to receive some samples or products from lower priced brands would like this box. I've found recently that I'm often disappointed when I look through the contents of the latest box I've received but with this box, I'm pretty sure I was smiling!

If you're interested in signing up, visit the She Said Beauty site here.

 Stace xx

Beauty Boxes - What would I like to see in them?

The monthly beauty box market in the UK had exploded in the past six months. I have mixed feelings about some of the companies but I did subscribe to Carmine and have received two boxes from them. I've read lots of blog posts and watched plenty of YouTube videos about the contents of most of the boxes which have been sent out and have noticed that there are some products which get people really excited and others which are pretty badly received. 

What's the purpose of these boxes?

The answer to this question seems to be different depending on who's been asked. To me, the boxes are supposed to provide the subscriber with a certain number (usually five) of deluxe samples from luxury brands. The thinking behind this being that we can try out high end brands we've not heard of before or products we find too expensive to buy without trying.

I find it a bit confusing that companies include a lot of full sized items and products from lower priced brands. I would prefer if they stuck to sending deluxe samples of "luxury" products; for £10 - £13 a month, I don't expect to find full size products which retail for £20 a pop and I don't want samples of products which cost less than a tenner to purchase in full size.

So, aside from the issues with full sized products and budget brands, which products do I not want to see in my box?

• Poor Quality Products - I'm not talking about products which don't work for certain people, I'm talking about products which just don't work for anyone. 
• Perfume Samples - I like perfume but these little samples are usually so fiddly and hard to use so I hardly ever try them. From what I've heard, most of the scents are not well received, either.
• Anti-Ageing Products - These frustrate me because they tend to be pretty hardcore anti ageing products and I have no need for those at this time. I know older customers would probably love to receive these but I think it's unfair to exclude younger customers.
• Small Samples - I know some boxes include little samples as extras but if one of the five samples is very small, it's disappointing regardless of what else is in the box. We want to be able to try these products out over at least a few days/a week.
• Inaccessible Products - Receiving something from a brand which is not easily available is annoying if you like the product. I know most of these companies have online shops where full sized products can be purchased so that combats that issue somewhat. I also question whether including a little sample of a £150 face cream will go down well either, I think the full sized products need to be reasonably affordable so that if you like the sample, you can afford the full size. This is one people are probably going to disagree with!

On a more positive note, which products do I think go down well in boxes?

• Cosmetics - I think there needs to be at least one make up item in each box. It doesn't have to be a full size but I think most people want to try something from the make up side of the beauty spectrum.
• Hand Creams - Okay, this may be a personal preference for me but the smaller sized hand creams which come in these boxes are great for your handbag.
• Something Everyone Can Use - Things people use on a regular basis anyway are always appreciated because they're things the subscribers can easily test out - things like a shower gel or a lip balm.
• Universal Shades/Formulas - A black or brown eyeliner will always go down better than a neon orange one. I don't think I've ever seen a neon orange eyeliner...
• Basically anything which doesn't come under the things I don't like to see!

If you've made it this far, well done! The points above are just my opinion. I'm still not completely sure what I think of this crazy beauty box phenomenon. I question whether I should spend my £10 - £13 per month on something I know I want rather than risking it on a beauty box which might leave me feeling a bit disappointed.

What are your thoughts? I'd love to know!

Stace xx