Beauty Dish

Pucker Up, Babycakes!

A few short Avon lipstick/gloss/balm reviews!

My Avon district sales manager sat next to me at my kitchen table two years ago. She wore soft caramel lipstick to match her Asian print jacket, a shade just two tones shy of her sculpted bouffant.

"Birdie," she said, her index pointing first to her lips, then mine, "every woman buys lipstick. Your new Avon business manual shows you how to sell the exact type of lipstick your customer needs. Here, take a look."

I glanced at the open blue binder, at a chart where you can match up hydration versus long-wearing versus affordability, ingredients, lifestyle, you name it. Each of the core Avon lipsticks was dissected, outlined, splayed on the page like an alien anatomy diagram. I nodded my head as if I beheld the sacred Tibetan Book of the Dead. I made a mental note to memorize these facts FIRST! And I did. I did.

Two years later, I can still cite the Lipstick Mantras, spill them into the palm of a questioning customer. But times change, products change, and Avon added New, Improved, and Super Duper 'sticks to its arsenal. I still sell more lipstick than any other item, but I've tested and tried them all in order to tell my customer my honest impressions. Here are some short and sassy thoughts on some of the newer products:

Review: Avon Shine Supreme Lip Color:

The brochure hawks Avon's Shine Supreme lipcolor with a glossy photograph of Avon Celebrity Spokesperson, Salma Hayek with Lustrous Berry swiped across her perfect lips. Avon claims that the Shine Supreme provides "moist, lasting color with self-renewing shine." The literature goes on to extoll the virtues of the "exclusive Rejuvi-Shine Technology" which "triggers shine for hours." A row of plump glistening wet coated lips cascades down one side of the page, each demonstrating a different offered shade, as if fifteen out-of-work porn stars puckered for the camera. Really, that row of lips makes me uneasy.

This product comes packaged in a contoured plastic container colored the same shade as the lipcolor itself. The lids screws off to reveal an attached wand with a tiny brush at the end. Shine Supreme has a vague chemical smell and an extremely slick and almost oily texture. I tried Shine Supreme in a cool tone - Polished Petal. It glided on easily, but I had a difficult time keeping the color "between the lines." When I was finished, my lips were crooked and slimy. I blotted the excess and tried to contain the slick with a lipliner. Bad move. My lips almost dripped color onto my chin. Ick. I tried reapplying, using the Shine Supreme as a gloss after first coloring my lips with another type of Avon lipstick. This fared better, but I still found the product difficult to apply.

Hours later, my lips were still wet and shiny. I'm just not sure that's such a great thing.

Review: Avon Glazewear Metallic Lip Gloss

Avon's Glazewear is one of those tried and true products. Each season, Avon produces several new shades of this popular gloss. This season, Glazewear is offered in new metallic shades - Copper Glow, Pearlized Peach, Metallic Garnet, Metallic Blush, Golden, and Rose Beam. I personally use every one of these shades, and find them to be flattering and soft on most customers.

Glazewear glides on with a sponge-type applicator. Most people I know use it as a topcoat over a complimentary shade of "regular" lipstick, but it looks great alone, too. It comes in a small discreet tube that you can easily tuck into the smallest evening bag or hip pocket. It smells nice and lasts for several hours without having to do a touch-up. I highly recommend this product and think all of the new metallic colors are wonderful. Yay, Avon! Glazewear ROCKS!

Review: Avon Kissable Lip Frost

Avon rolled out several products to compliment its new Be Kissable fragrance line. One of these "coordinated" items is the Kissable Lip Frost. It comes in a slide-open metal tin with an artsy lipstick imprint on the cover. The packaging is quite nice, and looks hip and modern. Avon offers this product in six muted tones. None of these colors are bright, but fall more into the earthy hues. You open the container and dip your finger along the gloss, then apply. The gloss is frosted and shimmers in the sunlight. I liked the feel of it, but found it to be drying to my lips over the course of just one day. I've had a customer complain that it "isn't sanitary" to be dipping fingers willy-nilly into your lipgloss. I suppose so!

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