October 2014 Blush Mystery Beauty Box

I received my Blush Mystery Beauty Box today and I have mixed feelings about it.  I think this may finally be the time I call it quits with this subscription.  The value of this box is about $101.99 if you go by the prices on Blush.com, but truly I wouldn't pay anywhere near that much for these items.  The cost of the subscription is $24.95 a month plus tax, and I feel I pretty much broke even in terms of what I would want to shell out for these items.  I pay for this with my own funds and the opinions are entirely my own.

I am very happy to see a few of the brands because I have wanted to try them based on YouTube recommendations or because they coordinated with a product I had received in a previous box.

Here is a quick breakdown of the five products included.

Glytone Eye Cream - Full size - $38 value

This Glytone Hydrate Eye Cream was a total bummer. We received this exact same Glytone product already this year in the January box.  It is the "highlight" product this month and is also the highest value product in the box.  This brand offers more than a dozen different products on the Blush website - why not send out a new product to try from this brand?  It was a big disappointment to me, and even if the card says it does, eye cream doesn't exactly scream Fall to me.

Strivectin-AR Night Treatment - .25 fl oz deluxe sample - $15 value

I wasn't super excited to see another Strivectin product either simply because this brand is incredibly expensive and I've seen it in a ton of subscription boxes.  If you were to purchase the full 1.7 oz. size it is $109 on the Blush website.  I am sure that there are people out there who think that is a reasonable price, but I feel like you could purchase and entire skincare system or a Clarisonic Mia for that amount of money and do better by your skin.  I'm not certain I will try this simply because if I fall in love with it I wouldn't be able to afford to purchase it in a full size. If I do try it I will likely use it so sparingly that I wouldn't notice its effects because I would be afraid to waste it.  I'm a weirdo though, so you can't really go by me here.

Cargo Beach Blush in Cable Beach - Full Size - $30 value

I am actually very pleased with this product.  I've always wanted to try Cargo cosmetics but had yet to find a set I was interested in and their stand alone product prices were a little steep.  This is a very shimmery set of four pink and bronze shades that blend together or can be worn separately.  I think the far right pink will make a very pretty highlight color on the brow bone.  They are a little hard to see in this picture, but it did capture the shimmery quality and the subtle glow it has when they are blended.  Again there is nothing about this product that says Fall to me.  It seems a really summery shade but I don't really care about seasonal makeup colors.  I prefer to wear what looks nice with my skin tone and I think this will be good.

Batiste "To Go" Travel size Dry Shampoo - $3.99 value

I was actually quite excited to try the dry shampoo (in the green and yellow can above) and it had a pleasant scent that was a little soapy, and a little lemony.  What I didn't care for was the white residue it left behind.  I sprayed it about five or six inches away at first and this is what happened...

After I brushed it out you could still see the white left behind so I don't think this would be a win for darker haired folks, even when I held the can further away it was still visible.  It did its job but I would expect more from a drugstore brand at a higher price point like this one.  I would like to see what the cherry and blush fragrances of this brand's dry shampoo smell like, but I am really addicted to the RockStar Dirty Secret by TIGI type.  Of all the brands I've tried (Psst, Tresseme, Suave, Oscar Blandi, Herbal Essence and several others) the TIGI wins hands down.

Klorane Desert Date Shampoo for dry hair 6.7 oz.  Full size - $15 value

This was also an exciting part of the box simply because I received a leave in conditioner from the same brand in this fragrance in an earlier box this year and I love the scent.  It is a little sweet and a little spicy.  The leave in product also makes my hair feel wonderful and I have used it really sparingly so I have about half a tube left and can marry it to its sister product.  I know that this brand of shampoo has also appeared in other Blush boxes in the past twelve months, so even though it is new to me I can imagine it being a similar letdown if you had received it before even if you liked it.
I have subscribed to the box since February, and the first box they sent me was the January box.  That was a little upsetting because I subscribed with the intention of receiving the February box as my first box.  Long story short, they promised that I would receive a February box as well, and when I called in March asking where my box was they said they would never have sent two boxes in one month and the only way I could receive the February box was if I paid the $34.95 non-subscriber price even though I was subscribed.   I canceled for a month and then re-subbed in April since I saw spoilers and that box looked interesting. 

 I don't have a very good track record with the company - there have been quite a few issues with my past boxes.  I've had four products arrive broken or badly damaged, two arrive past their expiration date, and one missing altogether.  I've found the best way to deal with them is to email them.  They never return my emails, but replacements for the expired item and two of the broken items showed up unexpectedly.  I didn't reach out about the other broken items or the missing item because I either fixed them well enough myself (a NYX eyeshadow palette that came unglued but was otherwise ok and a hair treatment bottle with a broken top that I replaced with another similarly sized cap from shampoo I already owned) or I just didn't care (some random hair treatment that was tiny and wasn't really suited to my hair type).  I probably ought to have cancelled by now, but I like that they generally send full size items or deluxe sizes and that they at least make an attempt to make things right. 

I've gotten to try some awesome products that are outside of the realm of what I'd pay for something if I didn't get to sample it first.  Brands like Klorane, Rouge Bunny Rouge and Peter Thomas Roth weren't really on my radar, and I appreciate the introduction.  I just wish they would focus on a wider variety of products and that they wouldn't repeat within a calendar year.  There are some categories of skincare that just pop up over and over.  Thanks to Blush I will be set for eye cream and bb cream (in colors that don't really match my skin tone) for ages.  I also have a TON of dry shampoo from them and I still have yet to get any Klorane dry shampoo which was a huge part of my wanting the February box.  I'm just afraid if I cancel I will be super jealous of whatever goes out next month.  If I were smart I would wait for spoilers and order it after the 7th if there was something really exciting.  I just feel like next month will be an awesome makeup month and it will sell out quickly.  

Ah well!  That's the beauty of the "Mystery" box I guess.  This one had two foil packs of samples.  One was sunscreen by Cotz which is seemingly in every box and when I tried it several months back it broke me out so I automatically pitch it.  There was also a Klorane shampoo packet which I just thought was weird.  I think it was a different fragrance but I didn't look closely because I hate foil packs.  Sometimes other people who post their box contents seem like lottery winners because I've seen them receive full size products as their free samples.  It always makes me a little jealous because they seem to be products that showed up in past boxes.  Maybe someday I will be a lucky duck too.

Hope this post finds you well and that you're excited about this month's box.  I really am happy about the blush and the shampoo and happy I didn't have to shell out extra money to find I didn't dig the Batiste that much.  It's a decent month!