To wonder why women buy into all this stuff?

[Pyjamaramadrama]

So I've been using the same £3 moisturiser that I have since I was 18. It's served me well but I decided that I need to invest in one with sunblock and thought I might go for a higher brand.

I went to Boots to the Clinique counter £39.99 was their cheapest moisturiser with spf and apparently I will also need primer, face wash, and I couldn't even get a sample to try before I buy.

I headed over to olay but was overwhelmed with the huge selection and ended up buying a £13 boots sanctuary moisturiser with spf. Realised when I got home it's perfumed so I'm not sure how well I will like it.

Looking online at the Clinique range there's absolutely loads of very expensive products that claim to reduce redness, reduce uneven skin tone, dark circles, I'm surprised they haven't just got an ugly face cream. There's also a million different make up products, my little make up bag looks really inadequate now.

Looking at the men's there's maybe 5 or 6 products.

Surely we don't need all this stuff? Dps face looks fine and all he does is splash it with water each day!

Um well water is a chemical Precious, do you avoid that? Everything is made of chemicals, including us. Avoiding chemicals is impossible unless you decide to stop breathing. Simple, btw, is absolutely full of synthetics and most people with sensitive skin don't get on with it (myself included).

I love makeup and skincare because it's fun. My moisturiser isn't hugely expensive but it makes my skin feel lovely. Broad-spectrum spf is by far the best wrinkle-preventer, but you don't need an expensive one. I have my eyebrows threaded because plucking my own is not precise enough and I find threading gives them a nicer shape. Eyebrows frame your face so getting them right is important. I do have expensive perfume because my favourite perfumes are orientals, which tend to use more expensive ingredients - but if I could get the same quality for cheaper I would, I don't think expensive equals better. My favourite perfume is Shalimar or Miller Harris Fleur Oriental, which are definitely not the most expensive or rarest perfumes.

Myrtle Simple is bloody awful for me. Skin doesn't feel clean, moisturiser doesn't feel as if it's doing anything and gives me spots!

Third shift, innit? Read The Beauty Myth, it's all in there.

I tried Simple when I developed Roseacea, thinking it was simple. I now avoid it, it made the problem worse.

I don't wear much make-up, only some basic stuff I've tried over the years that doesn't irritate. Even some stuff advertised as good for conditions like mine isn't worth it.

I use factor 50 sunblock from boots. Then maybelline foundation on top. Both together cost about a tenner and last several months.

I know quite a few beauty editors. Basically: high SPF sunscreen, AHAs, botox. Everything else is hype.

I'm currently using Olay as ran out of my expensive 10% AHA cream & haven't got round to replacing. Beauty therapist said Olay Regenerist is as good as any expensive moisturiser out there. I also use Boots Protect & Perfect serum.

Can I wade in and mention the rosehip oil that I bought due to a thread here a month ago? It's brilliant.
£13 for 100ml, I'm using it every night and it looks like the bottle will last me eight months at least.

This was the thread

I am a third generation Nivea babe.
Your skill just needs an emollient, any sort will do. Diprobase would do!

The miracle ingredients in the expensive creams do work, but not in the minuscule quantities that are in the cream you buy. The advertising skirts very carefully around this fact. If the miracle ingredient WAS there in effective quantity, the cream would be classed as medicinal and would need all sorts of testing and licences.

Brilliant Ben Goldacre explains much more eloquently in 'Bad Science'

*your SKIN

Spf is important. I just got loreal factor 30. Sunscreen will keep wrinkles at bay.

Its only a rip off if you buy stuff you don't need because you believe in miracles.
If you buy stuff you like because you like it you are just buying stuff you like.

I get a bit fed up with the 'women who buy/wear make up are so stooopid' shtick on MN

Just deal with the fact that some women enjoy buying, using and experimenting with cosmetics and skin care.

People who eschew such fripperies are not cleverer or any more real than those that love a good go with the Clarins and Clinique.

I have been using Johnson and Johnson's Clean and Clear for 20 years, since I was 14

Every now and then I try something else, but it gives me pimples. I used the Clinique range for a few months when in my 20s, but it was terrible for my skin. So, I went back to Clean and Clear. Ditto Simple, and Nivea.

FWIW my skin also gets worse when I stop using it as well.

But I do get why people spend money on these things as well. While I was using the 3-step Clinique stuff, I did enjoy putting it on and feeling like I was treating myself. If I hadn't broken out quite so badly, I probably would have kept up with it for that reason alone.

It was like applying anti stretch mark cream to my stomach while pregnant: sure it might not have done much (although I did end up with few marks), but it was a nice thing to do when I was feeling really yucky

That's what I've been using Johnson's Clean and Clear.

Why do women do it and not men?

Because we are conditioned to believe our value is in looking good. We have less value in our brains, skills or abilities vs how attractive men find us. Because our value is related only to what men view it as.

Men weather and still work in TV, singing and acting, women are on the shelf unless they retain unnaturally young looks (blondie) through ever more extreme measures (Cher). Because who cares if they can sing and act if they don't look good?

No wonder women spend silly money trying to look good, without it society is very clear you are worth less.

Another poster has mentioned The Beauty Myth. As well as all the patriarchal benefits of making women feel inadequate, is is now a multi billion £ industry, as you so clearly describe. Imagine how well funded women's pensions coukd be if we cut back on this stuff and were happy without it.

That's what I'm saying but the last two poster put it much better than me.

I use boots protect and perfect day cream and overnight hand cream.

Have def made my face less wrinkly and my hands less little spotty.

Like I enjoy pampering myself and feel I already spend quite a bit on budget ish beauty products.

I've never looked higher end but now I have my range of products looks really inadequate and I'm left wondering whether I should be buying all this other stuff.

Beauty products are supposed to make us feel good but I reckon that really they make us feel shit.

I bought into the whole cleanse tone and moisturise, but my face came out in huge sore spots so now I just wash it with warm water and face wash and do no more

I used to have an amazing skin tonic from Rose and Apothecary that I can't seem to find anymore. It was about 6 for a huge bottle which was high end for me in my early 20s. It was wonderful though and I long to find it again.

My dm despair at me because I don't use a cleanser in a bottle but instead use Simple face wash. Have done for years and it seems to agree with me (my skin was horrific in my teens and 20s). She maintains water and soap - ffs it is not soap! - is bad for me and my skin is awful.

My skin is not awful. I am 35 and my skin looks good! I get lots of compliments. I am ugly, overweight and dress like a nutter so I am pleased with my one redeeming feature!

I bought into the whole cleanse tone and moisturise, but my face came out in huge sore spots so now I just wash it with warm water and face wash and do no more

I don't use anything.... no moisturiser, no suncream, no makeup - I react to most things....

my genetics are not great in the wrinkle factor... mum/dad/grandparents all needed a good ironing out at my age... but I am 50 and unwrinkly....

I do wear sunglasses (every time I go outside - age related macular degeneration is genetic too) and a hat... which I think are the best "anti-wrinkle skincare" around

Because advertising packaging smell texture are all very seductive, and women are primed to feel insecure about appearance, increasingly men too.

Generally I don't buy into it, as has been said skin benefits from use of an emollient, I use olive oil thickened with beeswax and factor 50 from sainsbury @ 3 quid a tube

""Why do women do it and not men?""

Younger men are using products, I can see the difference in my nearly 30 year old Son in Law, who I mentioned earlier.

People do look less dry/dull if they use the right stuff. It's just that men were once told it didn't matter how they looked aka Sid James and many old dryed out looking men who were placed with fresh faced women in the media.

I've swapped my usual Elemis and tried something else, my skin looks different. My skin/complextion looks different when I do my whole routine of Papya face peel/exotic moisture mask, primer etc.

I'm not being kidded, I look closer to how I looked when I was younger.

My complection has changed since I went Vegan, I have a bit of "sparkle" back.

I dont have to moisturise for two days after a microdermabrasion treatment, I don't have to peel/prone for a month after a peel.

These products do change the appearance of your skin, over 45 (and for some after 25, smokers etc).

It's whether you care about this.

Just because some people (not just women) do, doesn't mean they have been kidded into it, it's part if your personality/interests/lifestyle.

When I go camping and don't wear a cover, at least BB cream, my skin is awful.

I feel better now than in my 20/30's, my diet and weight are excellent, I'm not ttc, worrying about work etc.

I'm certainly not some silly woman being sold products I don't want to buy, I need them to achieve the look I want, like I need my grey hairs covering.