Discontinued products. Oh, the heartache!

[BumBurnerBum]

I wasted a very pleasant hour or so yesterday afternoon drowning in nostalgia on the 90s teem magazine thread that is in Classics - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/4178119-Early-Noughties-teen-mag-ridiculousness?pg=14.

That sent me down an Instagram wormhole on the @90steenmagazinearchiveuk page (well worth a look!)

I have recently had my world rocked by the realisation that my favourite By Terry lipstain has been discontinued, and that Crabtree & Evelyn no longer do the Jojoba Oil soaps that I loved.

However, this trawl through 90s fashion and beauty has made me ache for some of the products I lived in then.

I know it's been done before but I would give my (lengthening) eye-teeth for:

Impulse O2; Miss Selfridge nail varnish (scented or glow in the dark); Charlse Worthington thickening spray (it smelt amazing though did nothing for the thickness of my hair); BATH PEARLS; 40 million soaps shaped like various animals etc.

The thing I miss the most though is the huge range of body products that Boots Natural Collection used to do. My friends and I whiled away many hours milling around sniffing various body sprays, shower jels, bubble baths and God knows what else.

Seeing photos of the Boots catalogue Natural Collection pages from around 1996 was such a visceral hit of nostalgia it was akin to a punch in the stomach.

Am I alone?

Benefit show offs! Particularly the pink/gold one

Cornsilk is still sold I think. I am sure I have seen it in chemists in London.

Corn silk is going for crazy money on eBay. I do have one unopened box left but still don't want to sell it even if it is going for £50!

@bugaboo218 -
Shaders and toners! Thank you - i was trying to remember these! I used the plum one all the time age 13. And a chestnut one too, i think.

Anyone remember Sun-in? No nostalgia for weird ginger frizzy bits of hair caused by this.

@SophieGiroux

Corn silk is going for crazy money on eBay. I do have one unopened box left but still don't want to sell it even if it is going for £50!

I have an unopened box. But tbh, I really think Coty Airspun is just as good.

[quote Ringsender2]@bugaboo218 -
Shaders and toners! Thank you - i was trying to remember these! I used the plum one all the time age 13. And a chestnut one too, i think.

Anyone remember Sun-in? No nostalgia for weird ginger frizzy bits of hair caused by this.[/quote]
Sun In! OMG. I used to live in Denver, Colorado, where the sun is super strong, especially in Summer. A friend who had light brown hair went Sun In. And fell asleep outside. I got a frantic phone call, 'OMG, osbert, it's hooker blonde! It's hooker blonde! Get here fast' (we lived about 5 mins. walk apart). It was bad!

Clinique dewy smooth foundation and long pretty lashes mascara and up-lighting illuminator
Clinique are dastardly at discontinuing exceptional products and replacing with inferiors and don’t listen to customers feedback either

And Force Flakes (not a beauty product but I do miss them)

tuttifuckinfruity the other Gap scent was called Om and smelled like incense. I may still have a bottle somewhere...

[quote Ringsender2]@bugaboo218 -
Shaders and toners! Thank you - i was trying to remember these! I used the plum one all the time age 13. And a chestnut one too, i think.

Anyone remember Sun-in? No nostalgia for weird ginger frizzy bits of hair caused by this.[/quote]
Yes - used to spray it in every time I dried my hair.....

Ah Sun-in. I used the Boots Natural Collection version of that. 14 year old me naively thought it was okay because it was in the Natural Collection and smelt of lemons!
My hair went brassy orange and had texture Worzel Gummidge would envy! Good job that isn’t on the shelves any more. Took me forever to grow it out and I was known at school as “the girl with the never ending roots”

I bought a huge bottle of flex conditioner in Benalmadena 3 years ago - I still have a little bit left .
I found it in a little corner shop.
About 10 years ago I bought the last 6 bottles in a little cheap shop in Sunderland.
My DH used to work for Revlon and when I first met him he had loads of left over stock - what I would give for a spray bottle of ‘perm life’ it was just perfect for curly hair ....

@Hellvelyn

Very recent but Boots pink curl creme. Dirt cheap and makes my frizz actually curl nicely. Where has it gone? No one in Boots can answer my desperate questioning.

There's some on eBay that will set you back £25 for 2

The peach scented talc from M&S in the early 80s, I loved it. It's amazing how scents can evoke so many memories.

There was also a scent called Silent Shores by Stowaway, similar to the Impulse range. I adored it and I'd do almost anything to be able to smell that again, it'd be like reliving my teenage years in the late 70s/early 80s.

I loved some of the Avon products - Rare Rubies and Secrets of India. I found a replacement for Rare Rubies when it was discontinued - Smoky Poppy from The Body Shop and an okay replacement for Secrets of India from Crabtree and Evelyn - and then they were discontinued!

I had these wash grains from the body shop that worked brilliantly on my face but they were discontinued. I used a grapefruit cleanser, toner and moisturiser from Yves Rocher - great products but discontinued.

I used henna from the body shop until it was discontinued. I started using Lush henna as a replacement. Lush drives me mad. I find a product there that I love and then they discontinue it or change the ingredients or the name - Queen of hearts face soap and many of the perfumes.

I used Body Shop henna on my hair and it was murky green for months. My mum had just paid for me to get my hair fixed after it went purple from some home colour so she was livid and made me live with it!

Prescriptives make up - now only available in the US online. Especially Magic Powder.

Ahh, shaders & toners were fab! I was a fake redhead for about 10 years in my late teens and twenties, but was never quite brave enough for henna. I used to go into the Lush in Neals Yard to look at it and try and muster the courage to buy a tub, but the resemblance to manure was just too off putting.

Henna doesn't work well with other hair dyes! Or chlorine in swimming pools!

@TheVampiresWife I remember Yardley makeup! My lipstick of choice was ‘Damson Crush’ or something like that.

@Darklane

Oh my! We are twins!

I remember the Max Factor perfumes, the Quant make up (I used to save up for it!), the Coty and Yardley stuff (the actual best set of eye shadows - soul setters - beautiful mauves blues greens etc). I was reminded of Revlon Flex conditioner as one of my conditioners smells the same!

Vivienne Westwood Boudoir perfume...I'm on the last dregs of my bottle & saving it for best!

@purdypuma

Vivienne Westwood Boudoir perfume...I'm on the last dregs of my bottle & saving it for best!

Ooooh I had this! Loved it. I used to work in cosmetics and one of my colleagues starting going on about how it was the worst perfume ever. Then she asked what fragrance I wore.......awkward.

Oh body shop blotting paper and shaders and toners!
I met DH in halls of residence when we were both 17. I had ridiculously sun inned hair, can't believe he fancied me!

I used to work in the Sun In factory. It was made in the same place as contact lens solution. It was a huge vat of bleach. We used to throw coins into it. No idea why as the vat was steel so you couldn't see the coins 🙄

Yardley Strawberry Creme lipstick. The only red lipstick I ever suited. A soft, slightly pinky red. I bought a few when I realised Yardley makeup was on the way out. Nothing has come close in - cough - 30 years.