F Guerlain and his "work ethic"

Back on October 15, 2010 Jean-Paul Guerlain, the namesake of the beauty company had an interview where he talks about the process of creating a scent for a customer "And for once I started working like a nigger. I don't know if nigger ever worked that hard,". How adorable. The company went into PR overdrive after protests called for a boycott of the company claiming the then 73 year old no longer had ties to the company. After two years in courts (even though the comments were made on national television) he was finally fined $15,800 USD to be dispersed between three antiracism organizations. $15,800  isn't the cost of this mans gas bill in his smallest home. You can read the full story here. Companies such as these are able to be racist and not pay because they know the risk i.e. fine will be minimal and customers will keep buying.

Based on Youtube, beauty blogs and retailer site reviews their meteorites are their most popular product. The item itself is pure marketing magic in cute packaging (Which I do have a weakness for admittedly)

It's essentially a highlight in the shape of individual balls in a tin. They retail from $63 for the powder balls seen above to $73 for the light diffusing primer. Luckily for us Physicians Formula makes better (cheaper) dupe called Mineral Glow Pearls.

From strictly a sanitary standpoint these are a superior product to Guerlain. You know when your using brushes in a powder compact and if the brushes being used are cleaned often enough it hardens the surface? The oils from your face combined with the dirt from the brushes does this. It is gross, BUT when dealing with a singular surface you can scrape off the top layer and begin to use a clean brush. That's not possible with individual balls. The best part is you can get the Glow Pearls for under $13! you can get them here for $11.99 or here for $12.42.

The struggle continues,

Happy Shopping :-)

Hello.

Hi. My name is Valerie. I'm a married mother of one scoop of preciousness, a handbagista, beauty junkie, documentary lover and recovering shopoholic. Like many working black women in the world, especially in America I love to shop. I mean we shop a lot. According to the 2013 Neilson Annual Consumer Report "Women control 43% of the annual spending power for the Black population." and not only that, "blacks consistently place a higher emphasis on grooming and beauty categories and at the top of that list is ethnic hair and Beauty aids (haBa), which Blacks purchase nine times more than others. hair care is serious business in the Black community at all income levels."  We spend nine times more on beauty that any other group. NINE. TIMES. MORE. This of course means anyone would be lucky and thrilled to have us as customers. So why then do we continually shop with retailers or companies who don't value us at the least and are blatantly racist at worst? My guess is maybe they don't know. Well that is where this blog comes in. Each post will highlight a specific offender as well as featuring an equal or better alternate.The world has proven time and again that black women are not worthy of respect or visibility not even when were rich (see Oprah trying to buy a handbag in Europe here). After not spending a dime on black friday in protest I had the courage to continue. I decided to take it one step further especially with higher end purchases to make sure the brand, parent company or retailer has a good track record or respecting my black purchase power. Until next time.


The struggle continues