A friend of mine texted me today and told me to quickly turn on the Dr. Oz show. As it happens, he's an avid fan of the show so I wasn't entirely surprised by this. So what was the topic that sparked the text? Cheap beauty and anti-aging dollar store products that work as well or better than the department store brands. Oh bother.
In the interest of full disclosure, I'm a marketing consultant and while I know that we have been blamed for everything from creating Christmas to kidnapping the Lindberg baby, I don't think we can take full credit for this particular sleight of hand. Besides my day job, I'm also a consumer who has to stretch her dollars and make smart purchasing decisions. Once I bought a no name eyeliner pencil that was so oily the black pigment was absorbed into my skin and disappeared in minutes and a face powder that made me look like a black Geisha. I'm not trying to trash drugstore products but are any of them truly as good as the department store brands? Probably, but I frankly don't have the time or inclination to sort through them all and deal with the hits and misses.
Which brings me to my point. Could it be that the reason Tide is the number one laundry detergent instead of Gain is because it works better? Are consumers so dense that given the chance to save money they will chose a more expensive brand simply because the commercial told them to? Perhaps Tide became number one through a process of trial and error. Someone bought the cheaper brand, discovered it didn't work well then ponied up a few more dollars for Tide and as they say, the rest is history.
My drugstore successes (and there have been a few), include Almay eye make-up remover which according to the bottle is the best selling remover in the country. Also Oil of Olay makes wonderful skin care products but please don't try to take away my Prevage. And for the life of me, I don't get the mystique behind Maybelline's Great Lash mascara. It didn't do a thing for my thin, wispy eyelashes, (thank god for Latisse).
Don't hold me to this but I believe the formula for product pricing is based on more than packaging costs and a desire to fleece consumers. Research and development don't come cheap and acquiring effective, quality ingredients can be expensive and time consuming.
Of course there will always be people who believe they can get something for virtually nothing. They are the folks who, like my mother, believe that there is a giant conspiracy on the part of big business to keep us from everything good including generic products. They're the folks who keep con artists and infomercials in business. The Dr. Oz guest demonstrated how tea bags and other products from the dollar store can achieve anti-aging results similar to more expensive products. I watched as Dr. Oz gleefully slatherd a can of dollar store pumpkin on an audience member's face using oven mits also bought for a dollar for extra stimulation. Sure, oatmeal, avocadoes etc. will exfoliate and the acids in some foods simulate a mild facial peel. But will they really make you look significantly younger? Your shinning clean skin will still sag and your jowls while having a certain glow, without the benefits of cosmetic surgery, will still point southward. I say use the green tea bags on your eyelids and definitely drink a cup and when you're finished, call the local spa and schedule a botox treatment, microdermabrasion or injectable session. Oh, and tell Mrs. Oz when you run into her at the cosmetic surgeon's office that I love her husband's show.
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