New to the community, new to skincare and seeking advice!

[ellex0]

Hello lovelies!! ☺️ I really hope someone can help me out with some skincare advice. I am pretty new to skincare... because most of my life (especially my teenage years) I somehow managed to be blessed with really good skin and great facial complexion. I was often asked why I ever wore makeup. Now at the still young age of 28 I’ve really started to notice some things about my complexion and just my skin in general that I don’t think have ever been a previous issue. I only REALLY started to care though about 6-8 months ago when I started getting asked questions by my boss and some co-workers and friends. “Are you getting enough sleep?” “What’s wrong, were you just crying??” And then I daily was being told I looked exhausted. Truthfully during that time period I was going through some pretty tough stuff and no, I was not sleeping well and I was crying pretty frequently. I won’t get into that but as we all know, stress on that level can and will lead to poor habits. Lack of quality sleep, lazyness, poor nutrition, and just lack of self care. I was so busy worrying about everyone else in my life and what was causing the stress, that I didn’t even think about me. Overall my appearance took a huge fall, mainly my face. I began to quickly develop giant dark circles under my eyes and those came with a lot of puffiness and swelling. The puffiness and swelling then lead to some fine lines and wrinkles right under my bottom lashes. I have dark patches at the outside corners of my eyes, and my eyelids go back and forth between dark red to just dark with no red and the whole area from the eyelid up to underneath my brows are effected by that. Without makeup, I look like I got punched in both eyes pretty much. The under eye area is also extremely dry. My face in general is now very dry... I blame that on lack of water intake and lack of proper skincare obviously but I was also drinking pretty heavily during that stressful period. I know, wrong choice, I’ve learned and moved on from that but now the face is just dry. Not flakey or anything, but it’s dry. My cheeks are always red no matter what I do but it doesn’t look/feel like a rash and the redness doesn’t cause pain or itchiness at all. It’s just red. So now that you all have a bit of a history of what my skin has gone through- here’s what I’ve done so far to try to nurse my skin back to as normal as possible and I’ll then tell you what my biggest problems still are. Thank you for reading all of this btw it means a lot because I really need help lol. About a month ago I really took an interest in finding a day and night skincare regiment that I could consistently follow. After doing some of my own research and reading lots of reviews (the reviews were for education only, I know everyone reacts differently to certain products) I thought I had a pretty good one. I’ve only been consistent with it for a little over a week because I’ve added some things, subtracted some things and just made little tweaks here and there. Knowing that results don’t really happen in that short of time I was not expecting much but I have seen some differences that I’m happy with...but it has also brought some awareness to things I didn’t think about. I went out and bought some products that got a lot of hype through YouTubers and review apps like Influenster. Some of them are really making my face feel amazing inside out but others I’m just not 100% sure or not because I got a sample which isn’t enough to really use long enough to see results. I’ll be honest, I’m not sure exactly how to classify my skin type. Since starting my routine it’s more normal than anything..I think? See that’s where I’m having a hard time. I know it seems black and white. If your skin is dry, it’s dry if it’s oily, it’s oily and if it’s neither, it’s probably normal. All I know is it felt dry to the touch before and my makeup always looked cakey. Anyway, I bought the Tatcha bestsellers set from Sephora because I really wanted to try the brand out. I needed a cleanser and a moisturizer, but most of all I really wanted to try out the Luminous Face Mist. The mini size of that was available for 20 bucks, and at the time they didn’t have any other mini sized Tatcha products so I just bought the whole set for $60. Great deal! I use the one step camellia cleanser every day both morning and night. I love this product because you don’t need much and while it is very oily, once water hits it, it turns milky and rinses off so easily. I also love that I can get all of my makeup off in just about 10-15 seconds and it really makes my face feel fresh, soft and clean after its rinsed off. I use that at night for makeup removal, and then I usually apply my night moisturizer which has been the Ponds Dry Face Lotion. I only started using that because I bought it a long time ago and just never used it. So it was a product I already had and it seems to have a pretty good reputation as well as it’s been around a long time. I use it as my night cream because it’s really thick and a little oily, so it’s not something I’d want to apply makeup on after. It also takes a while to soak in. I apply that to every part of my face except the under eye area because I then apply the sample I got of Belif Moisturizing Eye Bomb. I wanted a sample of this stuff because I am yet to see a bad or even neutral review of it ANYWHERE and I had read that it’s extremely moisturizing... and I will say so far it’s the only under eye moisturizer that has actually done its jo. Most products don’t do anything for that area for me because my eyes seem to... I guess block moisture? I would use an “under eye moisturizer” but after an hour my eyes would dry up again badly. I like this one because it does what it claims as far as moisture but I’m not seeing any difference in the puffiness when I wake up, darkness or the lines but A- I don’t think it claims to help with that stuff and B- it’s only been about 5 days of morning and night use. But when I got the sample my primary focus and concern was moisture and due to my lack of knowledge I assumed the rest would improve because of the moisture. I’m learning now that’s not the case. I still love the eye bomb but if I could find a cream that moisturizes that well but also has the benefits of helping with puffiness and the bags in general I’d be all in. So after I apply the Ponds cream and the eye cream, I give a light spritz or two of the Tatcha Luminous Face Mist. It’s super light but it does give me just a bit of added moisture and it feels really nice right after I spray it. So that honestly is more of something I just like to apply for the feel, not because I need it. During the morning routine I cleanse again with the camellia cleanser, and then I use the Tatcha Enzyme Rice Powder right after. I’m wondering if I should just do one or the other in the morning... but I do both just because I’m paranoid that not ALL of my makeup gets washed off at night, and the enzyme powder is such a light exfoliator. You can feel some subtle graininess to it when you are rubbing it on your face but it’s not like your typical exfoliating cleanser. I also love that when I wash it off, my face feels like baby skin. So using both just gives me piece of mind that all makeup from the day before has been completely washed off and any dead skin has been removed. Also my face feels freaking amazing and there’s no irritation with it whatsoever. My face doesn’t become any more red as a result and that’s important to me. After that, I moisturize with the Tatcha Water Cream. This one was interesting to me because while all other products in the set were for dry skin, this one said it was for normal to oily skin so I was almost turned off by it, but it also said it helps prepare skin for makeup. I use it as my day moisturizer and I honestly can say I like it a lot but I’m not sure if I love it yet. It does moisturize and it doesn’t dry me out, I love the smell, but I did notice that it does burn very slightly on my cheeks (where the redness is) but it’s a VERY light burn that goes away in seconds after it dries. Even with the burning it doesn’t make the redness worse at all. So this is another iffy thing for me that I’m wondering about... it burns a little but it doesn’t make my face more red and it makes my face soft. Then after all of that I again lightly spritz with the Face Mist and then I do my makeup. My goodness, I am writing a novel! Sorry, I just think it’s helpful to give details like this to ensure I get the right advice. If you don’t know what I’m using and how, it’s harder to help. Anyway... so while this routine has managed to slightly improve my skin in about a week and a half, I still have some concerns after something I noticed last night and I feel like I might need to change something. I quickly add that I haven’t worn any makeup at all the past 4 days just to give my skin a break and also to see if I saw differences. I washed my face last night using both the rice powder and the camellia cleanser. I usually don’t use the rice powder at night but truthfully I have no idea when it’s best or how frequently to use it. My face again felt amazing. I put on my Ponds cream and that’s when I got alarmed. My face turned BRIGHT red. My cheeks were WAY more red than they already are, and areas of my face that are never red, were a little red. The thing is, I’ve noticed this happen before but because it doesn’t burn me at all, I didn’t think it was an issue. So- the Tatcha water cream burns a tiny bit but doesn’t cause any added redness. The Ponds cream makes my face bright red all over and makes existing redness worse but there’s no discomfort when I use it like burning or stinging. The Ponds cream also does provide me a little more moisture than the water cream, but do I really actually need the level of moisture that Ponds provides?? I haven’t even looked at the ingredients, I probably should. It’s just confusing to me because I feel like something that burns would cause redness and something that doesn’t burn wouldn’t make my skin freak out. But there comes in my lack of education in skincare. I just don’t know enough to figure it out myself. In conclusion I need a facial moisturizer that will help REDUCE the redness in my cheeks. Again, generally the redness does not feel dry to the touch or cause any pain or discomfort. It’s just a red color that won’t go away. I need an eye cream that moisturizes like belif eye bomb but also promotes a decrease in puffiness, discoloration/darkness and fine lines, and idk, maybe I need more than I think? Thank you to any and all of you that have read this whole thing. Seriously I’m annoyed myself at how long this took to write and how long it actually ended up being lol. I plan to go to Sephora later today... I just don’t want to be sold something that won’t work. Samples of skincare are hard because there’s not enough of it to use for a period of time that prove if it works or not so if anyone can tell me what would be worth purchasing in a mini size to try, that would be amazing and I’ll be forever grateful!!! 🤗

[ellex0]

Hi again! Thank you again to those who made some recommendations. I made my way into Sephora today as planned and well, I touched on this a little in a different reply but my visit tonight was really disappointing to say the least. I don’t live very close to a Sephora right now, the nearest is about 10 miles from my house so I don’t go very often. Of course online ordering is an option but my patience level sucks especially when it comes to waiting for things that will help improve my physical appearance :). Also I like to have the option to sample something before buying it, especially if it’s expensive! Skincare products are an exception though because a sample is hardly enough to be able to see results to know if it works, because the samples are very small. I wrote down all of the recommendations before I went, which was about 10+ products. I left with only ONE of the items recommended by you guys which was the Sunday Riley Luna Sleeping Night Oil. I went back and forth with buying this SO much. There was only one left, and it just happened to be the smaller sized bottle for $55 which worked out because I wasn’t ready to spend $105 on one thing yet. I bought this because I needed a night moisturizer. I also needed help with redness. I wanted to try the Dr. Jart Cicapair line of products... but due to the cost I really was only trying to get mini sized everything. The only mini they had of that line was the color correcting treatment in a jar. They did not have a mini of the camo drops, serum, cream, or anything else. The treatment was I think 18 dollars for the mini. I had that in my basket for a while until I started overthinking EVERYTHING. This is the story of my life lol. I do not want to skimp on skincare but I also just don’t have it in my budget to spend 100s of dollars on this stuff at once. I started to try to prioritize what products were most important to me to try first. Redness was a huge priority, also finding a moisturizer since I threw out my Ponds. The Luna oil claims to moisturize and help with redness. The Dr. Jart color correcting treatment focuses on color correcting, but it did state on the box that it moisturizes. Idk, I got the impression that the CC treatment wouldn’t be moisturizing enough for me so I made the decision to purchase only the Luna oil instead of both that and the CC treatment. Trying to get the most benefits for my buck! I looked at the Drunk Elephant products. Wow they are expensive. Since I still needed a moisturizer for the daytime I elected to not go with Drunk Elephant due to the fact that I was already looking at $55 for the Luna oil, and I still needed an eye cream (they had no mini eye creams available unless they were part of a value set). This is where it got even harder - the ONLY mini eye creams available were included in value sets. Full size eye creams were 40+ dollars and I saw my $$ total skyrocketing by the second. I wanted the Belif true cream moisturizing bomb, but the full size was too much for me right now. The value set was 38 which was the same price as a full size true cream and it came with the moisturizing eye bomb and the true cream. I wanted that set so bad because of the price, and because it had the last two products I needed for the price of 1. The problem was that I had a sample of the eye bomb and I did fall in love with it, however I REALLY wanted an eye cream that moisturizes as well as provide other benefits such as brightening and depuffing. So at that point I decided against that set. KORA Organics are not sold at all at this location which I learned tonight when I circled the store 3 times looking for it. I wanted to try the KORA Organics noni radiant eye oil so badly after reading what it does and the reviews. Seemed like it would be perfect for me but they didn’t have that brand. Since I was out of eye cream I had to settle for something else until I could get my hands on the oil. It’s getting late and I’m realizing how long this is becoming. I ended up getting the OLEHINRIKSEN Glow Brightly value set. The price was 42 dollars and it came with the truth serum, the banana eye cream, a night cream moisturizer and a day moisturizer. So essentially I got what I needed, not necessarily what I wanted but I’ll eventually get those other products I had mentioned before... plus, OLEHINRIKSEN catches my eye every time and I’ve always wanted to try their products so this will be the moment of truth if they are worth it! I applied my Luna oil a few minutes before writing this for the first time and so far my first impressions are good. The smell was a bit aggressive at first but I ended up really loving it by the time I got done rubbing it in. It’s blue! Lol I like that too because I can tell where the product is on my face before it soaks in. the small bottle is going to last a long time. On the side of the box it says that after the first night you should see little results, I took a before picture so when I wake up tomorrow, I can compare. Goodnight and thank you!!

[GG84]

@ellex0 I have the Dr Jart Redness colour corrector, I don't use it really. It was gifted to me from Sephora. It's the one in the jar you are talking about. Its full. If you are okay with the fact that I stuck my finger in it once, you can have it. 

[darlyndar]

@ellex0 I think you did great with Luna and the Ole Henriksen. You have a great start. I own banana bright and use it every once in a while over my Kora. Since you are now using Luna, grab an SPF. That doesn’t have to be expensive. You can run to your local drugstore and grab one there. It’s really important to use an spf of 30 or higher when you incorporate acids. 

Are you in the US? I ask because I have soooooo many samples and deluxe samples from subscription boxes and Sephora. I’ve sent them to other BIC members in the past and I’d be more than happy to send you some as well. I even have a mini Kora oil I can send you. It’ll last forever. I know I have some Sunday Riley and Drunk Elephant packets as well as a B-Hydra mini and Marula mini that I got from a kit. I own full size so those are still in the box. From what @GG84, there’s a postal strike in Can, so it may take a while to get to you if you live up there. Just let me know! I know how expensive this all can be and they may not even work for you. With Sephora’s return system and the way they track it, I wouldn’t want you to get banned for retuning products that don’t work. 

[darlyndar]

@ellex0 Also, don’t forget to tag us (like I did with your screen name with the @) so we can respond to you a lot quicker. If you don’t, we have to search for the thread and read through it to see if you have responded to our posts or not. It may take a while. 😉😉😉

[SportyGirly125]

@ellex0 

For the under eyes I love ORIGINS - GinZing™ Refreshing Eye Cream to Brighten and Depuffand KIEHL'S SINCE 1851 - Creamy Eye Treatment with AvocadoFor moisturizer I love FRESH - Rose Deep Hydration Moisturizerand using OMOROVICZA - Magic Moisture MistFor the redness I like CLINIQUE Redness Solutions Daily Relief Cream with Microbiome Technology I find that DRUNK ELEPHANT - C-Firma™ Day Serum helps with fine lines and wrinkles. 

I don’t think you need the Tatcha cleansing oil in the morning. I would use it at night when you need to take off your makeup.  Use face wipes or a makeup remover to get the extra residue off. Also, I personally don’t use the Rice Powder everyday as my skin is very dry and sensitive. I only use it a couple times a week.  Lastly, I would stop using the Ponds cream.  Maybe your face is allergic to it and that’s why it burns. 

[ellex0]

Thank you! I’m about to post what I ended up getting at Sephora tonight and I’ll be honest, the trip was extremely disappointing and it became more complicated than it needed to be lol but overall I’m content in the end. A lot of products that you and someone else recommended were either not sold at all at my location, or just out of stock. I overheard one of the associates saying that a lady had come in earlier and bought over $1,000 worth of skincare products as gifts including value sets. I’m not sure if that was an exaggeration or not but this location I usually go to did look more picked over than usual. I know I can have stuff ordered while I’m there in store, but there were some things out of stock that I really did not want to wait for because I’m completely out like under eye cream, and now moisturizer. The Ponds cream, I threw out. It probably was bad considering how long I had it. It didn’t smell weird though or feel weird which is why I used it. That’s not the one that burned though surprisingly. It made my redness worse but it didn’t burn, it was the Tatcha water cream that burned but oddly enough, it didn’t make my skin more red. I also noticed today that it doesn’t keep my face moisturized more than a couple hours so I kinda scratched the idea of continuing use of that. As far as makeup wipes go, I’m yet to find one that doesn’t irritate my skin in some way so that’s why I steer clear of those. They burn and cause redness and dry me out. Even micellar water does that to me which is strange so that’s why I’m really loving the camellia cleanser. I can cut down my use of the rice enzyme powder if needed, but if anything it just helps my skin feel softer. The exfoliant is so gentle it isn’t irritating at all but I can see the fact that it is a true exfoliant so using it daily might be doing more harm than I think. I did not buy another cleanser tonight so I will have to continue to use the camellia one to wash makeup off at night but maybe I won’t use it in the mornings. I will just rinse my face with water in the shower and try to be less paranoid about my makeup being washed off. The cleanser does do a really good job of getting it all.

[SportyGirly125]

@ellex0 I'm glad you found at least something you liked.  If anything skincare is really tricky because everyone's skin is different and react to the same product differently.  It took me a while to get the right products for my skin.  If you are ever looking for a gentle makeup remover Bioderma Sensibio H2O at Beautylish is wonderful also an essence like SK II is loved by a lot of people in the community and adds moisture back to the skin.

[darlyndar]

@ellex0 Self care is so important. You’re getting a grip of your skin at the right time. So, with that said, I feel that your Ponds may be old. Time to throw it out. It also seems you may have dry/sensitive skin. 

Tatcha is a great brand but I personally feel there are sooooo many AMAZING K Beauty brands that are very affordable. And believe me, I don’t skimp on skincare. 

After cleansing, using an essence or toner will help a lot. fresh Rose & Hyaluronic Acid Deep Hydration Toner 8.4 oz/ 250 mL is great. This will give you layers of hydration that will not affect the rest of your skincare and makeup. 

As as far as daytime moisturizer, Drunk Elephant B-Hydra™ Intensive Hydration Serum with Hyaluronic Acid 1.69 oz/ 50 mL is also amazing and sinks in beautifully. Don’t forget to apply your SPF. Since you don’t really wear makeup, DRUNK ELEPHANT - Umbra Tinte™ Physical Daily Defense Broad Spectrum Sunscreen SPF 30wwill be great since it has a tiny to it. 

For your eyes, I cannot recommend KORA Organics Noni Glow Radiant Eye Oil .34 oz / 10 mL enough. This will plump those lines and give your undereyes hydration it’s never known before. You can always layer a cream over it. I actually use Tatcha The Pearl Tinted Eye Illuminating Treatment Moonlight because it also has a tint to it and can give added coverage while treating. 

For night time, oils will be your best friend. Sunday Riley Luna Sleeping Retinoid Night Oil 1.18 oz/ 35 mL will even out your texture and tone and it’s in the form of an oil. This will give you some added hydration. You can apply a straight moisturizer overtop like BELIF - The True Cream Moisturizing Bombaand you’d be set. 

As as far as your redness, Dr Jart Cicapair line sounds good for your concerns. It’s made for sensitive skin and redness. DR. JART+ - Cicapair™ Tiger Grass Creamaand DR. JART+ - Cicapair™ Tiger Grass Re.Pair Serumccan be used together during the day after cleansing and toning. Instead of B-hydra, you can incorporate these to moisturize and correct your redness. 

Since you you seem to have sensitive skin, incorporate any new skincare slowly so you can pinpoint which products may cause irritation. Start a new product every 2/3 days. If you decide to use acids, start at night, every 3 nights. As your skin becomes accustomed to it, you can build it up to every other night. I personally love acids and use them everyday since I have no sensitivity issues. This can all be very confusing and expensive, but you asked questions in the right place. There are so many knowledgeable, amazing women here that are always willing to help and guide you through the process! ❤️❤️❤️

[ellex0]

Omg I’m at Sephora and they don’t have KORA organics here at this location! I was really looking forward to that oil! I’ll have to order they online I suppose. In the mean time I’m going to grab a mini of a different eye cream and see how that works. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[GG84]

@ellex0 Ask them to order it for you at the counter, it will be shipped to your home for free!

[ellex0]

Wow, thank you so much for taking the time to read my post and understand exactly what I need! So far I’m very impressed with members here and how helpful everyone seems! I do have some questions though about some of the products: The FRESH - Rose Deep Hydration Toner - is this used after cleansing? And would you recommend I still continue with my Tatcha One Step Camellia Cleanser? The Drunk Elephant B-Hydra, can this be used as a moisturizer alone? And is this for day use? I actually do wear makeup on a regular basis, but the past almost full week I have not because I wanted to let my skin breathe. My foundations usually do have SPF but I may try some of the Umbra Tinte for days that I don’t have time for makeup or if I decide to go without again. KORA Organics Noni Eye oil - you say it plumps the lines and is hydrating which is exactly what I want, but will it address my issue with puffiness? I wake up almost daily with puffy under eyes and some days they are worse than others. It seems like I’ve been able to get the puffiness to go down a little bit as the day goes on but not enough... I just can’t pinpoint what product is doing that for me. You also said I could layer a cream over it... is it 100% necessary to do that or is it just something I can do if I want? If I can achieve depuffing, hydration and fine line plumping with the eye oil I would rather not have to apply an additional eye cream. Sunday Riley Luna sleeping oil - you said I could apply a straight moisturizer over it. Is this necessary or is it an option? I would love to avoid using multiple products at once to achieve 1 thing due to costs. Is this oil moisturizing enough to use without a cream? Dr. Jart I’m pretty sure I’m going to use regardless. It’s the only product that I’ve consistently read that it does what it claims to do as far as redness. I am heading out to Sephora right now, I’ll probably grab one or two of these products today and maybe I’ll order some others online so I can slowly introduce new things like you said. It’s going to be hard, I’m kinda impatient lol. I completely understand the realty that results will not happen overnight and that if I do this all at once it could be bad for my skin. I’ll just always be impatient. If I had the extra money and every one of these products were sold in the store I’d buy everything you mentioned right now but... I can only really afford 2 or 3 at a time so that’s probably a good thing. Thank you again, I’ll let you know what I end up with and how I like it!!

[faeriegirl]

@ellex0 Congratulations on finally taking time for yourself and making the steps to take care of your skin. I also have facial redness and almost anything with fragrance irritates it. I would definitely look into products with the clean seal on it. I only cleanse at night because if I do it twice it irritates my skin. So in the morning I just rinse with warm water. I have been using the Drunk Elephant brand and I love it. I highly recommend Shaba eye serum, C-firma serum, TLC Framboos, Marula oil, and the Protini moisturizer. They sell a set called the littles that has most of these products. I hope this helps. Most importantly keep making yourself a priority and take care of yourself!

[ellex0]

@faeriegirl thank you so much!! I have actually looked a little bit into the Drunk Elephant brand and was highly considering buying the minis set. The only hesitation for me is the price tag. If I remember correctly, the cost of the minis set is pretty high... like $90? I could be mixing that up with other sets I’ve seen because I’ve been researching non stop for he last like 48 hours lol. Info overload. But, I definitely am the type of person that understands value (I’m in the sales industry and I have to preach value constantly because what my company sells is the most expensive on the market). When I bought the Tatcha set, that was the most I have spent on really anything skincare/makeup related without using a gift card. I don’t think I had spent more than like 20-30 lol. Anyway it was $60 and I see why. I love it. I just wish the products would do something for the redness. I’ve had my eye on some Olehenricksen products, as well as some Dr. Jart products that claim to help with redness. The Olehenricksen ones are more eye creams that I’m looking at and the Dr. Jart has a cream that claims to be specifically for not only treating redness overtime but color correcting upon application as well. Both brands are higher priced as well. Do you have any experience or thoughts about those?

[SpaceLlama]

I know the DE products are expensive, but they are so worth it,  The one beauty product I will 100% splurge on every year is tDRUNK ELEPHANT - T.L.C. Framboos™ Glycolic Night Serum. It's done wonders for my skin texture, acne and improving it overall . 

I also used the First Aid Beauty Ultra Repair Liquid Recovery and that also helped with redness. If my skin was red the night before, it looked much better by morning if I used that product. Only problem is that it might be hard to find since it looks like it might be getting discontinued. You can still find it on the FAB website. 

If you want makeup, I use the stila One Step Correct 1 oz/ 30 mL  primer. It helps colour correct and hydrates your skin at the same time. It sort of feels in between a mousse and a serum 🙂 

Edit: I don't know if you're talking about the OLEHENRIKSEN - Banana Bright Eye Crème or not, but I had it and mostly used it underneath concealer. I have sensitive eyes and it didn't irritate them or dry them out so that was good. I've heard from other people that it did help with their dark circles and wrinkles, but I didn't have much when using it so I can't personally confirm 😬 The eye cream is pretty thick and yellow and focuses more on brightening, so I'm not too sure how well it would hydrate your eyes if they're really dry 😬 

[faeriegirl]

@ellex0 I have not tried Dr Jart. But I have tried Ole Henriksen. I tried the banana bright eye cream and while it didn’t do anything for me I have heard others love it. I have also tried the truth serum and I think it is a great product. I also liked the nurture me moisturizer. It smells like a creamsicle and is one of the only products with fragrance that doesn’t irritate my skin. The main drawback for me is the jar packaging. I still use the walnut scrub it is fantastic for exfoliating. I hope this helps!