There is now a $20 price difference between what I paid for a product I bought 3 months ago, and now. Same brand, same formula, same package, and same sellers. It’s $20 more now because I bought it and was stupid enough to let others know which one I bought.
I am thinking that there needs to be some way for people to share beauty secrets that is off the marketing radar. Every time we start to really like something, it either gets discontinued and then returns under a different banner at an exponentially higher price, or they simply jack the price up for no good reason but that new buyers don’t know any better.
I used the snail gel even though beans, oatmeal, banana peels, cucumbers, and many other things work just as well. I like the idea of simple creatures such as snails being well fed and treated so that they make pretty face juice. So when I’m lazy, I buy the snail gel.
The price is starting to get too high though. I think the sellers are getting a bit overconfident in this trend. It’s not like when people are eating the snails. In that case, the taste is actually unique. Slime though, is everywhere. Viscous protein abounds in nature. We sneeze it and secrete it constantly. They’re using snail gel because it works and it’s available and easy to understand. There are limits though, to how much people will pay just because snail slime is more popular than bean goo and easier than making your boyfriend time himself for after your showers.
As soon as people figure out that the revolutionary thing was using slime for skincare, and that it doesn’t much matter where it comes from, that will be the end of that trend. For now though, they are raking it in. Let them. I’ll continue to buy from places that are reasonably priced, and when those fall to the greed, I’ll go back to mixing my own.
Since there is really no way to escape commerce, I’m thinking maybe it’s time for those of us who have the talent to make bigger batches. Too much has become commercialized or only recognized if it has some commercial value. Since being “just a housewife” became a bad thing that, I shit you not, even makes one less eligible for disability in Israel and other places, women can’t just be good at nurturing people’s beauty. We have to be beauty experts and it has to make a lot of money or we failed somehow.
So maybe we, as a group, deserve the “pink tax” on beauty, since this is one of the areas in which we gave up our power. Maybe we sold ourselves out.
As for me and mine though, I will be making sure my loved ones are well informed and well supplied. I’m just going to be a little quieter from now on, when I find a product that stands out from the crowd. Apparently, the lack of recognition doesn’t stop some of us from being trend setters. We have to be careful to whom and how we endorse things.
So I stand by my recommendation of snail gel, but honestly mung beans and any other protein slime will do the same job. I hope the price of snail gel comes down, or that we see more love for more products based on other sticky things. Hey, eggs work. Whatever happened to mayonnaise mask?
