Try High-End Products while Saving Money

Hello! In today’s post, I am going to share with you a trend in beauty community that I saw in my country, Indonesia. I don’t know whether this trend is actually happening in other countries too or not, and as I’m writing this post, I haven’t done any research about that. But, if you do know something similar like this in your country or in other countries, please do let us know in the comment section below and I’ll update this post when you do!

So, what is the trend actually?

As beauty community grows rapidly in the past years, new products are released almost every single day. And by how fast information can travel these days, it’s so easy for us to know what’s going on ‘everywhere’ in the world. We can immediately get updated when a certain product is released and learn more about the product not only from the official brand but also from beauty influencers from across the nation.

Buying stuffs from overseas has also never been easier. Many international brands has open their official retailer outside their country of origins. There are also those who are called ‘personal shoppers’ or ‘online shop’ that ‘in some ways’ can help us getting products that have no official retailer here in our country. And even many more indie brands have offered an international shipping service.

Consequently, the desire of trying new products every time gets higher and higher. Sometimes we buy things because it’s a new necessary one, or because it’s a unique product that we don’t have yet. Or we buy things just because many people like them and they look nice?

However, sometimes, after we try them, they don’t work on us as good as they work on others 😥 So we end up not finishing them until they gone bad >.< And in the end we are just wasting our money on products we don’t even finish.

The thing is, money doesn’t grow on a tree! How do we fulfill this desire?

Here in Indonesia, there’s a system where we can buy products without having to pay a lot and buy the full sized. It is called ‘shared items’. So in this system, the seller stocked on several full size products and we as customers can buy only a few ml of it and the seller will store it in a small container. Just like the picture below.

For example, a seller sell shared items of Estee Lauder Double Wear Foundation in several different shades (let’s say: sand, tawny, rattan, etc) and sizes (usually: 2 ml, 3 ml, 5 ml, 10 ml). When it comes to expensive product like this, if we try it for the first time, there’s a possibility that it doesn’t work for our skin or the shade doesn’t match, so buying the full size is a bit risky. Therefore, ‘shared items’ is actually a good solution. We can even buy some different shades to test which one works best for us.

Another example is Urban Decay All Nighter Setting Spray that was sold in a spray bottle like this.

Also Too Faced Peach Perfect Powder that was sold in a jar with shifter like this.

And there are also other products that I’ve never purchased, such as Nars Liquid Blush in a small jar, Benefit Hoola Bronzer in a small eye shadow pan, and even Anastasia Beverly Hills Dipbrow Pomade in a small jar. Sorry I can’t include the picture of these products because they belong to the seller.

Actually, we can buy not only high end products, but also basically any products that can be shared, such as primer, liquid highlighter, toner, essence, etc.

Here are all products I’ve ever purchased. Some I purchased because I want to try them but unsure about the shade, and some others I purchased because I’m afraid it won’t work on my skin.

What do you think about this trend? Do you think it’s necessary and helpful? Will you try buying shared items if you ever had any chance? Or will you stick to buying the full sized products? Let me know your thoughts!

Until next time!