Companies I Avoid

I’ve been debating making this post for a little while, but my need to be upfront about why I do not support particular companies won out.

1. Archetype Cosmetics: While people rave that Archetype’s eyeshadows are amazing, the company is known for having the worst customer service in indie makeup. You’re lucky if you receive your order within a month; typically people wait about 3 months to receive their order, but I have heard of it taking even longer. When you do receive your order, if you do actually receive it, often things are missing from it. Any efforts to contact Holly, the owner, are completely ignored, including PayPal disputes, unless you are able to hunt down the phone number to the antique mall she works at, in which case you might be able to get ahold of her.

2. Caustic Cadets Cosmetics: It’s a Glittersniffer clone. Glow-in-the-dark eyeliner, against FDA regulations? Check. UV eyeshadows, against FDA regulations? Check. UV eyeshadows, made with soap dyes? Check. Lying about FDA regulations and the safety of the products? Check. Save your money guys, this one isn’t worth it.

3. Evil Shades Cosmetics: My first order was missing something. I contacted Andrea, the owner, about the problem and she assured me I would get the missing item with my next order. My next order arrived, and once again it was missing something. Both were small orders, and both orders I placed with the company being messed up is enough for me to not go back. Please see my review here.

4. Glittersniffer: I’ve avoided this Etsy shop because other bloggers have posted tons of photos indicating they repack. However, I just found out that they have sold non-cosmetic dyes and pigments as – you guessed it – cosmetics. Please see Mika Chan’s blog.

5. I Touch Roses: Originally I was okay with my semi-endorsement of this company, but unfortunately I have to change my position on it. Turns out that Ahna 1) lacks any kind of consistency (see the reviews by Lisa Kate and Heather, compared to mine), and 2) lacks customer service skills. You do not respond with “contact the post office” when someone inquires about their order, and you do not blame your lack of website updates on your “unexpected divorce” when you were blogging about said divorce a year ago!

6. Kupcake Kutie Cosmetics: Pamela, the owner, is related to the owners of Ruthless Cosmetics; she’s the mother of one, and the aunt of the other. This should come as no surprise if you look at the two companies, as their branding and product lines are nearly identical.

   The problem, however, is that with my taking steps to keep Ruthless from harassing me, she has jumped in and harassed me as well, repeatedly, on their behalf. Please see my posts about Ruthless here.

7. Lime Crime: Every single one of her eyeshadows has been matched to a TKB mica with the exception of Lime Criminal, which matches a 50/50 blend of Lemon Drop and Green Apple Pop! micas. She denies all claims of being a repacker, and has accused TKB of copying her. Denying it is one thing, but accusing a long-standing a well-known mineral makeup supply company of copying you, when they’ve sold the colors for years longer than your company has even been around? That’s just silly.

   Doe Deere/Xenia/Limey has also been known for harassing people who say anything negative about her company or products, including, but not limited to, making bogus legal threats in order to force bloggers to remove their reviews, one of the more well-known recepients of such being Grey of LeGothique.com.

8. Madd Style Cosmetics: Grey had a bad experience last October, which was echoed by numerous reader comments left on her blog. While Phyrra recently had a better experience, Mo, the owner of Madd Style, took it upon herself to bash Grey in comments left on Phyrra’s review, and had a bunch of her fanatic customers do the same. Trash-talking does not change the fact that someone did not have a good time dealing with your company; it does, however, make you look like a horrible person and drive away business.

   More recently, Eplefe put some question to Mo’s claim of running a vegan company; looking at her Etsy feedback shows purchases of carmine micas, and beeswax lip balm and solid perfume bases. What happened in result? Once again, Mo’s followers showed up to trashtalk and insult Eplefe. You can see for yourself what happened here.

9. Morgana Minerals: If someone posts a less-than-stellar review of your company or products, the professional thing to do is to contact them privately to discuss their concerns, or leave a comment with your contact info, inviting them to contact you. Completely inappropriate? Making an angry-sounding public comment chewing the person out and embarrassing them.

10. Orglamix: This one’s real ugly. I’ll sum it up as some people figured out that their purchases were repack/private label by peeling the Orglamix stickers off and finding the manufacturer stickers. Consequently, they found out that Orglamix has been lying about the ingredients and FDA approved use of the products, while the owner of Orglamix is still insisting her products are handmade on the Facebook page – and deleting comments she doesn’t like left and right (including my own, which I have screencapped).

    Oh, and she got busted sharing private information in regards to a particular customer with other people (screencap is located here, and a screencap of the customer’s now deleted self-defense is located here).

    If you’d like to read about it, other bloggers have made wonderful posts here, here, here, here….

11. Pretty Addictive Cosmetics: Run by the same person who used to run Ruthless Cosmetics. Please see my posts on Ruthless here.

12. Pure Luxe: Last year, the Mineral Makeup Mutiny made a blog post about how TKB’s Pop! collection tends to get repacked pretty often by mineral makeup companies. In that post, Pure Luxe’s Bubblegum Ballz collection photo was used. No identifying information was included, so you would have to know it belonged to Pure Luxe already to know that’s where the photo came from.

    Christina, the owner of Pure Luxe, wanted the image removed, so instead of contacting the Mutiny privately, she made a very nasty and very public comment that contained bogus legal threats. The image was removed, but in all of the drama, Christina never denied being a repacker. Just as well, because the Bubblegum Ballz are not the only thing she appears to repack. Please see my post here.

13. Ruthless Cosmetics: First, it’s all Lady Burd; nothing original here. Second, they’re selling makeup not approved for eye use as, you guessed it, eyeshadow, and deny any and all wrongdoing in this. Third, they think it’s appropriate to behave like hormone-driven teenagers and cuss people out and insult them for outing their company for the first two points. Fourth, they think it’s okay to send more insulting messages via Facebook…to the wrong person.

    However, the final nail in the coffin is the extent to which they’ve harassed me personally. They’ve called me all manner of names and insults, threatened to send their “legal team” after me, left public comments that were libelous towards me, and even gone so far as to create at least one fake facebook profile as me in attempt to frame me for harassment. Please see my posts here.

14. Sephora: Yes, I have had that bad of an experience with them. Please see my first, second, and third updates.

15. Sleek MakeUP: In November 2010, Sleek held a sale that, while they heavily promoted, they were woefully unprepared for. Among the ruckus, many customers, including Grey and Anastasia, had their cards and banks charged, while Sleek’s system ate the orders, or duplicated the orders, or tried to remove items from the orders. Sleek then ignored emails and requests for help, instead tweeting about how they thought they deserved pizza and cheesecake. Over a month later, Sleek finally told Ana that her order never came though…except she still didn’t have her money back.

    Fast forward to February 2011, and not only are tons of people still waiting for their order or their money back (yes, 2 1/2 months later people are waiting for refunds), but Ana reported that Sleek has taken to deleting complaints left on their Facebook page.

16. Taylor Made: I have made probable matches between most of their eyeshadow line and TKB micas and pigments. Anything I am able to get my hands on usually gets confirmed as a dupe once I swatch it. In spite of this, Taylor continues to claim her company is not a repacker. Please see my posts here and here.

17. TheSheSpace/About Face: Heather’s customer service has apparently completely gone to pot, especially since she announced she would be closing in order to do a new project. More and more people seem to be having problems with their orders, with pigments missing, full-size pigments being replaced with sample sizes, et cetera. Emails about problems are ignored, PMs on her forums are disabled, and so when someone resorts to trying to post in a contact thread that Heather specifically set up so that people could get ahold of her, she chews them out for doing so, and lets a group of her die-hard “Heather can do no wrong” fans call the person a troll (I wish I were kidding, but I’ve seen it myself). She claims emails have been working perfectly, and then she makes announcements saying emails are fixed, contradicting her earlier claim that they were working fine. She “plays dumb” when people do finally get ahold of her for order problems, and her solution is to PayPal a couple dollars, letting PayPal take their fees of course, instead of actually trying to satisfy the customer.

    Not only that, but I’m hearing stories of other people getting duplicate colors. If you recall my review (here), Heather blamed one of her employees for puting the wrong pigment in the bag. Now the theory is that she actually recycles colors in the limited edition collections. Clearance prices or not, ordering from her is not worth the hassle

    Update March 21 2010: now people are reporting half-full jars and 3 gram sample jars instead of the full size 5 gram jars TSS used to use. See this update.

Last updated April 28, 2011.

~ by shatteredshards on March 5, 2010.