Cosmetics

Make-up and skin and hair care products are a definite weakness for me. I have a few favorite ways to be able to save as much as possible and still enjoy my indulgences.

Mineral Makeup

I discovered how great mineral makeup is a couple years ago. It gained huge popularity due to how beautiful it makes your skin look, how good it actually is for the skin, and it's natural SPF. Many women, however, find it's far too costly. Many are only familiar with the most popular brands such as Bare Escentuals or SheerCover. Little known are the lesser advertised places such as

Everyday Minerals and Smoky Mountain Minerals

Everyday Minerals, in particular, has as good of feedback from consumer sites such as www.makeupalley.com as the Bare Escentual products. However, the cost is a fraction of it's more famous competitor.

Using Everyday Minerals and Bare Escentuals as prime examples, a Bare Escentual Foundation at the size of .30 oz. is $25, the similarly sized 8 gram size at Everyday Minerals runs $12. Hold on, though, this isn't even close to where you find the real savings.

When you visit Everyday Minerals, visit their Custom Kit section. Here's where the savings add up. The I Can't Believe It Kit, for instance, has 11 items of full size makeup and two brushes. That's under $4 per item. You can throw in a free sample kit to boot!

I personally find I run out of foundation faster than the blushes and eye shadow. On my last visit, I took advantage of their Personal Custom Kit, where you can choose any 6 items for $32. I chose six full-size foundations. Additionally, they were running a 10% off coupon code. My $12 foundations just became less than $5 each! Oh, and lest we forget the free sample kit to try out some new colors.

Ebay

Another great place to find deep discounted cosmetic items is eBay. There are several sellers that dedicate themselves to selling only cosmetic items and the shipping cost is minimal due to the weight of cosmetics. Be careful to pay attention to shipping cost, because there are a few sellers that inflate it to cover their other costs.

Whether you like department, drugstore or door-to-door brands, such as Avon and Mary Kay, chances are you can find it cheaper on eBay. Many sellers buy closeouts wholesale and pass the savings on to you. Once you find a seller that carries your favorite brands, be sure to save them to "favorite sellers". It's also a good idea to try to built up a relationship during the transaction via e-mail. Sellers appreciate their return customers and may give you perks, such as a free little item or an extra cut on combined shipping.

The primary things to remember when shopping eBay is to know your prices, pay attention to shipping, seeing if there's a deeper discount by combining orders, and making sure your seller has outstanding feedback.

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