8/20/12

See this?



No, this is not modern art. No, it is not from a gory crime scene. This is hundreds of dollars in lipstick...being thrown away. 

Why the hell would I do that? Well, listen up. It is because I care about my clients more than I care about cutting corners. I am not using my personal makeup, and I am not bringing a caboodles full of product that is on the fast track to being old enough to vote.This is also a good example of why I charge higher rates than a budget artist.

See, a budget artist could not afford to throw this product away because they do not charge enough to replace it, much less replace it with anything of quality. That lipstick that smells a bit funky and old beneath your nose on one of their shoots...yep, it probably IS funky and old. I evaluate my products for the slightest change in consistency, color, or scent and cycle it all out on a regular basis. It does not matter if I have 3/4 of a container left; if it is past it's prime, it  is in the trash. This ensures that the product being used on each client is within peak performance and keeps the client safer. I'm not going to save a buck at the expense of someone's health. 

As I like to palette my products, this is not an easy process. I scrape out every little dime-sized pan, and clean clean clean them. Then I boil them to get the last traces melted away, then clean some more, sanitize them and let them dry. This is a long, messy process that involves more than a little bit of testing the breadth of my profanity vocabulary. 



I do this because I don't believe in half-measures. My path in this career really solidified when I struck out on my own instead of risking the health and safety of my clients to save an employer a buck, and I maintain that same integrity years later as one of the core values of my own business. In the end, it is a beautiful thing.


2 comments:

  1. This is why I love you.
    Maybe I'm spoiled because you're the first makeup artist I ever had work on me, but at other events when I saw double-dipping, not sanitizing between clients, etc. I was completely horrified.
    You're setting a fantastic example that should be the standard in this industry. ^u^v

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  2. Thank you Grace, that is very sweet and wonderful to hear. I have had a lot of models who have worked with me share similar stories. I hope that by raising the models' own safety expectations and training my assistants well, we can keep makeup artists working at a higher standard.

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