your lipservice is chapping

I’d like to think of myself as a sort of consumer advocate but for now I’m my own primary customer save the occasional friend.  And generally I get some sort of resolution.  My own experience has been that stating the issue clearly, without accusation, using dates and whatever back up is available helps get things done.  Generally I get either my money back or some sort of agreed upon restitution to the issue. 

But there are two kinds of companies who drive me a little wonky.  Those who do not offer any sort of customer assistance and those who say they do, but really are the first.  I’m currently stuck in the middle of two companies with a combined offer that are doing both.  

Back in May I signed up for a limited offer TopBox deal that included a subscription to a Rogers owned magazine – LouLou.  The transaction included an opt-out option, which I decided to forgo, but no other steps to sign up necessary – to the best of my recollection.  I’ll fully admit that I’m not 100% certain there was more required, but arguably they had my address for the makeup box delivery and I’d paid in full via credit card for the promotion.  After that, I forgot about it for awhile.  I mean all magazine subscriptions say they take 6 to 8 weeks to start.  But by September my subscription was still noticeably absent, so I started down the follow up road.  As it stands today, we’re at an impasse.

 

Yes, I was a little cantankerous on Twitter.

It started with an e-mail to TopBox directly; got a polite but not terribly useful reply.  I tried LouLou, and got the same.  And now we were playing the ‘it’s not me, it’s them’ game.  So I took to Twitter.  And got more lip service.  As it stands after almost a month since this started, I have heard from neither company and have no resolution, and still no subscription.  I did however get a promotional e-mail to join TopBox; and as you might imagine, I’m not so keen to do this.  

Sure there’s always the good ol’ ‘buyer beware’ caveat.  And yes, I’m no fan of Rogers already, but now I have to put TopBox on a ‘not sure I want to do business with you’ list because of a $10* transaction, and apparently, I’m going to write a blog post about it.  Sure you looked for a second like you were doing something on Twitter, but in the end you didn’t, did you.

And because human nature inherently does not reward the good guy, I will relay the story of excellent customer service.  

As I’ve written before I’ve signed up a makeup sampling program, Ipsy.  For about $15 a month you get a package of ‘goodies’ every month.  So every month about the end of the second week of the month I get a bright pink bubble wrap envelope in my mail box with said goodies.   But not this month.  In spite of routing notices from the two postal systems handling this package, there was no delivery (to my house).  Contacted the company, we went back and forth a few times, with a suggestion I give it a couple more days, but when 4 days later there was no package, I got a ‘no problem, we’ll  get you a new one, sorry for the inconvenience’ e-mail and 4 days later a tracking code.  The following week a new package arrived with most of the goodies I was supposed to get, with one acceptable substitution.  No lip service, just service and a resolution. 

 

This month, this particular sight was missing.  Until it wasn't.

Fortunately I did get some lip balm in a recent Ipsy bag to relieve all the chapping caused by TopBox.

I write about these things in large part because I feel that the key to continued success is great customer service, no matter what your company is, or its size.  Sure some companies and some products can’t always be replaced or fixed, but there are ways to work with your customers to ensure that they feel as if you’ve heard them and you are trying to come up with a resolution.  If I’ve entered in a purchase agreement that is final sale or that clearly spells out that there are no returns/refunds then I take my chances.  If this is not the case what is the harm in trying to service your customer base, because as the old shampoo commercial goes, I told two friends…

* The approximate value of the subscription portion of the offer.

revlon we have a problem: or how the great lip gloss embargo of 2011 failed

A self professed make up junkie since I ‘borrowed’ some lilac eyeshadow from my Barbie head box and added some purloined Great Lash mascara.  Fortunately some level headed adults helped and so my I never really did go crazy, unless you consider continued use of blue sparkly eyeliner, crazy.  Considering it was the 80’s and I was known as the girl in the bright pink lipstick, I think I fared decently.  And since there’s really no photographic evidence, you’ll just have to believe me.

Around 2011 I was lip gloss shamed, and to a certain degree, my shamer wasn’t too far off.  I did have a purse full of very similar variations of a light brown, somewhat lavender gloss, along with several varieties of rosy pink and the occasional darker copper.  And so I decided that maybe it was time to finish up a few of those before adding to the collection.  A sort of conscious consumerism.  Apologies to the anti-Goopers in the crowd.

And for awhile it worked. 

All was well until the makeup companies came up with what, for me, was a dangerous combination.  Make up, in a box. 

Spring 2014 Box from SDM line Quo

Not new you say, well no, but something about the highly stylistic boxes, and myriad of colours, caught me, and I fell hard for that particular marketing scheme.

Fall 2013 Box from SDM Line Quo

So here’s where I admit a certain proclivity for boxes as well. And apparently eyeshadow.

Urban Decay Electric Palette - but can you blame me!

And now, we have an entirely different problem.  More eye shadow than one person can reasonably use in a certain span of time.  Say the next 10 years.  And so now, again, I try to make a conscious attempt to control myself.

Apparently I already announced this in January, so even a public declaration wasn’t enough to stop me.  But now, especially after a trip to the US where I was able to purchase a few items I cannot here, I have decided to be sterner with myself.  Since the truth of the matter is, really, at the end of the day, there’s no real need for a self imposed embargo - I probably already have whatever it is they’re offering.

because canada

A friend tipped me off to Ipsy, which I’ve just joined, a fun service, that for $10 a month sends you a bag of goodies, make-up and skin care to try.  In spite of a bit of, in my opinion, misguided marketing efforts not the least of which is calling their customers ‘ipsters’ as a play on ‘hipsters’ and personally makes me go ‘ick’, I think it’s a great little service.  However, because ‘Canada’, that’s a $15 monthly fee instead.

Recently, IRL I had to send a customer a price list and as he was located in the US I had to explain that the prices would be higher as ours was a Canadian price list.  He was genuinely taken aback.  I told him to flip over a book sometime and see that generally, things just cost more in Canada - and really for no discernible reason.  Although the government is currently seeking price equality at a national level.

I’ve been grappling with how to write about the subject of online stores and their related service fees and today I realized that in all honesty the reason is probably because Canada.

I’ll preface this by saying I have not e-shopped in the US and have no personal experience with their shipping policies, but since many things ‘Canadian’ are still American, I can generally see that there are pretty liberal, at least in comparison, shipping and return policies with most US to US e-shopping.  Then again I could be totally wrong.

But here in Canada, I have some experience.  Generally most stores have a decent minimum order, or periods of no cost shipping in order to entice customers to order.  The good ones also provide amazing return policies.  So here’s the disconnect for me - if I’m not getting better prices on your web site, and I have to pay for my own shipping there and back, what’s the incentive for me to shop online?

I am a lot of years removed from my retail days but I doubt the goal of repeat business and multi-unit transactions has changed that much.  So it follows if I walk into your store, I am assuming that the cost of that store, staffing it and marketing it are part of the price of the items.  If you’re an e-tailer, you don’t incur all those costs, I should be getting a better deal to reflect that, or at the very least, have my shipping covered.  Or if a physical store who also e-tails, basically, I’m not only paying for your stores but also for you to pack that parcel; the one that I paid for?!  And that I find confusing.

Yes I know there are costs associated with running a web store.  But you can’t tell me they are near as high as a physical location.  And to that end, with your added reach to markets beyond your geography, you should have an uptick in sales to further compensate. 

Let’s take my favourite retailer of late, well e-tailer to me.  Located only in la belle provence, Simons (I’ll give them a little shout out), a suggestion for another friend, offers decent low cost knit times, which I personally pretty much live in.  Orders over $50 are shipped for free, and they seem to have frequent no limit shipping promotions.  Orders arrive nicely wrapped in a branded box, folded, not in plastic bags, and your invoice in an envelope.  But the kicker, no questions asked returns.  Just go back to your account, tick the items you want to return, print the return label and take the box to the post office and your money returned upon receipt, which they acknowledge via e-mail.  Easy.  Peasy.  So if I’m uncertain of a size, I just order two and away I go, returning the one that doesn’t fit.  I’ve never set foot in their store – although I probably will if I’m near one now, and I order from them frequently.  Bonus points for showing both the back and front of an item and including the garment composition.

Conversely one of my favourite stores at the mall, Ricki’s, which is also not so conveniently located near me, doesn’t do it quite so well.  Shipping offers of under $5 are common, usually either $2 or $4 regardless of the dollar value of the order, but the kicker is, you can return anything to the store, but via mail you have to cover the return fees.  And that bothers me.  And I can’t use my store issued gift card credit online.  They do a good job of images and views, but composition isn’t listed, so for someone like me who likes a bit of spandex in her tee’s, I have to guess a lot. 

I could go on, but I won’t.  I will say that there’s a perfect set of features out there for garment sites.  Unfortunately I’ve never run into it all on one site.  So if you’re a retailer, and you’re reading this here’s what we need.   Multiple views of the item; front and back.  And a shot of the item in each colour, not some crappy colour swatch.  On a dummy form is great, or if the manufacturer gives you a product shot that’s great too.  I clearly like to know the composition of the item.  A ‘runs large or small’ indicator is a nice to have but not a deal breaker.  But if there’s one thing I could insist every site has it would be a size filter.  A multi select size filter – so that when I’m looking at items I can filter for my sizes only and not get all excited about something that is only left in XS.  And if I could, and I know it’s in vain, a ship to Canada landed price.  Although to be honest, I’ve been burned enough by landing fees to avoid shopping in the US or outside my country anymore.

So we’re not changing the world here, just my little corner of it.  And while I have some reservations about this Ipsy thing – like do they amp up the first couple of bags to hook you, or does it last.  In the mean time; lookie what I got!

March 2014 Ipsy Bag

it’s 2014; why is my mascara still running?

In the week between Christmas and New Year’s someone always posts a ‘what-we-predicted-for-the-future’ article.  It’s inevitable.  And usually the ideas presented for the present day, then the future, at that time are a strange mix of absolutely spot on and so horribly off base.

Whenever I consider the ‘future’, the images conjured are from 1982’s Blade Runner, which, if IMDB is correct was set in 2019, 5 years from now.  Floating dirigible restaurants that pull up to my moveable apartment wall, I don’t think so, but roving food trucks, well maybe, if Toronto Council will get over themselves!

There’s no Rosie the robot to clean our homes but robot vacuums, yes, which if you’re paying attention on youtube, are the favourite mobility device of the domestic cat.

Personal, portable computers, sure, and in several formats, but what are we doing with them?  Communicating yes.  Finding ways to entertain ourselves, sure.  But primarily because we’re all trapped in some sort of gridlock travelling back and forth between work and home because flying cars, streamlined transit and transporters never did materialize. 

And those devices; of which access to them is still determined by economics, meaning that educating children across economic status’ still isn’t a level playing field.

Food preparation.  If you want something decent, you still cook it.  And at my house on a gas stove that’s older than my parents.  Collecting said food, still done the old fashioned way, by going to the store and dragging it home because consumer friendly online shopping of the basics still isn’t with us in a real way. 

Online shopping – absolutely.  But delivery and returns still done via ‘snail’ mail, which is, in Canada at least, as we speak, being serviced out of existence.  And every password you use must be unique to the point of inertia.  My personal credit card password requires so many specific elements I cannot usually remember it for more than a day, and I don’t dare save it to my computer memory because the banking system isn’t hack proof.

In a lot of ways the human factor dictates how quickly we move away from known methods.  The truth is the tried and true often prevails even when it may not be the most ‘best’ way to go about something.  Landlines are still in use because when the power grid fails, and the cell networks go too, the old land line still works.  I see my friends less, but talk to them more because of social media, in fact I talk to people I don’t really know, if I’m honest because somehow the social of social media makes it possible for us to congregate.  And yet we have the highest level of single person households ever.  The future, the now, is bright, but it moves at the pace we can stand it. 

It’s all fascinating.  Some of it is digital.  But the real question is, since it’s 2014, why can’t they invent a decent mascara that does not run?

duck lips: or how i accidently became the world’s leading expert on lip gloss.

When I was a teen, almost every girl carried a little, colour topped pot of Rachel Perry Lip Lover gloss in their pocket.  The container was awkward, and you had to go to the ‘health food’ store to get it, but this colourless, flavoured gloss was way popular, mostly because, in addition to being a good product, it tasted and smelled amazing.  Mint Tingle was the favourite of most, but my aversion to mint made me a Raspberry Cherry girl.   Sadly, after having had a pot of RP’s Lip Lover on my bedside table since I was a teen, the company seems to have closed up shop and my Raspberry Cherry, once the last of my half used pots are done, is no longer.

The internet is rife, still, with people seeking this favourite product, which I suppose means if you have any aptitude with making cosmetics, or could figure out how to purchase the recipe, you might have a little bit of license to 'Mint Tingle' money for yourself.  However, failing that anything you’d find now has been around for awhile and eek.

So the search began for a replacement.  Certainly there are lots of options on the market, but something that smells and tastes good and will stay on overnight, to protect the thin skin of the lips turned out to be a tall order.  Admittedly there’s not really anything wrong with anything I tried, but I was looking for that special combination of taste and pliability and that was hard to find.

So here we go.  Smith’s Rosebud Salve was rated a favourite over and over again so I picked it up.  Unfortunately I don’t really like rose smell or taste so it has a fairly unsavory start to it.  Once the rose perfume dissipates the gloss is pretty benign.  Absolutely nothing wrong with the product but missing the smell/taste combo I was seeking.

Nip and Fab’s Lip and Nip Fix, which it turns out you can use for chapped nipples too, should that be an issue.  Found at the drugstore and reasonably priced.  It’s a step up from something like Blistex but again, no smell and tastes like Vaseline.  Might be handy for really chapped skin in the winter, but for lips, it went in my no pile.

So I moved on to Smith's Rosebud Strawberry Lip Balm, which also comes in Chocolate flavour.  Again nothing wrong with the product and it seems to give a bit of colour to the lips when applied even though it’s clear, but missing the taste.  The smell is so good it initially fools your senses into thinking there is a flavour but there isn’t.  A potential keeper, mostly because the tube is lightweight and purse friendly.

Hope was high for Eos.  The package, a round coloured container is cheerful.  The gloss smells and tastes good and there are plenty of flavours, including mint for those missing their Mint Tingle.  My only objection to the product is the delivery, a hard gloss that you do not dip your finger into but instead apply right to your lips and because of this, it is really hard to get enough on.  The other issue I have with it is the esthetics of the package, because once a male friend commented it looked like a testicle, well I couldn’t see it any other way.  And, this package is every weirder looking that Lip Lover, in your pocket!

The latest product I’ve tried, Tokyo Milk Dark Lip Elixirs, I bought the Cherry Bourbon flavour holds the best option, the gloss, a little firm but becomes viscous with a bit of heat from your finger, smells good, tastes OK.  It will probably be the one I try again when this batch is done with.  However if I could somehow combine the features of the Eos with the Tokyo Milk, I might be happier.

Carmex, with its yellow lid, not really a contender, but worthy of a mention because it has camphor it in and it’s the only thing I found useful in treating cold sores.  I keep a pot in the medicine chest for this explicit reason and when I feel that weird tingle, it goes on immediately.  This gloss is difficult to spread, but they do have a version in a tube now, smell pretty unappealing and doesn’t taste much better, but cold sores, the gift that keeps on giving and often the little reminder of x’s past, need to be treated.

It’s always tough to replace an old favourite, and boy do I have a drawer full of products meaning it will be awhile before I need any more lip balm.  All I can say to Lip Lover is farewell old friend, we’ve been through the ages, and you’re a hard act to follow.


P.S.  A friend tried in earnest today to find me more of my old standby online but came to the same end I did, that Lip Lover is no longer.  But kudos to her for efforts.  It gladdens this old crusty heart of mine.