Bloggie Wednesday: Do You Use Products That Are Sent To You For Review Immediately? Or Finish What You Have First?

Bloggie Wednesday: Do You Use Products That Are Sent To Your For Review Immediately? Or Finish What You Have First?

A perk of beauty blogging is getting products from beauty brands and PRs for editorial consideration. This means that I’ll get to try out products without having to buy them and sometimes, these products are reviewed or at least mentioned on the blog. Just so you know, this doesn’t happen very often. It’s still a bonus I don’t take for granted. Sadly, there are a number of beauty bloggers who started blogging simply to get these “freebies”. I’ve even received emails from people who asked me how to start a beauty blog because they want free stuff too. Sigh. Anyway, that issue is for another Bloggie Wednesday topic, not today’s.

Today, I’d like to ask beauty bloggers out there: when you’re sent products to review, do you use them immediately, or do you wait till your current products have finished first before you tackle the new ones? How long do you wait before you move on to the newer products?

During the first half of my beauty blogging years, I would wait till a product has finished first before moving on to the next one. In fact, I actually have a queue of products to use; First In, First Out. This posed a bit of a problem for the products that were sent to me that I needed to review because often I’d only use and perhaps review the product on the blog 6-12 months later. This doesn’t work well for limited edition products so I had to change my strategy to Last In, First Out.

The problem with that strategy is, while it worked for the blog, it’s not sustainable. In fact, it’s incredibly wasteful. As I look at so many of my half-used products now, I realised that something’s got to change. While I don’t use beauty products that were sent to me for review immediately, I would give my current products probably another week or two before I started using the new ones. This means that the old ones don’t get used up before I get started on the new ones. They don’t only take up space and frankly speaking, it’s pound-foolish.

I’m going to have to change this cavalier approach back to First In, First Out. By First In, it also means that I’ll have to finish everything up first before moving on to the next. And if it takes me a year to review something that has been sent to me, unless it’s a limited edition product, that’s how it’s going to be. After all, I’m a one-woman show here on BA! 🙂

Bloggers, I’d love your opinion on this. If you’re sent products by brands to review, how do you approach those products? Do you tackle them immediately or do you have a system for this? Perhaps you have contributors you pass these products to to try and review on your behalf? I’d love to know!

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10 comments… add one
  1. Val

    Woah, one year to review a product?

    Chances are I won’t love everything I review, so once reviewed (minimum 3-4 weeks) I’ll always finish it up use it on my body (serum, eye cream, toner, moisturiser you name it) or mix it with my existing body/foot cream to ensure I’m not wasting anything.

    Only products I love and swear by will be fully used up for me. xx

    1. Tine

      Oh yeah, it’s possible! I’ve lost count of the number of times I review a product and when I check when the product was launched, oops, over a year ago. Oh well. These days, I know what my skin likes and don’t like, which is why I tend to stick to what works instead of trying out new skincare willy nilly. Less wastage that way, I reckon.

  2. MakeupVixen

    I use up products I’m currently using before trying new products. Unless asked to review asap by a company or if the release date is right around the corner. For the most part I do hauls right away so people know what reviews are coming up, but I don’t rush unless there is a need to rush.
    MakeupVixen recently posted..Deborah Lippmann’s Academy Awards 2016 Beauty Report (Common)My Profile

    1. Tine

      Ahh good idea with the hauls bit. Wonder if I should continue with that. I used to do it and people started to expect reviews of the products. Unfortunately, most of the time, I’d either forget I have the product or have given it away. >.<

  3. Marciaf

    I use products for review for 30 days before writing. When new products come I take my photos and start using within a few weeks. It is wasteful but I save the ones I love and go back to them in between testing. Companies want reviews done within a certain time frame but with skincare its so much harder to keep up.

    1. Tine

      It is! I find it hard to keep up and the half-used items so wasteful. I was decluttering my beauty drawers just a few weeks ago and found so many half-used items that I forgot about because I kept trying new ones. 🙁

  4. Paris B

    It depends. I tell everyone that I have a 10-12 week turnaround time for skincare reviews. If they don’t like it, then too bad. I won’t miss the product. I generally add in new products as and when I’m done with something in that particular category. So yes, I can sometimes take up to a year. I’m naturally quicker (marginally) with limited edition makeup because makeup is easier to evaluate. But I’m never cavalier about skincare because I feel responsible for recommending things to people, and I want to make sure it works (or doesn’t). So long as the PR/brands understand the way you work, there’s no reason why you have to change how you schedule your products. I make sure they do, so I’m not compromised. If I boost something ahead of schedule, that’s my prerogative, and I buy a lot of my own crap too, so naturally, when I buy something, I want to use it! I try not to be guilty anymore about receiving products, especially unsolicited products. The fact is, not everything can be featured, due to limited real estate space, so I deem that it’s alright to be picky. If they don’t like it, then sod it. No big loss to me, if I’m to be honest.
    Paris B recently posted..I don’t wear mascara and according to Makeup Artist Dick Page, that’s OK!My Profile

    1. Tine

      I tend to push the items I buy to review at the front of the queue compared to what was sent to me because I bought it and like you said, I want to use it. Unsolicited items seldom make it onto the blog these days unless the item is really good and I have to rave about it. I noticed that these days, a lot of bloggers just post their 1-sentence review of the product on Instagram and that’s like their job’s done.

  5. Norlin

    That’s why I normally have to really think hard and consider if I actually need to use it right now before saying yes to reviewing a product. Eg. eye cream/gel – if I’m about to run out, then perfect timing, I’ll say yes I’ll try it. If I still have loads then I’ll pass. No wastage there. Products that don’t require “storage”, like say sheet masks, I can use it and throw away. That will be when it arrives even though I might already have a box of sheet masks I’ve already started using. If you know what I mean? That’s why I tend to say no to skincare products unless I think it absolutely tickles my fancy.

    1. Tine

      Yeah I know what you mean. I do that too. With products I specifically request, they usually go to the front of the queue because I asked for them. Just like the items I bought. Unsolicited items go to back of the queue and sometimes the older ones get pushed further back, hence the 1-year turnaround time.

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