Episode 346 - Beauty Devices, Korean Skin care and more

Perry Romanowski (0:00)

Hi, I'm Perry, and you're listening to The Beauty Brains.

Welcome to The Beauty Brains, a show where real cosmetic chemists answer your beauty product questions and give you an insider's look at the cosmetic industry. This is episode 346 I'm your host, Perry Romanowski, and with me today is nobody because it's a solo show. Yeah, Valerie is a bit under the weather, but she's gonna be back for the next show, so don't worry.

On today's show, I'm going to be answering questions about do Medicube devices work?

IRE products, who are they good for and does it work?

What makes Korean skincare products work so well? What are heat protection ingredients for hair? Do beauty devices work? What is the best oil for hair? Does treating hair with oil before shampooing help? Does scalp or hair steaming have any benefits? Are hydrofacials helpful? What bond builders work best? Do hair boron products really work better? What is crystal deodorant? Why aren't there more lip balms with water and humectants? But first, let's get to some of that chit chat. Or should I say kitten talk? Yeah, you see, we took in a whole bunch of kittens this time. There was this one cat who I even had the chance to get fixed, and she had kittens for the second time this year. Her first batch of four kittens was taken in by someone else around July, and then this batch, she has three. She carried them into my yard the other day. And in Chicago, we were under a freeze and snow warning. So I felt kind of bad for the kittens. I didn't want to freeze the desk, so I brought them into my warmer house. And I also managed to catch the mom and put them all in one room together. And now Mama Blue, that's what I call her. She was super scared, but you know, after a couple of days, she's kind of gotten more brave. And most importantly, she's taken care of those kittens. I did not relish the thought of having to wake up daily at 3 or 4 a.m. to feed little kittens again. So porch kitties are doing good. Hopefully once these kittens are a bit older, I think they're about three or four weeks old right now, I'll get them adopted out. I'll also get mama fixed and then we can reclaim our basement.

If you want to see a picture of the kittens, I put them as today's show image.

All right, but enough cat talk. Let's get on with the show.

SPEAKER_3 (2:42)

Hey, Beauty Brains, Medicube's Devices. Do they work?

Perry Romanowski (2:45)

How do they work?

SPEAKER_3 (2:46)

And do you advise anyone to buy them?

SPEAKER_2 (2:49)

Thanks, Joni.

Perry Romanowski (2:51)

Alright, Medicube.

They've got four devices that you can buy as a bundle for the low, low price of $1,200. Whoa, just in principle, though, I wonder, do people really continue to use devices like this over time? It seems a lot like extra work, and you're not going to quit using a product, so just from that standpoint, whether it works or not, I'd say it probably isn't worth it. But I'd also say there have been a lot of devices over the years, and the main problem that I see is that there is almost never an immediate effect. So now you've got to use this device, which is inconvenient, and then you just have to trust that it is doing something good for your skin. That is a tall ask for some people, if you ask me. Now, how many people would keep up the routine even if it did have some small effect? I doubt many. I think of a product like the old Clarisonic, which was a face scrubber, exfoliator. I mean, at least your skin feels different when you're done using it. These devices, they don't even give you that. It reminds me a bit of like weight loss. Like I know I could lose weight if I just went on some calorie restriction diet and really stuck with it.

Anyone could, but it's that sticking to it part that's really hard and I'm just skeptical anyone could stick to the routine of using these devices very regularly, especially without seeing some immediate effect. But okay, but what about these devices? If you did stick with using them, would you see much benefit? The short answer there is there isn't a lot of good supporting evidence that these things help much at all. Then there's the Derma EMS Shot.

Let's go through each of these. There's the Derma ES Shot, which claims to use electrical muscle stimulation technology. Basically, it works by sending electrical pulses to the skin, which in theory stimulate the muscles beneath the skin to contract.