Clinique 3 step skin careBefore the show I see my friend Kira walking in to the backstage, where we get our makeup and hair done. I look at her face and I can’t believe my eyes. Ok, now I can go back, and change the title to: “Kira’s skin disaster”. You see, normally, I am a very polite person, but I failed to stop myself the moment I saw her. It was “Oh my God” situation with that eyebrows-raised-face full of sympathy. Poor girl had red and uneven face with huge breakouts, some yellow spots, and eyes with tears ready to come out. Although tears were not primary caused by Clinique’s 3 steps skincare everything else was. And this is an hour before the show…

After some research I found that:

  • the ingredients of Clinique’s first step suggest that it is a simple soap, with nothing spectacular in it. Hmmm, I would never want to wash my face with soap even for free.
  • the toners (or “Clarifying Lotions”) are not greatly formulated either (for one thing, #1, #3 and #4 are identical ingredient-wise, less the coloring agent and varying degrees of alcohol)!!!!! #2 is a big disappointment because it’s got withhazel distillate and menthol in it, which can cause cell damage in the long run.
  • the moisturizer has no anti-aging agents, no SPF, just a moisturizer. It is a drug store product for the inadequate price.

So the true steps here are steps to irritation, redness and breakouts.Clinique skincare

The ad says:

“Can great skin be created? With Clinique’s 3-Step Skin Care System, the answer is yes. The simple process—only 3 products, for 3 minutes, twice a day—gets any skin clear, radiant, and glowing, in about two weeks.”

ATTETION CLASS! We have a guest speaker today:

I worked for Clinique for a few months. The 3 step is the worst skincare system on the market. Seriously, the soaps are literally soap, which is so inappropriate for the skin! The toner has so much alcohol in it that it reminds me of my early binge drinking years in college (ya know, when you drink McCormick’s vodka?) And on to the lotion…might as well let it dry out and stick a wick in it. At least it would be useful as a candle. In all seriousness, they taught me at Clinique school that the soap will not remove makeup, so a separate “makeup remover” with the soap was necessary to completely cleanse the skin. By the time I cleansed my skin twice, it was RAW. They also told us the Dramatically Different moisturizer was not enough. So we had to recommend using an anti-aging moisturizer on top of that! Well, ladies, that takes us to FIVE STEPS!

Kira-victim says:

Step 1: I found that the soap left my skin with a taut feeling and dry patches of skin. The dish goes all gooey after a while and I started to find hard lumps in the soap which I think were probably from the soap being exposed to water then left to dry out.

Step2: After two weeks of using it I had a red blotchy face where my skin had become sore and irritated from the soap and lotion combined, and I had broken out into spots all over my face, I’m not talking small pimples here, I’m talking boil like spots that hurt when I moved my face. I can honestly say that I’ve never had spots as bad as now.

Step3: It just seems to sit on my skin and not sink in, and doesn’t leave a great base for makeup, especially powder, as it just clung to the lotion that hadn’t been absorbed into my skin.

I heard, with most products, you have to give them a few days so that your skin can adjust, so I continued using it for 2 weeks, by that time it looked like I had a severe STD and my nose is just about to fall down.

breakouts after Clinique’s 3step skincareGirls say:

“The first day or two things were ok, but now when I put Step 2 on, my skin BURNS and my face gets red. The moisturizer does make it feel better, but my skin’s texture is sort of bumpy. I don’t have sensitive skin and have never had an allergic reaction to a skincare product.”

“The first 2 days I thought it was lovely and I enjoyed the novelty of the 3 steps. On to day 3 and I realized I was starting to break out in spots. After 2 weeks I repeatedly had little yellow spots around chin/t-zone, which although not major were a pest. I stopped using it after I found the skincare that was more suitable.”

“The first few days were horrific, the liquid soap, the mild one, dried my skin out and the toner, clarifying lotion (the purple one) stung. I had no improvement after a week of using this, in fact I started to notice patches of dry, flaky, red skin where it was upsetting my eczema.”

“These products made dry flaky patches around my nose that would start to peel and become red and sore. It took 2 weeks after I stopped using the products for my skin to go back to normal.”

“The moisturizer broke me out, smells terrible, feels terrible, the toner stings, smells like Vodka, and did NOT remove residual traces of makeup, the soap, dried out my skin, making it flakey and tight.”