Summarized from a consultation originally recorded on January 28th, 2024.
Annmarie Skin Care Skin Consultations are FREE, virtual group sessions, hosted live by our in-house skin experts, to provide personalized recommendations and directly answer any skin care related questions. Learn more about our skin consultations.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Welcome, come on in. I'm gonna get you guys marked here. We had a pretty small group registered, so there's a high likelihood it's just the three of us today. We might have another one or two who hop on, but we shall see. Hi there. Hi. I hope everyone's Tuesdays are good. Where are you joining from?
Customer: I'm from Sacramento, California.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Oh, lovely.
Customer: I'm from Haymarket, Virginia.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Okay, lovely. Lots of different,
Customer: Where are you?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: I'm in Kansas City.
Customer: Kansas? Nice.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: It is, it's, we had a lot of snow this weekend, just, yeah, kind of coming back out of it a little bit, but nice and warm inside. So I can't complain too much. I'm getting all the things here. Welcome. This of course is. Annmarie Skin Care, we're gonna start our consultation. Give you guys the coupon code here in a minute. My name's Kate and I am a licensed aesthetician. I've worked with Annmarie Skin Care for a little over six years, so I've been here a while. This is probably going to be shorter than an hour and a half today, unless we have lots of questions, which we have time for, but just with a smaller group, I think it'll probably, we'll just be done whenever you guys are done with questions. So let's jump into it.
Customer: I've used like two serums and I've used the aloe face wash, but I'm just trying to get like a good regimen for my current skin right now.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: So with a group this small, a lot of times what I like to do is just see if anybody wants to kind of come off mute and talk to me about your skin. And we'll start to build a routine for that person and probably answer some questions for other people as we go along. And then, you know, if another person wants to go, or if another person has questions, we'll just kind of keep going like that. So curious if anyone wants to be the first? Awesome! I'm going to ask a couple of questions, but I want to hear all about your skin. The big things I'm listening for is how dry or oily you run, how sensitive you run and what your biggest concerns are.
Customer: I think I'm like a medium for everything. More on the sensitive side. And then I had discoloration, like from old sun damage, I think I got a laser treatment like five years ago after I, or no, now my son's 14. So it was 14 years ago I think with like the hormones of my son and then the laser, like they didn't agree so I just got like permanent white and I've done like some chemical peels, but it doesn't, I mean the minute I go back out in the sun, it seems to come back. And then occasionally blemishes, but I'm also a breast cancer survivor. So and I'm on like Lupron, so my hormones are being suppressed right now. I'm very into it, obviously not having any endocrine disruptors and stuff like that. That's why I was interested in your brand. But, and I'm, I'm not used to using face wash, a toner, you know, like the moisturizer during the day, sunscreen and nighttime. So I want a good regimen routine, but I don't know if I'm using the right products.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. Gotcha. This is, this is perfect information. So I'm going to go through and just recommend a routine for you. I'm going to talk about a lot of products, but I'm trusting you to prioritize what feels most important to your needs and your other products right now.
Customer: Okay!
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Starting at the top, you know, obviously your first step is going to be your cleanser and this would be true for anyone, right? We're using our cleanser in the morning. We're using our cleanser in the evening with skin like yours. I like the Aloe Herb Cleanser here. This one comes in two sizes.
You can either do the 50 or the 100 mil. It's a soft kind of creamy blend. I think you said you had tried this one before.
Customer: I really liked it. When I went to a local esthetician, I don't know if she was just trying to sell a product, but when I went in she said that I needed something stronger and that's why she put me on this anti aging Dermalogica thing, but then I feel like that's supposedly has all the bad stuff in it. So I was like, I don't want to really do that.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. Yeah. So with someone who runs kind of middle of the road with dry and oily skin, I would say you could do either that one the Aloe Herb Cleanser and this one for those who haven't tried it is a kind of softer, creamier blend. This one's really supportive for skin that is dry, skin that is aging, and skin that is sensitive, especially a combination of the three of those. No, it's not going to have suds up. None of the cleansers that we have or products that we have have any sulfates in them, and so you're not going to get any bubbling that happens, and that's normal.
But a key ingredient in all of the cleansers is aloe and aloe when it hits water, it takes on this kind of saponification state if you will. And so this is a big part of what is helping to cleanse the skin. So the Aloe Herb Cleanser is a really good one. The other one that, you know, could be something that fits your needs. This is called the Citrus Mint Cleanser. This one is a gel base. So it's a little bit more I mean gel and consistency. We've got peppermint. We've got rosemary and that one we've got a good amount of citrus. It's designed to really cut through oil so if you are somebody who runs oily or if you have times of the year or maybe times of the month where you're a little bit oilier than others, that one is helpful. And so with someone who is looking at your skin, she might have a better look at what's going on and maybe the Aloe Herb Cleanser wasn't cleansing, you know, as deep as you might need. And then, the next best one I would say would be the Citrus Mint Cleanser for you.
Customer: Okay. I think she recommended the strong one more for like the discoloration, like it wasn't going to help that.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, so the thing there, there's a couple things with cleansers. For the discoloration specifically, and this is actually, we're going to hit a lot of the cleansers, another cleansing option is this one. This is called the Phytonutrient Cleanser. It's closer to the Aloe Herb Cleanser in texture. This one is what I recommend when I'm working with anyone who's really concerned about signs of aging. This one has ingredients to help support softening the appearance of fine lines. This one has ingredients to help support –
Customer: Sorry to interrupt. It was like $75 right? I was just looking at that today.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, it's about $75, approximately, I can't remember, but if you just saw it, that's probably, probably the pricing of it. This one, like I said, is one that I usually recommend for people who are working on signs of aging or have concerns with signs of aging including discoloration, including discoloration.
Customer: Yeah. Cause that's what I was thinking. I was thinking that maybe I would try the Phytonutrient Cleanser and then do the Aloe Herb Cleanser for my daughters who are 18.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: That might be a better fit. Let's see here. Let's get into the next step. So the cleansing step, right? We're starting at the top and you are cleansing your skin. Then we're going to get into toning your skin. And the toning mist is this step that's often kind of left out. People aren't really. Sure. What the point of it is or how to use it. We use the toning mist to provide this burst of hydration and this burst of nutrition. So this is helping to support the softening of the skin. If you have skin that runs kind of oily, we've got a really good one that helps to balance oil. And then they're particularly designed to support different skin types. So one for oily skin, one for normal skin, one for combo skin. We've got this one that works really well for dry, irritated skin with your skin. I'm going to recommend one of two and I apologize if you see my kiddo. It's Christmas break. And so we're, we're home! For your skin type. I would say either this one, this is the Neroli Toning Mist.
This one is kind of in between, you know, if your skin's maybe normal or normal to dry, or even on the oily side, but you have a concern that is signs of aging, the Neroli Toning Mist is supportive for those skin types. It's a very, very simple blend. This one starts with aloe vera juice. We've got a lot of neroli essential oil and then it is kind of like a soft blend from there. It's not super, super hydrating. It's kind of like soft hydration. And so for the kind of normal skin types, this is one that I like, you know, I think it's a good fit.
The other option though is this one. This one is the Botanical Hydration Mist with Immortelle. And this one is awesome for skin types that are really concerned with signs of aging. We start this one with two hydrosols. And the hydrosols in this are rose and immortelle. And both of those are kind of like widely known florals for how they work with signs of aging. They just really, really help. To soften the appearance of fine lines and keep the skin really plump. And then the fact that they're hydrosols, they also really provide a good amount of hydration. So skin that is dry and aging. But the thing that I think could be a good fit for you, is we've got several different types of chamomile in here and frankincense. And skin that gets sensitive at all. This is just a really, really quick soother. Now with the toning mist, these are sprayers, right? So you'll mist your face. You don't have to put it on a cotton round. And then it stays on the skin. So you aren't going to wipe it off or, you know, remove it with a cotton round or anything like that. It stays on the skin. My preference is to leave my skin a little bit damp with the toning mist as I apply my serum and my oil. But you don't have to do that. Everyone kind of finds their sweet spot with whether they let it dry completely or they leave it super damp. It changes the way the serum and the oil kind of absorb into the skin. And so I really encourage exploration with it. Try a couple ways, see if one feels better than the other. But, you know, a little bit of exploration helps you kind of feel how they feel different. So all that is to say there's a range with whether you do it dry or, or, or leave it damp. And then you come in with your serum, your serum step. So. But I want to pause and just see if we have any questions from anyone about anything we've hit so far.
Customer: Well, if we have a freshener or a toner that works for us from another brand, then is it okay to mix and match?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, that's a good question. And I'll answer that question for that specific product and then just in general. Most of the time, it is fine to intermix with other brands. Obviously, we've designed our line to be really synergistic with each other. Things that I would look out for that could impact how the serums are absorbed or how they wear is whether your toning mist has any alcohols or it has any kind of acids like a glycolic or something like that. I'd like to think not in a toning mist, but they exist. So paying attention to acids and, and what was the first thing I said? Yeah, just, just how stringent it feels if it's really stripping the skin. And that instance. I wouldn't recommend that you use it at all, but if you want to just finish it out, you might want a different serum with it. I think those would not, it's not going to harm you. It's just going to dry the serum out quite a bit.
So otherwise you're probably fine. And when in doubt, try it out and see how it feels. So
Customer: Are you acquainted with the app, the YUKA app.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Oh, I think I have heard of it but, but, yeah, tell us what that is.
Customer: Well, it, she rates, she's, she, I can't think of her first name right now, but has a group of people that rate cosmetics and food. And I've been on the Merle Norman program for a long time, but when I rate them on this app, they are very, most of their products are very low, bad to poor. for her. She has no motivation to sell anything.
She just has her motivation to help you pick, spend. I guess my motive is to spend my dollars in the best way for my skin.I'm, at my age, I'm not concerned at all about aging. I'm already there. And but I, I want to be able to spend my dollars for what's best for my skin.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: It does, yeah. And I want to, I want to clarify, when the products that were rating low, were they, were they our products or it was another brand that you had mentioned?
Customer: I was on Merle Norman.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Oh, Merle Norman. Okay, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. But they,
Customer: she rated the toner really high. From Merle. Oh, I see. Yeah. Merle Norman Toner was really high, but the others were poor to bad to awful.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. And there are lots of apps out there and like, EWG, there are sites that'll rank different products. And I usually refer to you to do your own research. Sometimes what happens with Well I'll speak for us with EWG. EWG is the Environmental Working Group and it's a website where you can check in on ingredients and, I mean, they'll do everything. You can look up all kinds of stuff. What we've run into with ours is that for us to get on EWG it's a huge fee. Our business is just not that large and it's also not a high priority that we're putting our money towards that. And so what can happen is customers will then upload information but sometimes they'll do it incorrectly. For example, we received a really low score on an eye product, I think at one point in time, because the customer had input a different version of some ingredient.
It was like a powdered something, powder chamomile or something that ranks higher than the ingredient that we were using. And so there's a, you know, with things like that, it could behoove you to either do your own research or check in with the brand and see if they have any follow up or they can offer any information that might help make that score make more sense or something like that. And sometimes the apps, I don't know about this one. It sounds like maybe not, but especially if they're an app that you don't pay for, there is a sponsorship relationship. And so some brands can pay to be either featured or to be featured or ranked higher. And so all of this is just, you know, as you're looking at apps or checking in on things to keep in mind that there could be, could be other information that, that changes it. And so with the Merle Norman, maybe you contact their customer support. Share that you've seen this and ask if they have any follow up that might, might make it make sense or might expand the context of why it received that score. And I don't know, see what they've got.
Customer: I got onto you from a wellness mama.Yeah. And that's how I got onto that app as well. Cool. I guess I trust her a bit. Yeah. And I've researched the app. The company, the YKK company, and they're unaffiliated with any product.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. Well, it sounds like they are pretty reliable. So I think with that information, I, you've got enough pieces to help make a decision for what feels good for you in whatever direction.
Customer: I bought your sample. I got your samples.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Okay. Yeah. The trial kit.
Customer: Okay. And then I got this one.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Mm hmm. Anti-Aging Serum.
Customer: I think this. Is this yours?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Mm hmm. I can't tell. Does that say rejuvenating facial oils? Oh, the activated night serum.
Customer: Yes.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yes.
Customer: Awesome. Those are the three I have. I have not ventured into them at all. I was going to hear what you had to say first.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: okay, cool. Well, I love that. I, the Clean Beauty Trial Kit, if any of you have started with it, is just a little set that we, a lot of our influencers will offer. So maybe Wellness Mama, Mark Hyman and it's just a good trial kit. We're, so we've got, we've talked about some cleansers, we've talked about your toning mist. The next step in your routine is your serum, your facial serum. And, I'm going to recommend something specific for you. I'm also going to offer maybe one or two others that could appeal to some other people your serum step. And this is true for our brand and true for a lot of brands. Serum kind of is a product category. There are obviously outliers, but a serum is usually a thinner consistency aqueous in texture, smoother in texture. They're designed to be able to be absorbed into the skin and to work on the skin a little bit lower than the fattier, richer moisturizers or oils. These are usually where you're thinking about your concerns because these serums are getting into the skin at a little bit of a lower layer, we can address things like fine lines, pigmentation yeah, crepey skin. Droopy skin from a different angle than just addressing it on the surface of visible skin. So, we've got a lot of them. I'm gonna speak to a handful. Not every single one of them. Yeah, I'll start with two. So the first one, this is, could be a good one for you. This also is a really, really widely used one. And so I wanted to make sure to call it out because a lot of skin types can use this one.
This is the Anti-Aging Serum. The Anti-Aging Serum is the one that you have. This is the one that would have come if you had received a clean beauty trial kit. This one is super, super helpful for skin that's dry, skin that's crepey, or skin that is starting to show fine lines. You're starting to see finer lines on the face. The blend of this one, we start with this really lovely aloe vera juice base, and so the consistency of it, which we'll see if we can capture, sometimes I have empty bottles, though this one I do. You can see it's kind of like a light, thin consistency, it'll run down the back of my hand. The scent of it, this one smells a lot like rose. A big composition of this one, we have the hyaluronic acid, which is a huge part of it. Hyaluronic acid is really helpful for plumping up fine lines. So areas of the face where you're starting to see creasing, especially on the forehead and like the smile line area, hyaluronic acid is a really nice one for. This particular one, also has this floral blend to it. So we've got idle lice, we've got the rose, we've got life everlasting flowers. All of these are included with the intention to kind of maintain the resiliency of the skin to support the skin's bounce back so that you have the capacity to make a million facial expressions and your skin kind of still return to its normal state. So this one, this is either currently or a bestseller or a second bestseller It's one that is oftentimes a bestseller and one that we actually do have in two sizes We've got this one, which is a 15 and this is a 30 milliliter And this is the only one that is in the two sizes right now we launched it in the second size because we had so many people who were subscribing to the the smaller one that we made sense on all ends to have a more cost effective option, one that's a little bit more sustainable. So all of that is just to, to tout the testament of how popular, how popular that one is. The next one I think might be a little bit of a better fit. This one is the Wild Fruit Serum. This one, the blend of this one, and you'll notice it's that black label again, usually these are really targeted for signs of aging.
The Wild Fruit Serum is designed to support aging skin from a lot of different angles.
We've got a lot of hyaluronic acid in this one, this one is really supportive for those fine lines again. The Wild Fruit Serum also has a fair amount of stem cells. So stem cells are an ingredient that we include that's often included in skincare to help skin kind of maintain its lift Your skin cells mimic stem cells and so with a little bit of time you see a kind of more taut look to the face, but the ingredients that I think are particularly apt for you, this one has uva ursi in it Uva Ursi is a brightener, and Uva Ursi is a particular brightener that works on targeting areas of the face.
So if you have areas that have active sun damage this is, this kind of like builds up, accumulates in those areas to help that to go back to sleep. Uva Ursi does. This also has an ingredient called Cucutu plum, which is very vitamin rich, but particularly very vitamin C rich. And vitamin C is an ingredient that's helpful for brightening, but you Evening the tone of the skin, the tone, the texture, the consistency, all of that gets even out really, really nicely with the vitamin C. So the two of them together, the Uva Ursi and the vitamin C are really helpful for sun damage, pigmentation, discoloration. Now, with your experience, what you, it sounds like you have, I'm not in front of you and I'm I can't diagnose, but it sounds like hypopigmentation, which is on the other end of the spectrum where there's been activity or damage that the pigmentation has shut itself completely off. I would do a little bit of research as far as how you're addressing hypopigmentation. We don't want to exacerbate it further. But, and a thing that can be helpful is sunscreen, and I'll get to that step, but I did want to qualify that this is going to be supported for darkened areas of the face. This is not going to be addressing, you know, the white hypopigmentation on the face. So that's the Wild Fruit Serum. The consistency is very similar to the Anti-Aging Serum. So I'm not going to pump it in my hand.
Customer: oh yeah! Hi, did you say that the Wild the Black Label is specifically more for like signs of anti aging, like the whole line of Black Labels?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yep, yep, yep. So that collection, the Black Label collection, is called the Wild Alchemy Collection. You know, as a whole, it's designed for more profound signs of aging. Every product in that line has a pretty particular focus for addressing signs of aging. Obviously it differs per product. That line also, we usually use ingredients that are either a little bit harder to source. They might be more tropical ingredients. Or there's a more laborious craft process. So sometimes we're using ingredients that have several steps before they're finished. Copper infused water, the hydrosols we've got a serum blend in our serum that goes through a little bit of a process before is the final ingredient for the product. So anyway,
Customer: That's a little bit more also on the expensive side compared to the other label?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: So they usually are a little bit more on the higher end of the price point. Oftentimes they're larger bottle size sizes too, which is a thing I usually know. So like back to the cleansers, for example. The Phytonutrient cleanser is around $75. It's only available in a hundred milliliter bottle. The other ones are available in two sizes, a hundred and a 50, and the price point I think is around $30 for the 50 and around. $59, I think 100. So, there is a little bit of a price point difference, but also larger bottle sizes. So there's that
Customer: I feel like I apologize because I missed the 1st part of the meeting.
You already talked about the cleanser that comes usually in the package.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: So I wasn't talking about a package specifically, but we did talk about some cleansers. We touched on that one, the phytonutrient, which is great for aging skin. We touched on the citrus mint, which is great for oily or combo skin and also the Aloe Herb Cleanser. This one, which is great for skin. That's maybe a normal, normal, dry, dry and aging, specifically early signs of aging and sensitivity.
Customer: So when do you use the serum? Where in the process are you?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, so we do our cleansing step first, we tone, and then we apply our serum. So this is the third step in your routine. That could change if you were including an exfoliant of some sort. That would still come before that. But when you start your finishing products, finishing means you've You're done masking, exfoliating, cleansing, you're doing your toning mist and then your serum. And so it comes right after the toning mist. And the application is really straightforward. I say that sometimes and then someone's never used a serum before, but what I usually do for both the serum and the oil is I'll pump it into the palm of my hand. I usually take my ring and middle finger. This is just preference and kind of swirl it and then I'll press it into my cheeks.
And my forehead and my chin whatever's left. I'll kind of bring down onto my nose and down, down onto my neck and my chest. And then I kind of apply and massage and upward motions. This is all just a little, can be a little bit extra. And so it's perfectly fine to pump it into the palm of your hand. Just kind of swirl it, swipe it on. As long as you're getting it onto the skin. You don't have to do the extra fluff. But what I find is I use a lot less product when I put it into the palm of my hand and then kind of pick it up versus putting it onto the tips of my fingers because it's so thin, it kind of runs in between the fingers and you lose some product that way. And so just to get the best bang for your buck, I recommend the palm for your hand or palm.
Customer: Yeah, I'm having the same problem.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. Another thing I like about the palm of the hand is that you can also incorporate boosting elixirs. I want to speak to one more serum, but then I can talk about what those are because I incorporate those a lot too. The last serum I want to mention is this one. This is The Activated Night Serum. This particular one, it is obviously designed for evening use. We use a retinol alternative called bioactive A. We don't have any retinols, this isn't a vitamin A derivative, this isn't a retinol derivative, anything that is retinol specific. And we did that on purpose, we wanted an ingredient that was certified, made safe, verified that it had been tested and confirmed that it is safe for the body, safe for the body at any season. You can use it while pregnant. You can use it for nursing. It is still safe for the body, safe for the body and the baby.
And you're still getting that, that beautiful, beautiful retinal kind of experience. You get a very smooth feel. This one's really helpful for pore size.
It also is really helpful for smoothing the appearance of fine lines and softening the appearance of creasing on the face. All of the things that a retinol would be helpful for, this one is helpful for. The feel of this one it, it is a product that works like retinol. So you're getting this kind of cell turnover, as the formulation of this product is much thicker. I'll show you this one on the back of my hand. You'll see it's not going to run down my hand. It's just a creamier feeling serum than the others. And that's by design. So that one, that's the Activated Night Serum. Now I wanted to talk about that one because most people, most skin types can use it.
It's a great one to have in your routine, but I also want to mention the Concentrated Boosting Elixirs because I mentioned this briefly here. I mix mine into my serum, you can mix it into an oil, you can also mix it into a mask.
But I prefer the serum because the serum is super thin, this gets right next to the skin. This set is a set of three concentrated boosters. We've got the Hydrate, The Brighten and the Revitalize. Now, the Hydrate is a concentrated amount of hyaluronic acid and peptides. And so this one, you can use this one morning and evening. So good for plumping the appearance of fine lines. Really helping to round out the hydration of the serum you choose to add it to.
The next one is the Brighten, Brighten is a concentrated form of vitamin C. And so this is a tetrahexyl desulscorbate, which is a mouthful. But it's one that we researched forever to find because a lot of vitamin C's on the market are rancid. They start in a powder form and then as soon as you mix them with water they peak in their activity and then they start to fade and so they aren't even effective by the time they get to you.
This is a shelf stable one which we're really proud of. But then on top of that, this one's also not a petroleum derivative. When we were looking for vitamin Cs, we were really surprised to find that a lot of vitamin C that exists out there is a petroleum derivative and that wasn't what we wanted to do. So that one, as the name suggests, is super helpful for evening the tone and the texture of the skin, brightening up the skin. So this is really helpful for anyone with pigmentation. The two that I've mentioned, the Hydrate and the Brighten, are sold on their own.
So if you're listening and you're like, I don't need the others, but I'd love Hydrate. You can invest in that one. And likewise with Brighten. You can invest in just that one.
Customer: You're saying to put the Brighten into the night serum.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yes, you can put it into the night serum. Then, I'll, let me tell you about the last one and then I'll walk you through how to use it and how to incorporate it in your routine.
The last one is the Revitalize. And this is a concentrated form of the bioactive A. The bioactive A, again, is that retinal alternative. And so, this one is a very potent, pretty strong booster here. Now, let's get into how you incorporate them. Now, I was saying, you know, I pop it in the palm of my hand. You mix these into another product as they are boosters. They don't want to go directly on the skin. They're very concentrated. And so if you put them directly on the skin, they are uncomfortable. That's not how they're designed to be used. So what I do is I pump the serum, any serum. I think some support, you know, some better than others. I love the Brighten and the Wild Fruit Serum together. I do that all the time. I love, love, love the look of it. Anymore, I don't have a lot of active pigmentation. There's still some, but I just feel like it brightens up my complexion so, so nicely. So, that's my favorite combo. But you could mix the Brighten into the anti aging.
You can mix it into the Citrus Stem Cell Serum. I did say yes, but we don't actually want to mix the Brighten into the activated night serum. The Brighton and the revitalize the vitamin C and the bioactive a, they don't, they're not active together, but they kind of cancel each other out. So the activity kind of doesn't really go as high as it could.
I don't really feel like you get the best bang for your buck. So I don't usually recommend the Brighton with either the revitalize or the activated night serum, but any of the others, you can be pretty interchangeable with I usually do anywhere from one to three drops. This time of year with the Revitalize, I go way lighter. I do like maybe one drop, maybe two drops, just because my skin gets so dry. And it's in a good blend, but it is an exfoliating product. And so I slow it down. But I like this set in particular for some skin types, because you can really, really choose how hard you go, how fast. If you are somebody who's really sensitive and you really want to use a retinol or retinol alternative, and you just have never been able to handle it, the concentrated boosting set is good because you can start with just a drop or even half a drop and feel how your skin feels with that one and maybe build up, maybe you slow down, like you can really customize it.
But all of this is to swing back to, It being in the palm of your hand. And so I do a couple of drops, mix it together and then apply it to the face. So those are the Concentrated Boosting Elixirs. I want to check in and see what questions we have before we continue. And you are welcome to use the chat. Also, I, you know, sometimes people join and don't feel like talking. So anything confusing or I can answer. Okay.
Customer: Hey hey, I'd like to add something. So I've been using the products for quite a bit of years, been on and off with them and I realized that most times I'm the only guy because I've had a consult like a long time ago, some years ago, but I'm guessing like most of these products are, they are for anyone, but I realized that they market mostly to women I would imagine because on this call, I'm the only guy.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah. So that is how it goes a lot of times….
Customer: But I do realize, so I'm a coach and I do DNA testing wellness testing. And I've done one for my skincare routine. I do have very oily skin. I'm in the T zone. However, my results did identify that I have increased risk of dry skin, higher likelihood of freckles and UV related damage, decreased ability to repair the UV damage, increased inflammation, eczema, psoriasis and reduced antioxidant response. And reduce plasma levels of vitamin B six and B12. Hmm. So, with all that, I wanted to put together kind of like a proper skincare routine based on that. I would imagine that some of the products that I've been using already have been helping. Yeah. But I just wanna see if there's anything else I can add in or tweak. But if you had any recommendations based on that, based on those positions, that would be great. I've got melanin. So, you know, yeah, that’s a good baseline.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Great! A lot of things to touch on in that. I'm going to put a pin in ours and we'll, we'll come back and finish the oil here for you. But yeah, you are correct. We do market a lot to women. Our demographic is largely female and oftentimes middle to mature age female, but, these are essentially formula blends that have different labels on them. And so they are, you know, work for every skin type, any skin type And we do have a fair amount of gentlemen who work with us! To be fair, they're just not on this call with us right now. So that's to touch on that now as far as what products might work for you Like, working with your skin type is a really, really nuanced one. But, I still think that this one, so, swinging back to the cleansers, this is the Citrus Mint Cleanser. Skin that runs oily, this is helpful for. And, this one is not stripping the skin. So, oily skin that might have a predisposition to be drier, to maybe get drier more quickly, this can still be helpful for.
Because we still start with aloe vera juice in this one, it's not. Drying the skin out when you're using the citrus mint cleanser, your skin still feels really balanced. I think balanced is really the best way to describe the
Customer: I didn't see the name. Which one was that? Oh, yeah.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Citrus mint cleanser. Usually I have a little assistant on the call who likes to put all the links in the chat, but she's not here today. Citrus Mint Cleanser, yeah. Did you say you had used this one before or not?
Customer: I think so. Yeah.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Toning mist wise I don't know if you were here when we were talking about the neroli. This one's probably going to be pretty ideal. It's really, really just this light burst of hydration, but it's not going to be adding a lot of moisture to the face.
Customer: great!
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, I think that would be most ideal to both support not adding excess oil.
Customer: I used the Rosemary one before, I'm not sure what that was doing so much.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: One thing I do like about this one for skin types that run either run oily or are truly oily is that you can use this one as kind of a shine control.
This one has rosemary, it has peppermint, and it has white willow bark. You can mist it over your routine really at any point in the day. The only exception to that would be like. If you're about to go out in the sun and you've just applied sunscreen, maybe don't miss it. But otherwise, if it's like three in the afternoon and you notice that you are really shiny, this is one that you can mist on the face. And I'd go a little on the heavy side. But then what happens is the rosemary, the white willow bark, they kind of gobble up the oil that's excess on the skin. And then skin is just left feeling very healthy. It doesn't mattify it like a powder or like blotting paper would. It just kind of absorbs what's excess on the face. And so I like it for that. I've got a lot of customers who have it on, like, their work desk. And they use that instead of powder anymore, or in their bag, or something like that. So, even if that wasn't the one that you opted for in your routine, it's one that I like. Or working out, this is one that's nice, like, if you don't want to take all the time to do the whole routine after a shower, like or you're not going to shower, misting your skin with this is, is, is a nice one too.
So if you didn't, if you didn't find that it helped that much in the routine itself, then there's another way that it could have maybe, maybe worked out for you. And then as far as the serum, right, so you've cleansed your skin, you're getting to your serum step. One of the lighter ones is this one.
This is the Citrus Stem Cell Serum. I would say this one is probably going to be the most supportive for any kind of pigmentation or even starting to run a little bit dry. It has licorice root. Both of these are brighteners and so any propensity for pigmentation helps to keep melanin like exactly where we want it to be. It does have stem cells in it, and so it can be helpful for maintaining the lift and the tautness of the face. And it's got some hyaluronic acid, but it's the smallest amount of all the serums, and so it's one that is very, very lightly providing hydration. It's not doing a ton of extra. Usually I'm not recommending this for somebody who's really, really dry. Or dry, but so a skin type like yours, that one could potentially be a good fit because I'm
Customer: thinking that maybe I have oily skin because I have that increased risk of dry skin depending on what is or isn't on my face and all this, all this oil production. Okay. So the citrus, I think I've used that before, and I used to combine that with the, as I mentioned earlier, the herbal facial oil for oily skin.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah, so let's talk about the oils and we'll hit which one is good for you too. So oil, so for those of you who are newer to Annmarie Skin Care we do use oil as our form of moisture. We don't use any creams or lotions. We aren't opposed to creams or lotions. We don't have a moral, like, disagreement with them. What we have found with our brand and our product quality is that it's been really hard for us to find a formulation of a cream or a lotion that maintains its consistency without a synthetic emulsifier. And has a long enough shelf life without a synthetic preservative. And so we've tried different versions over the years and some are so nice, but they have incredibly short shelf lives. And so we, it's, we just really can't. justify the short turnaround. I will say we are working on one again and this is one that we feel our formulators got some really good options for us.
So you could see one from us, but at this point it's just the oils. Another thing that we really value with facial oils, especially because we use really, really clean, purely sourced oils. is that they work really synergistically with the body. Your body naturally produces oil. That's true for everyone, whether it produces a lot or it produces a little, but you would, you would know if it didn't. You, there's particular disorders where it doesn't produce oil. But as such, when we're using oil, as a form of moisture very quickly, the body recognizes this and knows how to integrate it. And so what happens is your skin takes on this really, really lovely glow to it, whether we've decreased fine lines or not, whether we've reduced pigmentation or not skin, all skin from my 20 to my 90 plus year old customers takes on this very healthy radiance to it. It just looks really, really bright and healthy and glowy. And so this is another reason that we love using the oils as the form of moisture. So with all of that, we obviously have different options and ones that are working with the skin in different ways.
Our Divine Woman Elixir, what is it? Calendula, St. John's wort, Echinacea, Feverfew. Aside from the blend of this, this is a really cool product in general because the herbs that we use here, Annmarie grows them. Annmarie herself grows the herbs here. So there's this additional freshness too with the Divine Woman. But for skin that's dry and dry and sensitive or maybe normal, normal to dry and sensitive, I like this one. A lot, quite a bit. And how you use the facial oils, and I'll speak about a few more here in a minute, is very similar to the serums. I'll pump, usually a single pump, I very rarely do more than a pump. Sometimes if I'm doing like a gua sha, you know, stone treatment, I'll apply a little bit more, but one pump is pretty sufficient. Maybe even half a pump, depending on the time of But and then I apply it, right? Grab it. True, apply it to the face. Gentle upward motions and then continue on with my routine.
Now, other options that are really good probably spread here.
The Anti-Aging Facial Oil is one that is really, really, really, really supportive for dry skin and for aging skin. It is the richest of all the oils. The feel of this one, the jojoba in here is really what sends it. The jojoba mimics skin's natural oil, the weight and the size of, of jojoba oil. They mimic that. And so the body really quickly seems like, Oh, moisture on the face and then integrates that into the skin. You feel the difference with the anti aging facial oil.
Customer: So one of the herb seed, one named
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: The Herbal Facial Oil for Normal & Combination Skin. Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. All right, we're right at the hour.
Let's just pause and see what questions we have. I obviously have a lot more products. We have masks and I think I will admit this is our first consult of the year, and so I'm not sure what the email I don't know if it said specifically we're giving away the illuminating pearl mask, or if there was just a giveaway, but this is good, you know, when we hit kind of the end of the call, when we're all done with questions, when everyone feels supported, I'm going to do a little bit of a drawing, I have my computer do it for me, and then see who's going to take this product home, so I'm happy to get into that product, sunscreens, I want to just check in and see where we're at and what, what, what we're wondering.
Customer: Do you have a sunscreen as well?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah! Let's talk about that real quick. So, our sunscreen, we call it our Sun Love. This is a zinc oxide clean reef sea hypoallergenic. What else is this one? Hypoallergenic. Yeah. Reef friendly. The zinc oxide in here that we use zinc oxide is the sun protectant. We have the formulation of that. It isn't too white cast, which is one of the things that we were really, really celebratory with when we crafted this one, or actually called this our everyday sheer sunscreen. We went with an SPF 20, which sometimes sounds low to people. SPF 20 still blocks 95 percent of UV rays. SPF 20 is 95. SPF 30 is 97. You get to SPF 50 or at 98 or 99. Nothing will claim 100. And so. In my opinion, anything over 50 is just taking your money. But to swing back to this one, we went with the lower SPF because we wanted the ratio of zinc to be such that when you applied it, it wasn't super gloppy, white cast, chalky, weird zinc oxide sunscreens, which there are millions of them out there. They, Kind of have this reputation for being just really white cast and this one I'll, I'll admit it's a little bit white when you first apply it, but when it blends into the skin it's just so, so, so glowy, just like this light, beautiful layer to the complexion there. We do use a non nano zinc in here, which means that there's no potential that this is going to cross into the bloodstream.
And so, you know, if that's a concern of yours, this is the non nano zinc. It isn't waterproof, this is, I usually get into that more over the summer, but there isn't an ingredient that fits our brand standards that would keep this, like, completely bound to the skin, and so it's not a waterproof one if you're, swimming, you know, it will rinse off.
So things to keep in mind if you're doing a, you know, a marathon and you sweat profusely, that might be an event that you opt for a different sunscreen. But otherwise, it can absolutely handle some sweat. It can handle some water too, but it just is, it's not waterproof. So a good thing to know, especially if you're going to be exposed to that one.
So yes, we do have a sunscreen! I do recommend it for everyone. With your skin type, you might be able to get away with using that in place of your oil in the morning. Some skin types, especially on the normal or more normal oily range, don't need both the oil and the sunscreen. The sunscreen's got some burriti fruit and pumpkin seed oil, and so it does provide some moisture to the face. It's not actively absorbing oil, and so, you know, you might play with it and see how they feel, you know, do one day. With the herbal facial oil in the morning, do one without and see if you like the feel of it better, but you don't need the extra moisture. And so you might be able to get away without it and just save a little bit of money. Most people, myself included, it's not quite enough moisture so I still use oil and then sunscreen on top of it.
Customer: Is it just for the face, or is it for the whole body?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: That's a really good question. So it's designed for the face. It can be used over the entire body. Usually this, I mean, this is where I kind of like project my budget. It's a pricier piece, and I, you know, if your pockets can hold it, it's great on the body. But the texture and the consistency is really designed to work with the face. It's designed to not be too white cast. It's designed to be pretty quickly absorbed. All of that. And so, you know, with that information, I'll let you do what feels good. You can use it on the body, but you might opt for a sunscreen that isn't as pricey that also supports the body. You know what I mean??
Customer: I had a question about the Brighten Booster. Was that the same as the Wild Fruit Serum Brightening Complex? Is that, was that the same or is it different?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: They are different. This is, we get this question a lot, which is always good feedback because it's like, helps us pay attention to our naming process. The Wild Fruit Serum is a serum and so this is a Full blend of lots of different ingredients. So this is the one that has aloe vera juice. This has hyaluronic acid, stem cells, peptides, and resveratrol. This has got a pretty wide array here. The Brighton booster is three ingredients. We have. Vitamin C, very concentrated vitamin C. We have SeaBuck Thornberry, which is an antioxidant that supports the integration of vitamin C. And then we've got a little bit of Aspenbark. It's a very small amount and that one is just kept, it keeps everything playing nicely together. And so this is a super, super simple blend. The other thing about the Brighten is it's a booster. And so if you try to apply this directly to the skin, it is too concentrated, it is uncomfortable, it does not feel good. It wants to be in something else. And so we mix the booster into a serum, into an oil. You can put it in a mask. I never put it in a mask. I feel like it goes too fast. You don't leave it on the skin long enough, but you can.
It just needs something to support it to not be directly on the face. The serum, you can. Serum, of course, you can put directly on the skin. So, yeah, they are different.
Customer: So in terms of antioxidants, because I realized that that was a need for me, outside of like dietary antioxidants.
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: Yeah.
Customer: That be the case with the Brighten Booster?
Kate – Annmarie Skin Care In-House Esthetician: All of our serums have a high antioxidant composition. All of our oils do as well. One of the oils that has the most additional antioxidants is this one. What's this one? Rejuvenating Facial Oil. This particular one is kind of like, quite a bit above other, the other products as far as the antioxidant inclusion, this product, the whole product is kind of rogue.
We formulated it differently. The intention was to have a product that was as active as possible. That could still be used morning and evening. And part of that means that we included a lot of antioxidants. Superoxide dismutase is a really potent antioxidant. We've also got astaxanthin, which is another really post potent antioxidant.
So all of our serums do have some. They'll vary based on the serum. serum, but the oils, if you're really needing the extra antioxidant this is one, this is a pretty pricey product. Part of that is the formulation process. And part of that is the ingredient composition. And it's one that's richer than I think you would need most days, but what you might find is supportive is that you use it almost as a booster. And so you do this one, you know, maybe you do it morning and evening, maybe you just do it in the evening, but you use the herbal facial oil and include maybe half a pump. You know, up to a pump of this one as part of the kind of treatment or addressing the antioxidant need in the skin. I do say with this one, you know, this is great for you to use as facial oil as well. If your skin runs sensitive at all, sometimes the antioxidant composition can feel a little intense and you might exhibit, they're just like little white bumps. They feel kind of like a breakout, but what it really is is your skin kind of reacting to the amount of antioxidants in the skin. And it's usually where the skin is really thin, like the sides of the mouth, sides of the nose, sometimes upper sides of the nose, across the top of the lip. And that does fade usually within the first 10 days. If it's outside of the 10 days, or there's a lot of heat or discomfort with it, then it might be an actual reaction. I absolutely trust your body, but otherwise, if it's not too active, then your skin's just adjusting to it. So, I call that out, because you likely would be totally okay but it can kind of be a little bit of a process.
Okay, I'm gonna close it out. Thank you, three, for joining, and thanks for hanging on till the end. If you have any other questions, just shoot us an email, but otherwise, happy shopping! Thank you, everyone.
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