A Facebook fan of ours wanted to know more about how I develop Paula’s Choice products from concept to the final version, ready to be launched. They also wanted to know how my process is different from the way other companies create beauty products. I have to say, I love this question!

It is astonishing even to me how incredibly different my product development methodology is from other cosmetic companies’.

Creating new products and improving our current formulations is my passion and it has been my life’s work. Every product is my achievement or concept and I personally oversee the formula from every perspective. That alone is rare.

There are no owners or formulators for cosmetic companies who have spent the past 30 years writing 18 books on skin care and makeup. Most of the people developing skin-care products either don’t take the time or they don’t know how to evaluate a peer-review scientific study.

Many of the scientists who work for cosmetic companies are not penetrating past the claims of one product, or they don’t actually understand or are involved in an entire skin-care routine. You only have to look at the vast number of products in jar packaging, or that contain alcohol among other notorious irritants, or are antiquated formulations; for some reason this still shocks me.

My team and I always obsess over:

1. What the research says about the ingredients we want to use.
2. Analyze what the actual overall benefit to skin will be for a specific skin type or concern based on published research and then on our own clinical panel testing.
3. How it compares to other products (if I can’t make it far better and sell it at a more reasonable price than other cosmetic companies, we won’t make it).
4. Most importantly, it must work within a framework of superior skin care (gentle cleansers, toners loaded with “bio-active” ingredients, sunscreens enhanced with antioxidants, moisturizers and serums containing substances that repair skin and fend off environmental damage, effective exfoliants—not scrubs which tear at skin, etc).

What makes our process different is basically the following:

1. I have a unique concept of skin care based on published research about different skin-care concerns ranging from acne to rosacea, wrinkles, sensitive skin, oily skin, and dry skin, etc. Most cosmetic companies don’t approach skin care in a cohesive, systematic fashion; they follow trends or an exotic ingredient they can build a story around.
2. We never jump on bandwagons. Just because apple tree stem cells or ingredients claiming to work like Botox are being thrown into moisturizers, I would never include it simply because it would make for good ad copy or a fashion magazine editor would think it was new and different. The research must be there to support adding it to a formula.
3.  My fundamental philosophy is to never harm skin: Irritation and inflammation is bad for skin. There is no contradictory evidence on this one. Other companies throw in known irritants ALL the time because it sounds natural or they just don’t know what they are doing.
4. In the world of cosmetics most product development people are in the marketing department (that never fails to kill me). They decide they will be able to build a story around some new ingredient and then give that information to the chemists and a new product is born. That process has nothing to do with skin care.
5. Because my team and I have reviewed thousands of products and have spent every day poring over published research about skin, we know up close and personal what hundreds of other brands are creating and understand their formulations. We have a bird’s eye view of the industry and we can avoid formulary mistakes and can discern formulary excellence from every angle.

I’ll never forget the time when my product development manager, Kate Mee, and I met with a prominent cosmetic lab down in California (they did work for many of the major cosmetic companies). We sat around the table with three of their cosmetic chemists, two of the owners of the lab, and two of their main sales representatives. When we began discussing the formulas they had been working on for us, they were taken aback at the research we had done and the meticulous detail we went through to evaluate the ingredients.

I said, “Doesn’t every cosmetic company you work with do this?”
They said, “None of them do this.”
I said, “Then what do they do?”

Their response was that they “talk marketing ideas and what star ingredient they want the product to contain, or how the product should smell, or what natural ingredients we can put in it, but never research and definitely not an analysis of every ingredient.”

I said, “But if the product is for acne and they don’t have acne, or if the product is for dry skin and they don’t have dry skin, why would they try it?”

Their response: “They don’t really care about the ingredient deck. The people we meet with are from the marketing team; they don’t know anything about the science of skin, skin problems, or cosmetic chemistry. They care about appearance and how they can sell the product.”

Geesh! That was one of the most eye opening experiences of my career. I have written extensively about what can and can’t benefit skin. As new research comes to light we change or improve what we do. As new requests come in from our readers or customers we examine how we can meet those needs—often we can, but often we can’t. What we will never do is pretend a product can do more than what is possible. All of this adds up to skin care you can trust, whether it is from my product line or from other cosmetic companies’ products we recommend on Beautypedia.com.

My Cosmetics Cop Team’s most recent Online Radio Show was all about makeup tips to help you look young, healthy, and vibrant. Doing the weekly radio show has been a kick and we’re thrilled to have so many listeners and callers! Because this particular show was so popular and we didn’t have enough time to go over every tip and product recommendation, we decided to publish the information on our blog. We hope you find this information helpful—and that you’ll tune in to the radio show because we have some wonderful topics coming up, each designed to keep you beautifully informed!

Makeup Don’ts

• Don’t neglect skin care or try to cover up skin problems with makeup instead of treating them! No matter how good any individual makeup product is, it will only look as good as the skin it’s applied to. Skin must be smooth and free of dry, flaky patches or yucky, clogged pores. Using makeup to conceal what you don’t like about your skin is the wrong approach.

• Don’t forget to check your eyebrows: Overly drawn on, penciled in like a waxy line, or overly sparse brows are not what you want to see. These mistakes can make someone who is 25 years old look much older.

• When you tweeze or wax your brows there is a fine line between natural and softly shaped, and a fake, overly arched look. If you’re not sure how to groom your eyebrows, make an appointment at a salon that specializes in brow shaping and enhancing (but have them provide an outline of what they want to do; you don’t want to have your brows stripped away).

There are some interesting brow makeup products to consider. Some of the Cosmetics Cop Team’s favorites include:

o Billion Dollar Brows Brow Powder
o Origins Fill in the Blanks Eyebrow Enhancer (this is a brow pencil)
o Maybelline New York Define-a-Brow Eyebrow Pencil
o Sephora Arch-It Brow Kit (comes with great instructions and tools for shaping your brows at home)

• Don’t forget to check your makeup in a magnifying mirror: What you can’t see, you can’t fix, especially makeup settling into lines around the eye and folds along the mouth. A little powder applied directly over the line, blending upwards and out, can keep everything in place, but you have to see it up close to get it done right. Have your sponge and/or brushes ready so you can quickly blend or diffuse any mistakes. Magnifying makeup mirrors can be purchased in most drugstores, Bed Bath & Beyond, and beauty supply stores such as Sally Beauty.

• Avoid overly greasy moisturizers around the eyes, as they are a slip-up waiting to happen. It will encourage concealers and foundations to travel right into the very lines you want to hide. If you feel you need an extra-emollient moisturizer around your eyes, do it at night after you’ve removed your makeup, and use lighter-weight products during the day.

• Don’t forget to downplay shiny makeup during daylight hours: Extra shine or glitter is fine at night, but during the day no matter what your age it just looks overdone, kind of like wearing a sequined gown to the office. Exception: there are many “radiance-boosting” makeup products that forgo obvious, distracting shine in favor of creating a subtle luminosity. Examples of our favorites in this category include:

o Clinique Fresh Bloom Allover Colour (great for the cheek area)
o Lancome Color Ideal Illuminateur Sheer Highlighting Pressed Powder (great for all over use)
o Lorac Oil-Free Luminizer (ideal mixed with your foundation for a subtle glow)
o Jane Shimmering Bronzer (brilliant as bronzer and the “strips” of color also work as eyeshadow)

• Don’t forget to be careful with gloss: Too much gloss can look like you’re drooling, instead of a luminescent glow of color over your lips. Also be very careful with glossy, slick, or creamy lipsticks; if you have lines around your mouth, these will bleed quickly and won’t last past mid-morning before a touch-up is needed.

Again, check in a good magnifying mirror during the day, because for some women, it takes a bit of time for lipsticks or glosses to feather into lines around the mouth. You can also stick with softer colors from some of the best lipsticks we’ve found for comfortable, long wear—and they don’t feather into lines around the mouth! Our favorites:

o Estee Lauder Double Wear Stay-in-Place Lipstick
o M.A.C. Lipsticks (Matte or Satin—the color range is huge)
o Rimmel Lasting Finish Intense Wear Lipstick
o Revlon Matte or Super Lustrous Lipsticks (the latter offering a staggering range of 70+ shades)

Makeup Dos

• Pay attention to your smile! Whiter teeth make you look healthy and vibrant. Even if your skin isn’t glowing, if your teeth do, it adds incredible brightness and beauty to your face. Since Paula’s Choice launched our Brighten Up 2-Minute Teeth Whitener we have all become fastidious about our smiles! And our customers agree: This product has become the best-selling item Paula’s Choice has ever launched!

• Dark lipstick is, well, dark. By definition when something is dark it isn’t bright and glowing. Soft color is a sexy, glowing look any time of day. Red can work too, and it makes a dramatic statement, just keep it on the brighter side as opposed to a deep magenta shade (and definitely not purple or anything in the brown family). Some of our favorite red lipsticks include:

o NARS Lipstick in Fire Down Below, or Jungle Red
o Laura Mercier Lip Crème in Truly Red
o Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick in Cherries in the Snow, or Fire & Ice
o Estee Lauder Double Wear in Stay Scarlet

• Think soft color with blushes and eyeshadows, but nothing too pastel-ish. Do a split-face makeup application on yourself to test different looks and see which one gives you the soft celebrity or cover girl look you want to achieve.

• Make sure the intensity of your blush complements your skin tone. If you have fair to light skin, pale pink, rose, or peach shades are always going to be more flattering than deep berry or plum shades, which can make the cheek area look bruised. In contrast, women with medium to tan skin tones can look gorgeous with berry or plum-hued blush. The Cosmetics Cop Team has some favorite powder blushes, and they are:

o American Beauty Blush Perfect Cheek Color (this line is sold at Kohl’s)
o Jane Blushing Cheeks Blush
o L’Oreal True Match Blush

• Color balance is important. In other words, if you are wearing a pinkish lipstick or gloss tone your blush should be in a similar color family. It’s sort of like if you are wearing a pink skirt and orange top: under most circumstances, these strong colors can clash. It can sometimes work, but be careful. High contrast makeup can look glaring, and if you’re thinking young, vibrant and healthy, stick with related tones.

• Soft glowing (not shiny or glittery) foundations, blushes, and powders used carefully can add a beautiful dimension to skin, but you have to be careful. Shine all over can be distracting, but placed in the center of the face (not the nose) and along the blush area and chin can eradicate dull skin. Of course great skin care is more important, but getting some help from your makeup is the best of both worlds.

• Ignore the recommendations to use cream blush. The reason you don’t see cream blush very often at the counters is because it is hard to use. When you blend it on, you’re generally wiping off the foundation and powder you just applied. It also tends to slip and fade more during the day and it is harder to control. Given how soft and beautiful blushes are these days you can achieve a sheer, creamy look without a cream blush and get better, faster results. If you must have a creamy-type blush, stick with cream-to-powder formulas such as:

o Revlon Cream Blush
o Clinique Blushwear Cream Stick
o Studio Gear Naturalism Cream-to-Powder Blush (sold at Ulta)

• Do use blush! Forgoing blush is a mistake. It would be like not wearing a blouse with your skirt, you’d be naked on top. Same thing with blush, don’t leave your cheeks naked.

• Eyeliner applied close to the lashes with a soft brown or charcoal brown shade can look beautiful by enhancing the lashes and framing the eye. If the outer corners of your eyes have begun to droop, make sure the eyeliner turns up ever-so-slightly so you don’t emphasize the drooping. For the lower lash line, use a softer color than you did for your upper lash line. For example, if your upper lash line is lined with black, use a dark gray or even a soft taupe for the lower lash line. Black all around the eye can look too harsh and take away from the soft, even-handed look you’re going for. Powder eyeshadows work great as eyeliner, and those from M.A.C., Shu Uemura, Sephora’s own brand, and Trish McEvoy offer wonderful options.

• Test makeup primers. Some formulations smooth out skin and help create a glowing, but not shiny, look to your makeup. You want a primer that enhances your skin tone while also giving your skin the ingredients it needs to look and feel healthy. Some of our favorites include:

o Giorgio Armani Light Master Primer
o Jan Marini Age Intervention Prime Face Primer
o M.A.C. Prep + Prime Line Filler
o Victoria’s Secret Airbrush FX Face Primer SPF 20

You can also apply any well-formulated serum in lieu of primer. With a well-formulated serum you can be sure you’re getting the benefit a primer provides, plus critical antiaging ingredients skin needs to repair itself and resist wrinkles. Paula’s Choice offers three Antioxidant Concentrates that are brilliant options for use as a “foundation primer with benefits.”

• Blend, blend, and blend again. Don’t use emollient/greasy concealers on blemishes. Do use a lightweight, flesh-tone (that means no yellow, orange, or lavender tones) concealer that is a shade or two lighter than your foundation.

Now that you know what to do and what to avoid, we hope your makeup application and the look you’re going for will be easier than ever to achieve! Here’s to beautiful days ahead—and using makeup to enhance your best features rather than covering them up! For complete reviews of the products mentioned above, visit Beautypedia.com.

On April 22, I blogged asking for your help with finding better names for the two “toners” I created as a part of my CLEAR anti-acne system. I can’t thank you enough for all of the insightful and truly valuable feedback you provided. I wish there was a better way to express how truly grateful I am, but hopefully the great results you get from using my products speak for themselves!

From the moment I started to see your comments, my team and I began meeting to incorporate your feedback and suggestions to find the best way to explain our CLEAR products. The goal was to help those people visiting my Web site to find the best combination of CLEAR acne-fighting products for their skin type. Based on all of your feedback, here is what we came up with:

• Step 1 – the cleanser in both routines will keep the same name: Normalizing Cleanser Pore Clarifying Gel
• Step 2 – the “toners” will no longer be called toners. Essentially, these products are exfoliants and can (and often should be) used with either Paula’s Choice Moisture Boost or Skin Balancing toners.

The new name for each will be:

Regular Strength
Targeted Acne Relief
Exfoliating Solution
with Salicylic Acid

Extra Strength
Targeted Acne Relief
Exfoliating Solution
with Salicylic Acid

• Step 3 – the benzoyl peroxide products will be called:

Regular Strength
Acne Fighting Treatment
with 2.5% Benzoyl Peroxide

Extra Strength
Acne Fighting Treatment
with 5% Benzoyl Peroxide

We are starting to change the names on PaulasChoice.com, and in the months ahead, the new names you helped us create will be reflected on the packaging and in our catalog as well.

I have always said it takes a village to handle life, but it also takes a village to run a company! I want to thank all of you for being a part in our village. As always, your comments have a real impact on the decision process here at Paula’s Choice!

My team and I sincerely welcome your continued feedback about any and all Paula’s Choice products. After all, we create them to help YOU have the skin you’ve always wanted!

If you are anything like me, when you envision the CEO of a cosmetics company you may picture an authoritative figure wearing a designer outfit with an executive assistant sitting right outside their door, waiting to answer every beckoning call. Ok, The Devil Wears Prada may have influenced this vision a bit, but the fact remains that we often perceive these high power individuals to be intimidating, untouchable, and far removed from everyday people or everyday life just in general.

While that may be true for some corporations, let me set the record straight here at Paula’s Choice. I would know; I’m Paula’s assistant! First of all, I have to start out by mentioning that in the 30 years Paula has been flying around the world educating women about skin care, and running Paula’s Choice, this is the first time she has had an assistant. I’m flabbergasted at how she managed to juggle it all on her own (though to the credit of the office, she has had great support). Nonetheless, let’s get down to the details you really want to know…

Is Paula a diva? Well, she does like her Perrier mineral water and flying first class (but she flies me first class, too, so that part of her being a diva is fine with me), yet in reality Paula is about as down-to-earth as they come. Some days she comes into the office dressed to the nines, but other days she’s completely comfortable sporting a casual ensemble. She’ll be the first one to greet everybody as she enters the building, compliment you on a new hair cut, or stop to play with the dogs in the office. It’s easy to tell when Paula is here because you can usually hear a roar of laughter before she has even made it up to her office on the second floor. (Speaking of laughter, she has been known to interrupt a meeting to play a funny video she just saw on YouTube, but you didn’t hear that from me.)

Another surprising fact is how hands-on Paula is. You might typically think of a CEO as someone who has “people” for everything, but as busy as Paula may be, she will actually read letters from customers and take the time to respond. She holds weekly meetings with our Customer Service department to keep them up-to-date with the latest information, as well as get feedback on what our customers have to say. Even when she is traveling across the globe to different time zones, Paula will wake up at 3am to do her online radio show. Every product development idea, Beautypedia.com review, or Paula’s Choice promotion goes through Paula.

Last, but certainly not least, what sets Paula apart as a CEO and as The Cosmetics Cop is her capacity to relate to people. Fans catch a glimpse of this on her weekly radio show where Paula tells all from her struggles with puberty and acne as a teen, to her experiences with menopause and plastic surgery. Paula has sincere empathy for the skin-care issues that her customers, fans, friends, and employees face and she is always there to lend advice and sometimes even some free products. Moreover, what other CEO would recommend products outside of their own? Only someone who is dedicated to helping you find the best products for your skin. Now that’s a far cry from what most of us would picture of any CEO from any other company in the world.

I have always supported companies that are about more than just the products they sell. Spending your money on any brand’s product is an indirect endorsement of the company’s culture, perspective, and how they see their social responsibility.

In my short period of working here at Paula’s Choice I’ve already learned that Paula and her team deeply respect women. Our responsibility is to treat our customers with respect, give them honest, straightforward information, and help them take the best care of their skin possible without wasting money. We never oversell to anyone and we never build up false promises! Never!

The Paula’s Choice and Cosmetics Cop Team all believe women and men everywhere deserve to feel the best about themselves inside and out, and it is our job to help in that process.

Paula’s Choice is also dedicated to supporting social causes and always has been. Paula passionately believes it is her responsibility to give back to the community. Paula’s Choice supports a wide range of community causes with both time and money: The American Cancer Society, ASPCA, Habitat for Humanity, and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation are but a few we support.

I am also proud to say that the entire Paula’s Choice team is committed to helping the environment as best we can. Some of the things we do is have minimalist packaging (no wasted outer cartons), all our packing materials are recyclable, our plastic containers (and caps) are recyclable, and our catalogs and step-by-step guides are printed with soy-based ink. Paula’s Choice will never test on animals, nor will the company fund an outside source on their behalf. Paula’s Choice also supports local volunteerism and donates products to countless organizations.

For me, being part of the Paula’s Choice team means I am actively involved in making the world a better place, and selling products I know women and men can trust to take the best care of their skin! That makes coming to work every day pretty darn good!

First things first: I love my mom. She’s an incredibly sweet, caring woman and it is because of her nurturing I was able to develop an inquisitive, determined nature (as a kid, I was the human version of Curious George and no end of exasperation for my mother).

Like women all over the world, my mom checks with me in my role as the director of The Cosmetics Cop Team about some of her beauty concerns. Lately, it’s been about hair-care products. At age 63, like many women Mom is experiencing thinner, more fragile hair. Mom states that her hair is thinner, drier, and harder to manage than ever. She’s always on the lookout for new styling products, and often asks me about the Redken items her salon uses (I advise her to save her money and she typically doesn’t fall for the sales pitch).

Not too long ago, she became overly interested and excited about Kerastase, the ultra-expensive salon brand owned by L’Oreal. It didn’t help that her sister (who definitely has money to burn) raves about the products. My mom took her recommendations seriously because they have similar hair types. Eventually, she wrote to me asking for less expensive alternatives (I had a feeling the high cost of Kerastase would get to her). Her Kerastase phase seems to be over, and she’s been happy with some of the comparable products I recommended from another L’Oreal-owned company, Garnier Fructis.

Here’s where things went awry: Mom’s looking for a lightweight styling product to tame her hair and add shine but not weight. I recommended the Aveeno Nourish + Style Volumizing Foam. It’s a good, inexpensive liquid mousse that should work really well for her, as she heat-styles her hair. She thanked me and then proceeded to check out this product online. Several minutes later, another email from Mom landed in my Inbox:

“Honey, one person who reviewed this product said it left a residue. Now I’m not so sure about it.” I wrote back and asked why she zeroed in on the one negative comment (which we didn’t find to be true in our review for this product) and seemed to ignore the 20+ positive (I mean really positive) reviews also posted there. She didn’t have an answer but that one negative comment stood out like a sore thumb and her trepidation soared despite what I had told her. She was worried it would feel heavy on her hair, too.

I responded as follows: “Mom, I understand your concern, but you don’t know anything about that woman and why she wrote what she did. For example, what if this reviewer doesn’t wash her hair that often? What if she uses a hairspray that leaves a residue, or double processes her hair? What other products does she use? What is her definition of residue? What kind of hair does she have? Without more information there is no way to know why she liked or disliked a product.”

Of course, the sobering truth is Mom just didn’t believe me—at least not 100%. She’d rather believe an anonymous woman online than her own son, despite the fact I’ve been studying and writing about cosmetic products (including hair care) for over 10 years. I mentioned this exchange to Paula, and she could relate. She remarked that it was years before she could get her mother to stop shopping for skin care at Neiman Marcus in tandem with her friends who only wanted to believe expensive meant better (Paula’s mom didn’t break this habit until Paula created her own line PaulasChoice.com).

Sigh. It isn’t easy being a Cosmetic Cop. There are so many hurdles to overcome like obnoxious advertising and thousands of opinions from people without the research or expertise to evaluate or really understand what they are using. Personal experience means something, but given the wide, often fickle range of preferences and expectations, it’s not the most reliable way to assess a product’s value or efficacy.

But my own mother! That is just disheartening. I love you Mom (and, to be fair, I’m not the perfect son and, like everyone else, have my weaknesses) but sometimes I just want to pick up the phone after these email exchanges and yell saying, “Mom, just buy what I tell you, I am 1000% right. I have the science, research, and the largest comparison database of cosmetic products in the world I use to base my recommendations on!” Of course, if I did that she’d likely acquiesce and promise to listen better next time. But I know it’s only a matter of time before she sends me another question about a product a friend, co-worker, or her hairstylist mentions, and we’ll go around and around again.

After a flurry of meetings in the office the other day, I sat quietly at my desk for just a moment before the phone rang. I picked up the receiver and said, “Thank you for calling Paula’s Choice, this is Deborah, how can I help you?”

While this greeting is considered standard in the world of customer service, something at that very moment struck me and I realized just how different Paula’s Choice is when it comes to our level and dedication to customer service. In fact, we are by most measures fanatic about it. Our company culture truly believes in service at the highest possible level. Each and every department in our organization wants the best for the Paula’s Choice consumer and while we want to generate orders, we think it is far more important to be sure you get the right products (not just sell you more and more products or, even worse, the wrong products), along with services that make you feel comfortable and safe and better help you navigate the complicated world of skin care and makeup.

Upon reflection, I am proud to tell you that many of our meetings are about what we can do for YOU. From specials and upcoming articles to packaging, customer service troubleshooting, generous return policies (better than almost any other company we’ve heard of), easy refunds or credits when you have any problem, and even free rush shipping when we make a mistake. You are always the focus. Although I personally hear from many of you that we are meeting or beating expectations, I thought, why not open this up to further discussion? What I want to know is: Are we meeting the mark we strive for daily? Are we truly stepping up to serve you at the highest level possible?

We do a lot of talking to answer your questions, but we also do a lot of listening and I am curious to hear what you have to say. So now it’s your turn. What’s on your mind about how we can do more for you here at Paula’s Choice?

I recently received an email from a woman who read my article on facial exercises and passed it on to Carole Maggio. Ms. Maggio runs the Web site www.facercise.com which is devoted to, you guessed it, facial exercises. According to the Web site, Maggio is considered “the world’s foremost authority on facial exercises.” I’m not going to argue with that attribute, but from my point of view that’s sort of like being the foremost authority on how to use a rotary dial phone.

Obviously, Ms. Maggio didn’t like what I wrote about facial exercises, which is that they do not work to reduce wrinkles or improve sagging skin in any way, shape, or form. For any signs of aging, including sagging skin, facial exercises can do more harm than good.

Maggio’s criticism was not only of my information but on my expertise. She states in her newsletter that my “only real tie to the skin-care industry is as a former makeup artist” and that I am not a doctor. It is true I am not a doctor, but I have given presentations at international dermatology conferences; I belong to the Society of Cosmetic Chemists; I have been actively involved in the cosmetic industry for 30 years; and, I have written over 18 best-selling books on skin care and makeup. Oops, I almost forgot, I also formulate all of my Paula’s Choice products. Yes, I am also a former makeup artist but clearly my credentials go far beyond that.

Maggio also wrote that Doctors Nicholas Perricone and Mehmet C. Oz have recommended facial exercises as a means to look younger. I am not surprised Perricone gave a nod to this silly practice, as history has shown he’ll say just about anything to get the attention of those concerned with aging (regardless of whether there’s solid research to support his advice). After all, Perricone sells over a dozen products priced over $100 claiming to get rid of wrinkles, yet like most dermatologists, he has done Botox injections for his patients.

But Maggio is wrong about Dr. Oz. In the book he co-wrote with Dr. Michael F. Roizen, You Being Beautiful, they state the following: “Exercising the facial muscles is a sure way to increase wrinkles. The facial muscles pull on the skin to give you facial expressions. And the repetitive movements of the skin, over the years, combined with the normal thinning of the collagen and elastin of the dermis, will eventually crack the skin, causing wrinkles. Botox is the reverse of exercise; it paralyzes muscles and lessens wrinkles.”

However, despite what Oz wrote in the book, he mentioned on his show a Japanese study that may give credence to the idea that facial exercises work. However, this study was not about facial exercises but about measuring skin elasticity at different ages (Source: Journal of Dermatological Science, September 2007, pages 233–239). Of course Maggio left out the discrepancy between Oz’s comment on his show, the actual study, and what was written in his book.

Speaking of Botox, Maggio was very upset that I’d recommend this procedure over facial exercises. According to her, facial exercises are natural, which they are, but they don’t work, so it doesn’t matter if they are natural. Actually, Botox is natural as well: it comes from a naturally occurring neurotoxin that’s purified and made safe for use in people. You may not know that there are over 4,000 studies showing Botox’s benefit for everything from wrinkles to cerebral palsy, while no such studies exist for facial exercises.

Maggio seemingly couldn’t find any of those 4,000+ studies as she asks in her newsletter, “Where are the studies proving Botox is effective and safe for long-term use?” She should have checked the United States National Library of Medicine National Institutes’ of Health’s web site at www.pubmed.com; they are all there.

Suffice to say, I strongly stand by my article and research about facial exercises. According to abundant research, facial exercises provide no benefit because lack of muscle tone is not the cause of wrinkles or sagging. In fact, muscle tone is barely involved in these at all. The skin’s sagging and drooping are caused by 10 major factors:

1. Deteriorated collagen and elastin (due primarily to sun damage and inflammation)
2. Depletion and movement of the skin’s fat layer
3. Repetitive facial movement (particularly true for the forehead frown lines and for smile lines from the nose to the mouth)—muscle movement causes wrinkles
4. Muscle sagging due to the loosening of facial ligaments that hold the muscles in place, not because muscles aren’t toned
5. Hormone loss
6. Bone loss
7. Gravity
8. Genetics
9. Skin cells stop reproducing as we age
10. SUN DAMAGE!

You can exercise your face if you want, but I would strongly suggest taking the time to exercise your body and applying sunscreen during the day—it will serve you far better than making funny faces in the mirror, manipulating your facial skin toward more wrinkles.

Our Product Development Manager, Kate, recently gave me a lab sample of a new product she and Paula are working on for the RESIST line. It’s a serum with retinol, an ingredient which typically makes me run scared. It’s not that I’m unaware of what a great ingredient retinol is for skin (if you’re only going to use one antiaging ingredient beyond a good sunscreen, retinol or retinoids should be it), but my skin and retinol don’t have the best relationship. In fact, retinol is sort of like the out-of-town relative you love to have visit, but for no more than a couple of days. Beyond that, things start unraveling. The shine wears off, and you’re reminded of why you don’t suggest said relative stay for a whole week.

Kate can get very enthusiastic about the Paula’s Choice products in development, and she was practically giddy over this serum. Her enthusiasm was contagious, as I willingly agreed to try it, past history with retinol be damned. Imagine my surprise when I actually liked the product. I really liked it because after using it for just one night, my skin looked better. It was smoother, brighter, and, if I’m not mistaken, a bit firmer too (or at least it felt firmer). Being aware of the placebo effect, I kept using the product and monitoring the results. That’s when things got interesting…

By the fourth night in a row of using this concentrated retinol serum (it has an amazing texture and is really easy to apply) I was sure the results weren’t just placebo. How? Because in addition to my skin, including minor wrinkles, looking better, it was also looking worse—a side effect I’ve experienced with other retinol products, but this was different…it was a better kind of worse.

Allow me to explain: Lots of people cannot tolerate efficacious levels of retinol (at least not daily) because they get a strong kickback as it works. Redness, peeling, or skin feeling sunburned are not uncommon side effects. I’ve experienced all of these in the past, which led me to develop what I thought was a case of “retinol-itis.” The cure? Avoid anything with retinol, period. But I’m glad I wasn’t so resolute about that because I discovered the side effects from this retinol serum were brief and fleeting. I adjusted usage to once every two days, then two days off, and my skin acclimated beautifully! The initial peeling and minor sensation of sunburn (there was no visible effect) went away—and my skin keeps improving! Not only are my fine lines becoming much less apparent (though, full disclosure here, they weren’t all that obvious to begin with), but my skin tone is much better and minor freckles are fading. It appears I can finally use retinol as an ally in my fight against signs of aging!

All of this is to let you know I am over my retinol-itis thanks to this potential new serum from Paula’s Choice! I’ll make sure Paula gives this retinol serum strong consideration for approval. It’s a marvelous formula that I know our RESIST customers will love.

There are many things I love about owning a cosmetic company. I love that I can provide the real information consumers need to make intelligent, rational decisions about their skin care. Presenting the facts doesn’t always make me money; obviously, it would be easier to promise women miracle ingredients that replace cosmetic surgery rather than tell the truth about exactly what my products can and can’t do. Mostly I love formulating new products—that’s the best! Taking research about new ingredients and new understanding of how skin works and then putting that knowledge together in a new formula is thrilling. It is challenging, stimulating, endlessly creative and always rewarding, especially when my customers love the results.

What is often difficult is helping customers understand how to put a skin-care routine together or how one formula differs from another. For example, often one formula is different from another only because the base formula’s chemistry affects the rate of efficacy or a different base is needed to support the product’s claims. How do you explain such technicalities to thousands of people?

Here is where I need your help: The two toners I created for my CLEAR anti-acne line are confusing customers. One is Regular Strength and the other Extra Strength, BUT they both contain 2% salicylic acid. Therein lies the problem! The difference between the two is the base ingredients which don’t seem significant—but they are. Both formulas are liquids but one allows the salicylic acid to penetrate better (that’s the Extra Strength), and the other allows the 2% salicylic acid to be effective but less penetrating so it is essentially a more gentle formula. See what I mean? It’s not so easy to explain when the amount of active ingredient is the same for both products. Based on customer feedback, the names and descriptions we have aren’t helping.

So we are considering renaming both CLEAR toners. Here’s what my team and I have come up with:

The Regular Strength could be named: Soothing Acne Relief Toner with Salicylic Acid
The Extra Strength could be named: Extra Strength Deep Targeted Acne Relief Toner with Salicylic Acid

On the back of the container the percentage of salicylic acid would still be there with the appropriate description.

The Soothing Acne Relief Toner would state:

This toner contains 2% salicylic acid in a gentle formula that allows for effective exfoliation on skin’s surface and inside the pore lining. It is best for sensitive skin or for those with mild acne.

The Extra Strength Deep Targeted Acne Relief Toner would state:

This toner contains 2% salicylic in a penetrating formula that allows for maximum exfoliation on the surface of skin and in the pore, making it more effective for those with moderate or stubborn acne.

So tell me what you think. If this was your cosmetic line, with anti-acne products you knew were some of the most effective available, but there were formula nuances the consumer needed to understand to determine which one to use, what would you change on the label (keeping in mind there isn’t much room)? I would sincerely appreciate your input!