2020 hasn’t been just bad enough – this year, two cosmetics brands decided to break my heart and discontinued two of my absolute staple products. It’s a catastrophe, people! I’ve been lucky: me and my Holy Grails have been a happy family for a while. I started to investigate: discontinued beauty products – why? And what can you do?
WHY??!?!?
Beauty brands, like all companies (keep that in mind!) want to earn money. They want YOUR money, and the more invested you are in the brand, the better.
Reasons brands will give you why they discontinue products will centre around three points: they want to innovate the product/the line-up, packaging is being updated or there’re problems with one or more ingredients.
I’m not saying that’s not true, because, in a way, it is. But here’re some marketing/business sites. See what they say about reasons for continuing a product:
Disontinuing products, for whatever reason, is GREAT for business (Morebusiness): companies can run sales (‘until stock lasts!’) and get buzz on social media (remember when Urban Decay held a frigging funeral for the Naked 1 palette?! – ELLE). They can sell stock on special deals sites, sell grab bags with low selling items, and so on and so forth (Growcode).
Discontinued beauty products
And we haven’t even covered reasons that may entice especially beauty brands to discontinue products:
Especially ‘cult’ items like the Naked 1 palette will see low growth after a time, simply because the market is saturated. You won’t, very likely, use it up and buy a new one. So, much more profitable to discontinue it and release ANOTHER one (Beautyandthebullshit)!
For some products, the profit margin may be too small after a while: ingredients may become more expensive, for example.
Trying to hang on to your HG makes companies very happy
Because: not only are you like to buy up existing stock, you’re also freeing them of inventory that sits on valuable and costly space in warehouses.
You’re also SUCH a willing guinea pig when a company will then re-release a product with either revamped packaging or newfangled formula. You will pay very likely whatever the cost. Peachy! (For the company, not your wallet.)
If a whole product line will be discontinued, and in its place a new one is launched: aren’t you very susceptible to buy that one as well? – Yes, thought so.
What I did and you shouldn’t
Recently, I both stockpiled and desperately bought a new version of my HG: I bought about five bottles of the ‘old’ Isdin Pediatrics sunscreen that had been recently re-formulated. Ostensibly, they reformulated it because customers demanded a new, unscented formula: on the way they also changed filters and used older (and, very likely, cheaper) ones. (How it should be done: Purito’s customer base likewise wanted an unscented version of the Centella Green Level sunscreen. They cut out the fragrance, didn’t change anything else and came through.)
I also tried to move heaven and earth and buy some bottles of cosrx’s Galactomyces Alcohol-free toner that has been discontinued. My own speculative guess is that Galactomyces isn’t that hot new ingredient any longer. Cosrx also now sell their new Propolis and Cica toners without a spray nozzle, thus lowering production costs. At the same time, both new toners are more expensive than the old one. I’m a sucker, so I bought both new ones to try them out. Don’t be like me.
What you CAN do
Sure, there’re whole subreddits devoted on how to acquire discontinued Holy Grails, and Temptalia’s dupe list exists for a reason. (Here’s a good list how you might get your hands on discon’ faves. – Reader’s Digest)
The thing I learned the hard way in 20 years of being a beauty lover, though: new products will come out. Hording old faves might be a totally pointless exercise: a new HG may unexpectedly come along. Also, we beauty lovers are people that LOVE to discover new products, right? That’s part of the fun!
Discovering new things might be more reasonable than obsessing over what you’ve lost, too. Especially holy grail products say a lot about how we perceive ourselves (Stylist) and may be especially hard to let go off because of that. (Imagine a signature lipstick, or a signature scent, or even that vegan, clean, green sunscreen that says something about your beliefs and lifestyle.)
But what I’m really wanting to say is: shop savvy. Be aware of marketing tactics. Be smart. And have fun exploring.
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