I've been intrigued by the Fresh lip balms for a while - they're widely raved about on the Blogosphere, and a small part of me just likes the novelty of a metal tube. So in late November, I bit the bullet and bought a sample pack of seven mini lipbalms from their website. Weirdly, I can no longer see this particular set on their website - admittedly, the Fresh website is ballache to navigate - but I think I paid around £44 for it, not including £6.95 postage. It's not exactly a student purchase, I'll give you that.

 The box did have a red ribbon on it, which I excitedly ripped off.
 The pretties!


 From left to right: Advanced Lip Therapy (clear) Nude, Rose, Tulip, Ruby, Fig, Advanced Lip Therapy (clear) with SPF.




Hand swatches:
 From left to right: Nude, Rose, Tulip, Ruby, Fig.

Lip swatches:
 Bare lips.
Advanced Lip Therapy.
 Nude. My lips are pretty pigmented, so this barely shows up - a hint of shimmer, but not much else.
 Rose gives a subtle fuschia colour to the lips - much less noticeable in real life.


 Tulip is a slightly deeper red, much more pigmented version of Rose on my lips, with a little more shimmer too.
Fig is a deeper sheer mauve-brown on my lips with shimmer that borders on microfine glitter. It's a little distracting for a tinted lip balm.

So what do we think about the Fresh Sugar Lip Treatments?

They're nice. All of them feel very light on the lips, and as someone who despises the heavy feel of say, Vaseline, a lip balm that feels weightless is a must. The range of colour pay off is good, too - I can reach for Nude for lazy days or Tulip if I want a bit more of a statement lip. The packaging is very luxurious and classy, too.

For what they are, they're also pretty expensive. Excluding postage, this gift set works out at nearly £7 a (mini) lip balm - although this is way better value than their full sized tubes, which retail at £19 a pop. Considering the fact that they're very soft and creamy and also mini sized, I've got through a couple of tubes entirely with about two weeks of regular use. That wouldn't make a dent in a standard size Nivea or EOS, for comparison.
While you can't compare budget with high end, I'd completely understand high end pricing if the product delivered high end performance. In terms of moisture, I'd actually rather stick with my Nivea Fruity Shine balms, which surprised me! The tinted Fresh Sugar Lip Treatments are actually not particularly moisturising. The clear versions give a lot more moisture than the tinted ones, but also wear off quickly. They're also very heat sensitive - after a day at work with SPF in my pocket, the little stub of it remaining had melted against the side of the tube, slanting it so it was pretty much unusable. :(

While I don't think I'll be repurchasing mine when they run out, I am interested in the similar product from L'Occitane - priced at £12 for 4g and reported to be super moisturising, those will probably be my next purchase come payday!

Black Friday 2015 left me with around 50p in my current account, no exaggeration. I'll explain.


In life, some people have willpower, and others really don't. I fall into the latter category. And in my university town, there is a huge shopping centre that my village raised-more-sheep-than-humans mentality struggles to comprehend at the best of times. In the newly opened KIKO store, they were offering a massive buy three get three free deal (basically everything half price but cleverly locking you into buying shitloads of product) and that was the beginning of the end for me and my bank account. Various online deals sealed the blow. 

Major culprits:

ASOS (damn you for stocking Illamasqua)
Jack Wills 
Superdrug
Lookfantastic
Cult Beauty
Microsoft (in all fairness, I've been saving for the Surface 3 all year)
Apple (complete impulse)
And Boots' 4 for £10 on Revlon Just Bitten Balm Stains finished me off. KIKO started it though. You shoulder most of the blame. Erm, and me and my lack of self control. 

Just to remind you guys of the damage:

 
 That's not even all of it. Let me know what you guys would want to see reviewed first.
 
 Superdrug:



Impulse Primark buys:
Reviews for all coming soon.

Please comfort me with your own Black Friday purchases in the comments?