For us women of color, we don’t just buy makeup products based on how good the commercials are but its suitability to our skin texture and skin tone. One of my frustrations with mainstream makeup brands is that they do not understand the black skin which is why many-a-times, they offer limited shades for dark skin while their product textures or formulation simply do not work on our skin. 

Black women turned to ethnic or makeup products for women of color because they best understood our skin. Fashion Fair was my first introduction to makeup and then I have used Black Opal, Iman and Flori Roberts. My favorite still remains Flori Roberts because of its formulation which makes one look effortlessly youthful. Ethnic or makeup for women of color fill our pores better for better coverage. Some mainstream brands, even the designer brands fail to understand that black skin has more density as such, it takes a lot of series of applications for the foundations or powders to fill our skin which is quite frustrating.

Over the years, I had also fallen for Mary Kay makeup products because of its ‘no-makeup’ finish that gives one the natural feel and look without feeling heavy on the skin. Mary Kay still remains my go-to makeup brand for the everyday look.

Recently though, I decided to go beyond my all time favorites listed above to try out two drug store brands – Cover Girl and Maybelline. Sincerely, if I hadn’t seen the Queen herself – Queen Latifah on Cover Girl, I probably would had never used the products because seeing the Queen gave me the assurance that Cover Girl had put my black skin into consideration. Queen Latifah gave me the confidence to go to a drug store and buy Cover Girl makeup products. I was glad to find that I wasn’t disappointed at all.

The second drug store makeup brand I almost cannot do without is Maybelline, thank God for its Dream Matte mousse. In all honesty, had Maybelline not developed this soufflé, next to flawless, light weight, buildable coverage dream matte mousse foundation, I would never had bothered to use Maybelline products. My only initial challenge was finding the perfect shade for my complexion but ever since I bought the caramel shade, I have been so happy 😊

I guess for women of color, sometimes we need to step outside our comfort zone to find what works. And thank goodness that the makeup industry is changing to be more inclusive as one tend to find brands with much more diverse shades than ever before. 

So, go give a drug store brand a try! 

Tell me, is there any drug store makeup you love?