ELF: Same sh*t, new packaging

I don't think I've ever fallen out of love with a brand as hard as I have with ELF. Yet another sleepless night where I find myself perusing their new items and online swatches and I just can't care anymore. They've released their Beautifully Bare and Aqua Beauty lines that have been out for over a year now, and now there's the new Beautifully Precise line that is comprised of tools. I've whined some time back about my theory that they are rebranding to increase prices and phase out their Essentials line, or at the very least whittle it down to the bare bones, thus eliminating the one thing that appealed to me as a company: the super affordability. I used to have no problem spending $1-3 on something that might be incredible or could be total shit. I mean, I would be disappointed if a formula or shade was awful on me but at that cost it wouldn't kill me to pass it on to someone who could actually use it. If their products are (now) no cheaper than your basic drugstore line and my experience with their products is so splotchily hit or miss in the past, I have zero desire to branch out and drop money to try their new products. I can be perfectly content with their items I've fallen in love with in the past. At least the packaging is sleek and pretty?


So today it just hit the point of frustrating. Halloween is quickly approaching so I decided to browse the makeup sets for costumes. Anybody who has followed the company knows they've been doing these sets for years but come on now... Let's use the 60's mod and Basic cat (insert *pumpkin spice latte here) sets for example. Pretending these are sets to have the perfect costume makeup is insulting. Let's just call it what it is: you threw together 3 or 4 random loose essentials items, slapped them together in a box, scribbled 4 whiskers on your face on top of glam makeup and called it a day. Same shit with the holiday sets, but at least they tossed in some extra packaging to take down one of those bastard trees with each purchase. Still though, see complaint issued above.

I do have a product that I love though, and it's the best (the only good, really) "big ticket" ELF purchase I've made online, swatch unseen-it was a new product at the time. I would definitely repurchase the prism eyeshadow palette, images in poor lighting below. Everything else I've purchased over $3, save for the translucent HD powder which I rarely use, has been a bust. This including this colossal waste of money. I've only used a few lip pans, a blush or two and maybe a powdered highlight. The shadows are too powdery with little pigment and most of the shades for any product didn't work for me. The only other things I could swear by are the Hypershine glosses in any color but I was pretty particular to bare and vixen, studio eyeshadow in raspberry (I think), This guy that doesn't exist anymore and the studio blush which now I regret tossing those after the manufacturer expiration date (a thing I now call bullshit on btw).

I took these pics some months ago. My darling husband wanted to clear the table. He does not believe in two trips and I swear, the second, equally shitty quality picture, was taken not 10 minutes after the first.

*Addendum: I could kill for a latte right now. Or Long Island iced tea with a splash of lemonade. Equivalent, says I.