How 4 Makeup Factories Create Products From Lipstick To Eyeshadow | Insider Beauty

Here's how four makeup factories create their products. Colourpop Cosmetics makes its products in Los Angeles. To make its fan favorite lippy sticks, in-house chemists mix the base formula with powder pigments. That goes through a mixer three times to make sure everything is evenly combined. Then the mixture is poured into a mold, the extra lipstick is scraped off, and the entire container is chilled. It's unmolded and transferred into tubes. The brand's creme gel liner pencils are made with a similar process. First, the pigments are weighed and mixed. A liquid blend of ingredients is added to the powder to make the liners smudge and transfer resistant. It's mixed a few times so that it's all well Filler is added to make sure the eyeliner can spread easily when applied, and wax is added to help keep the eyeliner in place. The mixture is placed in the eyeliner mold, carefully pushed through, then wrapped in a plastic wrap to prevent contamination. The final eyeliner is then packaged by hand and shipped. Benefit Cosmetics' Precisely My Brow Pencil is one of the brand's best-selling products. White, black, yellow, and red pigments are combined with ingredients like steric acid that help thicken the mixture. A variety of waxes and oils are added, which help bind all the ingredients together. The mixture is poured into a rolling machine, which turns it into a pencil shaving consistency. Those shavings are compressed together to create the core of the pencil. A machine cuts it into tiny, precise pieces, then it goes through a shade and durability test. The shade test makes sure every color is what it's supposed to be, while the durability test makes sure the product can endure 25 times its weight before breaking. The products that pass the test are individually filled by hand and x-rayed before making their way to stores and your brows. Rimmel London's Stay Matte Liquid Lip Color products are made to be super pigmented and long-lasting. Cosmetic scientists test the matte formula to make sure it's touch-proof, kiss-proof, and waterproof. Each color is tested for smoothness. Then it's mixed with the base matte formula. The mixture goes inside a viscometer to test the thickness. And finally, it's bottled and tested to make sure it passes the matte test. There are currently over 20 matte shades you can try. Sona Gasparian is an LA-based beauty blogger and the founder of Persona Cosmetics. Persona carries a variety of lip, eye, and face products. When creating her eyeshadows, Sona develops the formula and colors alongside a chemist. She also determines the press levels for each shade to make sure the eyeshadows have less fallout and more pigment. Once all the shadows are ready, they're packaged and shipped. These are the brand's Color Theory Eye Kits. Sona's audience goes along for the ride with every product development, contributing to the scent, formula, and shades of products.