Memebox: We Broke Up

Here follows a sad tale of love, obsession, and poor treatment. No, I'm not talking about the 50 Shades of Grey film. I'm here today to talk about the sad end of a relationship. Memebox and I have broken up.

Here's the deal. Back in December 2013, when things in my life were all sorts of wrong, I heard about this cool Korean beauty box. The more I heard about it, the cooler I thought it sounded. I threw caution to the wind and bought my first box, and then the affair started.

My first box was full off the COOLEST THINGS. A tea bag which you dissolve to make a tonic for your face? The perfect skin blurring primer? Amazing smelling herbal shampoo and conditioner? I was smitten.

The boxes that followed were a mixed bag, and I found some products which I'd go on to use to death (like this eyeliner) and others which I gave some severe side eye (like this eyeshadow and liner combo).

Finally, after my obsession got a little carried away and the amount spent on Memeboxes in my tracker spreadsheet reached an alarming amount, I hit the pause button. The boxes had been slowly declining in quality and frankly, the novelty had worn off. I had a giant stash of serums and cleansers and BB creams and I only have one face.

Then Memebox started sending me boxes for review, which was very nice of them. I still gave them just as honest reviews as I had before, but with the boxes came strings. I was enrolled in an affiliate programme, which was fine as I didn't really do anything with it. They sent me some discount codes to give to my readers, which was also nice. They would give me a heads up as to what I was going to receive and when, so I could track the parcel and plan my posts.

But then things started to go downhill. They ran some poorly organised competitions, which were a nightmare to try and set up, follow and comply with. Boxes began turning up out of the blue. They started setting rules (sorry, guidelines) around timings and content of reviews - and if there's one thing that's guaranteed to raise my hackles, it's telling me what to do. I'm a hobby blogger, for goodness sake. They then changed the affiliate programme to a third party type situation, which I didn't bother signing up for because I never used the first one. It felt like the rules kept changing, and I struggled to keep up.

By this point, I wasn't buying any new Memeboxes myself. With my slow-blogging approach to updating, it felt like every second post was a Memebox post as it was and I didn't want this space to become a Memeblog. I was beginning to feel beholden to produce the content and I didn't like that one bit.

None of these things were the worst thing in the world - you want to send me some free pretty things? Things which I love and had been raving about for months? Certainly nothing to get upset about. But a month ago, they announced they were ceasing all international shipping. What?

Now, there are many conspiracy theories going around the forums but I haven't really been reading enough to comment. Here's why I'm confused.

The K-beauty trend is just beginning to explode across the globe. Lisa Eldridge is leading the charge and by the looks of it, it's going to be huge. So why abandon such a large market just as it's taking off? Why would you expend so much time and money reaching out to foreign bloggers, shipping them free products from Korea (I think I got maybe 6 free boxes? At a guess) and running a seemingly complicated affiliate system. All to just throw in the towel?

I feel bad for the customers who had stockpiles of rewards to spend on boxes and had to use them in under 3 weeks (during which time there was hardly anything left to buy), and I also feel bad for those international customers who wanted to cash out their rewards but due to Paypal transfer fees and shoddy exchange rates to their local currency were left with a fraction of what they'd saved. 

It's a shame it had to end on such a bad note, really, and has left quite a sour taste in the mouth for many people. That's not a great way to build a brand, and it could have been handled so much better.

So from now on, there will be no new Memeboxes around here. I have a feeling some of you may be quite pleased about that, actually! Instead, I'll be slowly working my way through my stash and hopefully finding plenty of new products to love.

Ultimately, I'm not mad because what it has left me with is a love for Korean beauty products and that is the silver lining I'm taking from this baffling situation.

-Rachel

The Last Memebox: Special #52 WTF: Wonderful Treasure Finds

It's the end of an era - Memebox have announced that they're no longer shipping to international customers. So here we have the last box which I will ever receive from Memebox. Overly dramatic? Maybe, unless you're a K-beauty-aholic like me!

If you haven't heard of Memebox, they are a Korean non-subscription beauty box which, until recently, shipped internationally. They're undergoing some changes at the moment but are still available in the USA, so if that's where you are then you're in luck!

Let's see what was in my WTF box...

Tonymoly Mr Smile Patch ¦¦ I can confirm that these were absolutely everywhere in Seoul, so they're definitely a craze at the moment. This is a patch which you put on your smile lines to smooth and firm them up. Now we all know that no face patch is going to permanently fix your smile lines, so this seems like an amusing gimmick to me - that said, it is quite funny so I'll go with it.

Mumur Air Waterdrop Cooling Hand Cream Snow Blossom ¦¦ This is a really weird hand cream - it comes out like a gel, and then melts on your hands to form little droplets just like water, which slowly absorb into your skin. It contains hyaluronic acid and is paraben and fragrance free, which all sounds good. I found the effects to be reasonable but not super moisturising, and not enough to combat the seriously cold weather we're having here at the moment. I think this would be perfect for when you need a slightly lighter duty hand cream in the hotter months, when the cooling effect would be appreciated, too.

Skindeco Comedo AC Power Serum ¦¦ I have a heap of serums and they seem to last forever, so this is joining the back of the queue. It promises to soften roughened skin texture and remove pore clogging dirt and oil leaving a more glowing complexion. It's got ginger and garlic in it, which seems like the base for a good stir fry rather than facial oil but hey, why not. It's a lot less gross than snail mucin!

Dearberry Play Coux in 03 Peach Choux ¦¦ This is an illuminating primer with a pinky hued shimmer. I thought this was going to be excessively sparkly but it's actually not; in fact it's quite reasonable. I used this a few times under makeup and it did an ok job, and crucially it didn't clog my pores. However, I didn't feel it did anything for the longevity of my makeup and the illuminating effect wasn't anything extraordinary enough for me to keep using it, so overall I'm kind of on the fence about this. Nothing particularly wrong with this but... I don't love it.

Yadah Capsule Tok Soothing Gel ¦¦ Here we have a gel containing aloe vera capsules to soothe skin and vitamin capsules to brighten. This is a cooling and soothing gel basically, and I have actually been on the lookout for something like this to use after threading treatments. This seems like a good option so I'm going to give it a go next time I have my eyebrows done.

Elinette BMS Cure Cream ¦¦ So. I'm going to be really quite honest here. This cream smells like meat. I thought it was just me, but I got S to smell my face (that's love, people) and he concurs. The results were certainly not enough to put up with a face smelling fairly strongly of some kind of chorizo, so this is going in the bin. Why meat? Why?!

Bath Charm Store Dead Sea Salt Pearl Natural Soap ¦¦ Well, everyone uses soap, right?! This one is in a cute shape with a little pearl, and has got lots of lovely sounding ingredients like dead sea salt, shea butter, hyaluronic acid and jojoba oil and is meant to be used on your face. I've been using up another cleanser for my morning cleanse but I think I'll switch to this one when it runs out. I have to say, I tend to avoid bar soaps for the simple reason that they often go soggy, which really creeps me out. Yeuch.

So there we have it. The last ever Memebox. It's been quite a journey, and now I must attend to my giant stash.

Farewell, Memebox!

-Rachel

Linking up with the K-Beauty Blog Hop. I need to get my K-Beauty fix while I still can!

The box reviewed in this post was provided by Memebox for consideration. However, I have bought Memeboxes by the drove from when they started shipping to the UK until they stopped, and during that time I have been a firm fan of theirs.