Update to Cosmeticcounterphobia

I'm slowly, but surely, getting over my hangups and this weekend marks another triumph for my journey on this road we call "life." Corinna and I successfully procured cosmetics at the Tyson's Corner One mall this weekend without any trauma or angst. "GO US!" Upon Kate's (my coworker) suggestion, I checked out the MAC counter and purchased what I needed and more. [The MAC foundation came in a plastic squeeze tube like my new "Skippy Squeez' It" peanut butter.] The MAC counter was mobbed, but our patience paid off because the salesperson was actually quite good at her job and efficient despite my initial reservations about her dramatic green eye makeup.

Do you have to be licensed to sell makeup because I wouldn't have picked the lip gloss "green eye makeup salesperson with the 'SASSY' tattoo" picked. She suggested this "Lychee Luxe" colored lip-gloss that was pinky orange and urged me to try it on. The color looked horrid in the bottle, but I complied while telepathically trying to communicate to Corinna that our salesperson was "cuckoo" and we should cease to take any more of her color advice. Much to my dismay, I liked pinky orange. Who knew?

Corinna picked up some foundation from the Origins counter and we both experienced an odd, but pleasant reverse sticker shock. Neither one of us had a good sense of how much makeup should cost and makeup counters, conveniently, do not display their prices. We both thought our makeup was going to cost significantly more. At one point I tried to casually grill the Origins salesperson nonchalantly asking her "Have prices gone down recently?" She assured us that prices had remained constant.

Not believing her, I set out to collect some data. My only point of data for cosmetics prices was Prescriptives foundation from four years prior so I needed to gather some current price data in order to perform my analysis. The price they quoted me was comparable to what I paid before so taking inflation into account, I conclude that makeup prices have remained constant, but prices have gone down in terms of real dollars.