MAC haul (from MAC.com, via Hop Shop Go. read about my last experience with Hop Shop Go here ) This

MAC haul (from MAC.com, via Hop Shop Go. read about my last experience with Hop Shop Go here ) This post is a little overdue, but recently I had the urge to try out MAC lipsticks because of all the rave reviews over them. The only brands I've ever tried before are: Rimmel, Ulta and a Korean brand called aeropost Missha. These are all pretty inexpensive, ranging from $2 (Ulta lol) to about $12. Keen to make my first foray into higher end makeup, I realised that actually elsewhere around the world, MAC isn't considered 'high end'. It only seemed the case because Australia grossly inflates the price of MAC products! For these lipsticks, Australian beauty counters sell them for $36 a pop, whereas in the US you'll find them in Sephora for only $15. That's like x2.5 the price! MAC USA doesn't ship to Australia obviously, so I decided to see if I could use Hop Shop Go to get the lipsticks for cheaper. I wanted aeropost to get the products at their usual $15 per piece shipped to the US (using my US address), and then get Hop Shop Go to ship it to my Australian address. Would $15 (US price) aeropost + international shipping from the US to Australia, be less than $36 (Aus price)? ie would buying MAC cosmetics in this roundabout way from overseas, be cheaper than directly purchasing it off the local counters? Well it certainly was lol! I bought 4 MAC products from their US website: 1 x MAC Prep and Prime Lip primer ($16) 1 x MAC Rebel lipstick ($15) 1 x MAC Ruby Woo lipstick ($15) 1 x MAC Please Me lipstick ($15) these 4 products were shipped with free US shipping to my address in Oregon, USA. I also bought 11 things from Forever 21, of which most was my sister's stuff so I haven't shown it. this Forever 21 package was also shipped with free US shipping to Oregon, USA. So then to calculate the savings I made for a MAC lipstick using Hop Shop Go, it's not really accurate to take the total shipping I was charged and then divide it between the products because the Forever 21 package added extra weight and contributed to higher shipping fees in the end. Nonetheless aeropost even if I included the Forever21 package, I still ended up making savings on the MAC products: With the two packages, chargeable weight was 3kg, and the total amount paid to Hop Shop Go for shipping to Australia aeropost ($37.80), fuel ($5.04), aeropost and insurance costs ($1.91) = $ 44.75. Taking into account the Forever 21 order as well, the MAC lipsticks incurred about 44.75/4 for shipping = $11.2. This makes each lipstick about $26.20 each! And if I made a rough calculation of how much shipping would be on each lipstick if the lipsticks were the only things I purchased (using the HSG shipping calculator), then I would make even more savings: The Forever21 order was about 2kg, and the MAC order was 1kg (yes it was only 4 cosmetic items...but it came in a box and they rounded the weight upwards). The Hop Shop Go shipping calculator estimates 1kg to be about $28 for shipping minus the fuel and insurance costs, which we'll say is about $4.50 =   $32.50. so then taking into account aeropost only the MAC haul, the MAC lipsticks would incur about 32.50/4 for shipping = $8.10. That makes each lipstick about $23.10 each! So with either calculation, I still made savings of $10-$13 on each lipstick which is being sold over the local counters for $36. Although it's not an amazingly high saving, I still think it's worth it if you're planning on buying 3 or more products. I bought 4 an d altogether that saved me $40-$52. The savings would be even greater if Hop Shop Go had cheaper shipping fees or lowered their insurance and fuel costs though. On my blog I've only ever talked about HSG but I've been meaning to try out another service I've heard of called FastShip2U. I'm planning to do another overseas haul with them soon so I can compare :) (oh and don't go too crazy on using HSG to save yourself money on overpriced cosmetics,  here  is a list of prohibited items ! Includes aerosols (eg hairsprays), flammable products (eg nail polish)) now on to reviewing the actual products!
Since a lot of people might be worried about how cosmetics are packaged and handled from overseas, I took a picture of the packaging of the lipsticks. It came in a box, which was about tissue box-sized. Underneath a bunch of black tissue paper, there were the 4 cosmetic items. There was no bubble wrap but it's alright since the lipsticks were individually boxed and weren't like glass nail polish bottles or anything, and honestly the cardboard box itself is enough to protect the whole package during transit. I'd be more worried about nail polish bottles and eyeshadow palettes if it didn't have this minimum level of packaging!
This product filled in lip wrinkles quite nicely, and when I put the lipsticks over it the application was really smooth. It prevents lip feathering (when the lipstick runs into the creases around your lips over time) so that nice and sharp outline around your lips remains intact.
It a