A Just A Little Bit Orange Feature. By Clara Pettitt. Copyright © 06/03/2002. All Rights Reserved.

Sunless.com at the International Esthetics, Cosmetics, & Spa Conference — Page Two

Beach

I was a happy woman the day I first tried Beach, made by Strong Products, as is everyone who has despaired of finding a fast drying sunless tanning product that smells great.

"I'm going to add more fragrances," said Vonda Manley, creator of Beach sunless tanning products. What those fragrances will be is still undecided.

Last year, Vonda introduced a new fragrance, Raspberry Creamcicle, which many Sunless.com visitors think is the best smelling sunless tanner ever. Current fragrances include Coconut Rum and Pear.

Strong Products donated a prize, a Coconut Rum set, to the Sunless Tanning Contest.

See the Strong Products web site for more information.

SUN Laboratories

My boyfriend Dave won't admit it, but he always enjoys seeing the SUN Laboratories exhibit.

The question is: what will the ladies will be wearing this time? At the Chicago Indoor Tanning convention in November 2000, it was gold midriff tops and hip hugger pants.

This convention, they wore stretchy, but comfortable looking, dresses in bright tropical prints.

SUN Laboratories, the granddaddy of sunless tanning, has the most extensive selection of products of any brand. But they are going to be introducing more new products, a foam product for faces and a bronzer.

In the last two years, SUN has introduced numerous new products: Strictly Faces, foam and spray versions of their lotions, even shimmering lotions.

I finally got my hands on the new foaming products last year; while I haven't posted my reviews yet, I liked them a lot. As many have noted, you can use a slightly darker version of the foam than you may be used to purchasing in the lotion.

SUN offers four strengths of their products. From the lightest to the darkest, they are Luxurious Self Tanning Milk, Tan Overnight, Ultra Dark, and Dark Sunsation.

I normally use the two lightest products, but I found the foaming version of Ultra Dark worked well for me. The only issue with the foams is that they contain sodium lauryl sulfate, which is drying to the skin. So if you use them, be sure to alternate with other, more moisturizing sunless tanning products.

Note: Most sunless tanning mousse and foam products contain drying ingredients — the ingredients are what make the products foamy.

See the SUN Laboratories web site for more information.

St. Tropez

In case you haven't heard, there is a St. Tropez craze in Europe.

In the United Kingdom, St. Tropez is touted as the number one sunless tanning product.

The impression I got from reviews in the U.K. was that St. Tropez was an extremely dark product, so I wasn't keen to use it.

My coloring looks best with a light to medium sunless tan; to this day I tremble when I think of my experience with Clinique Self Sun in Dark.

When I finally tried St. Tropez recently, I was surprised [and relieved] that it was normal, medium product.

But that's because I wasn't using enough.

At some point, someone got the idea of putting St. Tropez on as thickly as mud. The salons in Europe that offer self tanning treatments do this; that's why the product is rumored to be so dark.

As you can see from the picture above, that's a whole lot of sunless tanner.

Certainly this trend has been a boon for St. Tropez — if you are using three to four ounces per application, you are going to be going through a lot of the product. At an average retail price of more than $30 for 8 ounces of self tanning lotion, you would be spending more than $10 per application.

If you get a St. Tropez self tanning treatment in a salon, prices start around $75.

So how is St. Tropez used in a normal, more sparing, manner? Quite pleasant. Both the lotion and the mousse have a light, herbal fragrance, and they dry quickly. It's difficult to spread the instant bronzer in the products evenly; I recommend you don't try, but use it as a guide to make sure you have everything covered.

See St. Tropez web site for more information.

Next: Jan Marini, Fake Bake, AVRF....