Lacquerous - High End Nail Polish Subscription Box - Page 2

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This just sounds all around gross. I use polishes at the salon and never have had a problem, but I've starting bringing my own. This just sounds like a disaster in the making. Do you have to sign a waiver that says you won't sue if you get a nasty infection? It just seems like a really bad idea. 

why not just depot the nail polish into little sample nail polish bottles and send three at a time that way?

weirdddddd

ewww!! when I started reading I thought I'd give it a go (we all did I think), but the whole sharing thing, no way! ew ew ew! that sounds like a really bad idea!!

Who would pay $18/month to "rent" nail polish?

This seems like a strange service. Whether or not our concerns are founded, our concerns are going to be super common, so it may be a difficult business to sustain. I agree with earlier posts--I would love if the higher-end polishes came in minis. I change my polish all the time anyway, so minis are actually more practical for me unless it's base coat or top coat. Many of the 'indie' polish makers offer minis, and I am drawn to those that do.

Not to mention the fact that selling used nail polish is actually illegal!  I don't think the FDA cares whether you're "renting" it or flat-out buying it.  I have a feeling that this venture is extremely short-lived.

Where'd  you see that? The FDA regulates the ingredients but  I didn't see anything about sales.

Quote:

Originally Posted by meaganola 

Not to mention the fact that selling used nail polish is actually illegal!  I don't think the FDA cares whether you're "renting" it or flat-out buying it.  I have a feeling that this venture is extremely short-lived.

I hadn't heard of this service until seeing this thread, but now I'm seeing it being mentioned on a lot of blogs. It was even on the BB blog. I just don't like the idea at all. Nail salons are often not even as safe as they can claim, but there's no way to really regulate how clean people are being in their own homes. Decants of NEW bottles, I might be able to get on board for (although I'd rather stick with Julep or a service like that), but no way will I share used bottles with people I don't know. I don't even let my friends use my polishes, but ugh... just yuck. All it's going to take is one person with a super bad experience writing all about it and more people will come out with concerns. They really need to rethink what they're doing. Although, maybe the announcement of their company will bring out more people voicing concerns and they'll change some things around.

It's illegal to sell any used beauty products period. I have friends that make & sell cosmetics. A few years back, you could sell used beauty products on ebay but not anymore.

Julep is only $1.99 more. You get 2 NEW (or 3 if you chose IT Girl) polishes and another body/beauty/mani/pedi item. Who would pay $18 for used polish that you don't even get to keep? I don't get it.

It looks like they deleted all negative comments on their FB group.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kukalu 

I also received an email from Lacquerous regarding their polish sharing program. It looked appealing to me, but when I started reading the fine details, I became a little concerned.
The "sharing" part really concerns me. What if you pay your $18 and end up receiving a 1/4 full bottle of polish that's thick and unusable?

As far as bacteria, fungus, or other microbes not being able to grow in polish, I don't support that study (whatever company did the study) at all. Bacteria lives all around us. Different types of bacteria can grow in ANY condition. I bet if I were to take a used bottle of polish and run a microbiology test, some bacteria would be present. Although, this said bacteria may not necessarily cause harm.

When I worked as a nail tech for 12 years, I separated the nail polish from the toenail polish. Anytime I SUSPECTED nail fungus, the base coat, nail polish color, AND top coat got tossed (even if it was brand new)! Fungus is so easy to get BUT hard to rid of.

Lastly, I just don't think Lacquerous thought this through enough. Maybe, if they went back to the drawing board, they could turn this around.

Just my $.02

Back in beauty school we had a lesson (involving a Petri dish and a bottle of polish used on a client with a fungal infection) on if polishes could become contaminated if used on someone with an infection. The short answer is yes, nail polish CAN become contaminated by an infection. While implements and tools can be sterilized it's against the law to knowingly work on someone with an infection. ANY product that comes in contact with someone with an infection such as a fungal infection has to be thrown away unless it's metal and can be sterilized in an autoclave. Most salons don't have autoclaves due to the cost so the alternative is bleach and alcohol which can't be used in nail polish.

So this "renting nail polish" is most likely against the law in most states because there is no way to make sure the person using it doesn't have a fungal infection or something else that can be passed along in the polish.

Did anyone carefully read the ToS on this? By agreeing you put yourself at risk in several ways. You gave them permission to run a credit check on you. Really? For $18 a month? Why would they need that? Especially since it counts against your FICO score. You also agreed to pay full price for any polishes you claim to have not received (or that they claim not to have received back from you). Yup. You never got them, but you just agreed to pay full price for them. You also agreed to let them charge your CC an unspecified penalty fee for any polish they feel is returned in 'poor condition' (no description of just what that means), any polish they feel you used more than your share of (again, no description of what that means), and any polish that is returned late, even if you have proof that you mailed it back in plenty of time. And you can't fight those charges, because you already agreed to them. That seems to me a pretty high price to pay to sample used polishes. And while things may not be able to live IN polish, they are most cerainly able to live on the bottle and cap. Wouldn't touch this with a 10 foot pole.
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sandi 

Did anyone carefully read the ToS on this? By agreeing you put yourself at risk in several ways. You gave them permission to run a credit check on you. Really? For $18 a month? Why would they need that? Especially since it counts against your FICO score. You also agreed to pay full price for any polishes you claim to have not received (or that they claim not to have received back from you). Yup. You never got them, but you just agreed to pay full price for them. You also agreed to let them charge your CC an unspecified penalty fee for any polish they feel is returned in 'poor condition' (no description of just what that means), any polish they feel you used more than your share of (again, no description of what that means), and any polish that is returned late, even if you have proof that you mailed it back in plenty of time. And you can't fight those charges, because you already agreed to them. That seems to me a pretty high price to pay to sample used polishes. And while things may not be able to live IN polish, they are most cerainly able to live on the bottle and cap. Wouldn't touch this with a 10 foot pole.
 

WOW! I wouldnt touch this with a ten foot pole either. I personally do my nails 2 -3 a week,  because for some reason polsih always chips within a day on me. And ive tried a million different base coats and top coats. I can be a germaphob at times, so this is creeping me out. I rarely go to places to get my mani or pedi because i get grossed out by people. So no go for me! plus I tend to stick with the same polishes, so if there was a julep  for essie or opi polishes, I would be all over that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sandi 

Did anyone carefully read the ToS on this? By agreeing you put yourself at risk in several ways. You gave them permission to run a credit check on you. Really? For $18 a month? Why would they need that? Especially since it counts against your FICO score. You also agreed to pay full price for any polishes you claim to have not received (or that they claim not to have received back from you). Yup. You never got them, but you just agreed to pay full price for them. You also agreed to let them charge your CC an unspecified penalty fee for any polish they feel is returned in 'poor condition' (no description of just what that means), any polish they feel you used more than your share of (again, no description of what that means), and any polish that is returned late, even if you have proof that you mailed it back in plenty of time. And you can't fight those charges, because you already agreed to them. That seems to me a pretty high price to pay to sample used polishes. And while things may not be able to live IN polish, they are most cerainly able to live on the bottle and cap. Wouldn't touch this with a 10 foot pole.
 

A credit check is done, from my understanding, to ensure you're not a risk in stealing their polishes. Frankly $18 for used polish... no thank you. I think the whole thing is a RIP OFF when there's companies like Julep and now Square Hue (which I haven't subscribed to but am going to since it's currently $14.99)

Since they have your credit card number and your permission to charge you penalty fees, and they charge you before they mail the polish so they know the card is good, I just think this is far more dangerous than it's worth. And since you agreed to those conditions prior to receiving any polish, the CC company is not going to go to bat for you if Lacquerous decides to charge outrageous fees for whatever reason. And since they are getting both insurance and tracking, if you don't get the polishes they will know that, so why should YOU have to pay for them? Especially when the insurance already is? As far as the credit check, every check you get for any reason shows up on your credit record, and although they shouldn't, they count against you when you try to get a mortgage or other significant loan because it doesn't say what or how much it was for. Borrowers assume that those credit checks represent substantial debts and if there are more than a few of them, it's going to affect your ability to get loans and the interest rates you're charged. But even without the credit check, why would you give someone unrestricted power to charge you any fees they feel like charging? They set no limit. They could charge you hundreds of dollars for 3 missing polishes, polishes returned in 'poor' condition (whatever that means), or polishes you used more than 'your share' of. How much is that? They don't say. Not willing to take that chance myself.

Their ToS is very loosed ended for them. They can change prices and what they send you whenever and to whatever without notifying you. No refunds no matter what too. I am not sure why anyone would consider this. I see no positive to it.

I filled out the form on their website saying I wanted to unsub from their waiting list/email list. There's too much that's vague for me to feel comfortable about subbing, and I mentioned my concern about "what do they consider an appropriate amount of polish use" and got this response in my inbox this morning.

"We understand there have been a few questions around this rule in the club. As stated, it's a guideline for those people who are hoping to abuse Lacquerous. In our studies, it showed a woman - in a 30 day period - only uses the same nail polish once (as a rule of thumb we allow for 3 applications and ofcourse all nail lengths are fine). We want people in club to enjoy the lacquer, but we needed to make it clear that it is high-quality, expensive lacquer and not be used with all your friends. We do have to protect ourselves and I'm sure you can understand our concern."

I guess I'm not part of their demographic - if I can't decide on a color to wear, there are a few colors I tend to fall back to, which are repeats in the same month. And what about those ladies who are limited to a certain color palettes for work reasons?

Quote:

Originally Posted by peridotcricket 

I think I saw this via ILoveNailPolish on Facebook. It looks like they send you 3 polishes, you try them for a maximum of 3 manicures, and you send them back. Then they go to the next person. You can then purchase the colors in their shop. I'm not sure this is the same one I saw, but a "Rent a Polish" service sounds like a big scam to me.

Could this whole Lacquerous thing be a scam or a joke? Wouldn't the FDA stomp their a$$es for renting/re-using nail polish?

If it's a scam then Time magazine is helping them.

http://style.time.com/2012/11/13/bottle-it-up-lacquerous-a-netflix-for-nail-polish/

Frankly it's WAY too dangerous of a service between them charging the CC/DC anytime they want if they feel you used too much to the potential dangers of the polish becoming contaminated and of course that credit check which can potentially damage a person's credit score.

I don't think it's a scam as much as it is a really bad business plan from people who haven't thought things through, and that is *really* bad news.  The part where end users are responsible for items that arrive damaged on either side smacks of covering-our-own-rear-ends-because-we-don't-want-to-be-responsible-for-this-stuff on the part of Lacquerous, which really rubs me the wrong way.  It's just unprofessional.  If you're a business, it's on *you* to take on certain responsibilities, and their TOS seems specifically constructed to absolve themselves of all of those responsibilities.  No way, no how, not even for a free trial period.

(And I find that things like _Time_'s Style section get a press release, rewrite it just enough to avoid being called out on plagiarizing or acting as a mouthpiece for the company, and call it good.  You will see the same information over and over in every single similar "news" source.  They don't really seem to vet/rsesarch things.)

Quote:

Originally Posted by meaganola 

I don't think it's a scam as much as it is a really bad business plan from people who haven't thought things through, and that is *really* bad news.  The part where end users are responsible for items that arrive damaged on either side smacks of covering-our-own-rear-ends-because-we-don't-want-to-be-responsible-for-this-stuff on the part of Lacquerous, which really rubs me the wrong way.  It's just unprofessional.  If you're a business, it's on *you* to take on certain responsibilities, and their TOS seems specifically constructed to absolve themselves of all of those responsibilities.  No way, no how, not even for a free trial period.

 

(And I find that things like _Time_'s Style section get a press release, rewrite it just enough to avoid being called out on plagiarizing or acting as a mouthpiece for the company, and call it good.  You will see the same information over and over in every single similar "news" source.  They don't really seem to vet/rsesarch things.)

I love the concept, but their implementation is poorly designed and is very vague and shady. And I'd love to know where they got their "survey" results from.

Read the article and stated my personal opinion of this service. I like how the one person tried calling Zadi out for having her opinions on this service. I don't care who supports this issue. Like I posted, I share with my blogger friends, family and friends my opinion of the different service's and the information taken from their companies web sites. Anyone who has taken biology class know that indeed bacteria can grow in just about anything. I would like to see an official statement/information  from an impartial company stating that there is no way there could be any contamination. I'm going to talk to my brother this week and get his opinion since he's an analytical chemist. He's the head of a major company that tests things for the government and the private sector. The so called business model they are using is nothing short of bullshit giving the company full regin to do whatever they want to those who sub to this service. Are we going to read stories from customers who will be charged unknown amounts of money at the companies whim? Yeah I'll stick around for that. You don't treat your customers like that period!! While they may well believe they are providing a niche for those would walk into this sub service. The concept and execution is in my opinion a bad, bad, bad concept for sure.

Having spoken with David from SGS (which is a company whose mission is to independently test products), I know what I've been told is that YES ANYTHING can become contaminated. I've seen it with my own eyes in a demonstration that my cosmetology instructor did and granted that was 20 years ago and polish formulations have drastically changed since but nothing anyone can convince me that polish can't be contaminated.

This is legitimately just nasty and I wouldn't feel safe with it at all. their TOS totally turns me off. Frankly, NARS, Chanel and Butter London polishes aren't enough for me to join and allow you to check my credit. Let someone with a good reason do that, like a landlord.

Yuck!  And for $18/month you could buy 1 or 2 really nice polishes to add to your collection.

I think they lied to you. I can't find any reg on that and this service is getting a LOT of blog play and magazine play to be breaking a law. Now I'd like to find out for sure because that is just squirelly of ebay

Quote:

Originally Posted by meaganola 


That's what eBay told me when they shut down one of my auctions for Liquid Euphoria nail polish last year.

Here's EBay's policy:

The law on nail polish, on the FDA website, does not specifically state anything about selling used polish only the regulation of what's allowed. There is a Key Legal Concepts portion which talks about the Federal law in regards to products that have become contaminated, specifically Section 601 of the FD&C Act [21 U.S.C. 361]:

The link on EBay goes to the old FDA website which I had to use Wayback Machine to look up however I had to go back to 2001 to pull up the page EBay was linking to which of course was more  links which I can't access. So I've emailed the FDA about this to find out what the law is and their stance on distributing used cosmetics (in this case nail polish) on a for profit basis. My email to the FDA:

i had signed up for this, felt iffy about it, and after reading everything here, am passing on it all together.