Bring Back Gatekeeping

Why every publication is doing beauty awards these days

Around this time about five years ago, I was ass-deep in Excel sheets, cataloging a pile of loose liquid eyeliners, powder highlighters, blush sticks, mascaras (lengthening and volumizing), and makeup brushes that I’d chuck into the deepest, lowest file drawer of my office desk until it shut no more. Green for the ones that passed the test, yellow for the ones that were meh, and strikethrough for ones simply not worth mentioning.

For about 4-6 weeks, I had been diligently testing these products using the one arena I had: My face. I’d pit different products on each side of my face (two mascaras, two liquid liners, one side each) so I could give them all a go within the allotted trial period.

Testing beauty products is arguably the funniest part of a beauty editor’s job and largely took up most of mine, as someone whose workday was routinely interrupted by bags bursting with new products from any and every brand with something to hawk. While I do believe many poor experiences are caused by user error rather than formulation failure, the reality is that most formulas are…fine. As a beauty editor, this was my most universal lesson from the job. Most of it is just…fine. But that isn’t very editorially compelling, now is it?

Years prior, I had volunteered to sign up for hair masks, face masks, toners, cleansers — the kinds of things that take ages to use up, can’t realistically be used every day or significantly impact your outer shell within a day or so. And they take up SO MUCH SPACE in my home. In my experience, 4-6 weeks is not enough time to vet beauty products you aren’t already familiar with. Three years in, I learned my lesson. Makeup is the easiest to test with immediacy and within my “normal” routine. It tends to tell on itself within the duration of its wear.

Working for The Beauty Authority™ at the time, this was a gauntlet that felt prestigious, important, and an honor to undertake — and most importantly, a huge determining factor in next year’s budgets. It is the mechanism of how the publication thrives. It provided a platform for the most eyes on our commerce links, advertiser relationship maintenance, and reinforcing editorial authority. It was also fun. The power! The influence! The dermatitis!

Since I’ve left that W2 lifestyle for the hobo hustle of freelancing, I’ve noticed that almost every publication has a beauty awards now.

There’s more, I’m sure, but these are all these seals of approval I could be fucked to copy/paste

And I see a number of FAQs about them around beauty forums, namely:

1. Are they rigged?

2. Are these awards all just bought by advertisers?

3. Is it all bullshit?

And as a former agent of the seal, I can tell you