Saturday, February 9, 2013

Green Grab Bag January 2013

Green Grab Bag used to be one of my all-time favorite subscription services. Without warning, it went from great to bad quickly. Instead of deluxe and full size samples, December’s bag was mostly full of small one-use only packet samples – so I unsubscribed. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t unsubscribe in time, and was charged for January’s bag.

I was a bit mad at myself for that – because this is one of the more pricey subscriptions I had, and I really need to free up some money. But at the same time, I thought “Okay, one last GGB might not be a bad thing.”

Oh but it was.

Here’s what I got this month:

1)  Dead Sea Warehouse Face and Body Bar: Of all the things in the bag, this made me the happiest. Why? Because I’ve seen this product at my local Whole Foods, and I wanted to try it. But, it’s a rather expensive soap – and I don’t normally use soap. However, I have this weird skin issue going on with my back, and noticed that when I bathe with sea-salts, it goes away… for a while. This soap is filled with minerals from the Dead Sea, and I thought it could be helpful – but for the full price of the soap (about $12 for a bar), I didn’t want to spend the money. I was so excited to see this soap in this month’s GGB that I’ve used it twice already – and it seems to really work at abating whatever is going on with my back. This product has a big thumbs up from me.
Retail price: $6.65 for a small bar, $11.95 for a big bar (at my local Whole Foods)

2)  Savvy Boheme Coconut and Shea Body Mousse in Breathe: I received this before, but in Summer in Spain – which I absolutely love! This one is peppermint, and so not as decadent or enticing. Still, it’s a good product and I know I’ll eventually use it all up.
Retail price: $14.50 for 4 oz.

3)  Golden Path Alchemy Cleansing Oil: This is a fairly small sample, but I should get about three uses out of it. The one thing I’m not happy about is that in order to know how to use it, I was instructed to go to their website. That’s a bit of a fail. Also, when I attempted to use it yesterday, the oil would not come out of the dispenser.
Retail price: $22 – size not mentioned on website

4)  Monimay Sun Shadz Dry Shampoo: First I have to say: this sample is super stingy. It’s so small, it’s not really worth fooling around with.
Retail price: Applicator, $29.95; Refill, $29.95

5)  Virga Botanicals Pumpkin and Carrot Mask: This is a fairly small sample as well. It looks to be a decent size from the outside (not deluxe… but not stingy), but upon opening the jar, it's a mix-it-your-damn-self kind of product - no thank you! For that kind of money, I want it pre-made! One thing in its favor: it's from an etsy shop!
Retail price: $18.95 for 4.5 oz.

6)  Brittanie’s Thyme Organic Everyday Moisturizer: You know what? I almost threw this away. I didn’t even know it was in the bag. It was adhered to the inside of a pamphlet – so if that doesn’t give the size of this sample away, let me spell it out for you: it’s a tiny foil packet! You know how much I love those (insert sarcastic smile here). Additionally, I did open it to try it - the contents had separated and smelled rancid. I tossed it, because I believe it had gone bad.
Retail price: $16 for 2 oz.

Nitpicks: My $15 basically bought me two tiny packets, one tiny cleansing oil, a decent size body mousse, and a rockin’ bar of soap. I know… I didn’t mention the mask – but probably because it’s a non-item to me, as I don’t use masks. A better use of that $15 would have been to just buy the freakin’ bar of soap the first time I saw it at Whole Foods!

Lasting Impression: I had hoped that this bag would be a sweet good-bye to GGB – in other words, that I would have felt sad to see it go when I received this last bag from them. But instead it was a reminder of why I ended up letting it go in the first place. I will keep an eye out on reviews for upcoming bags – when my financial situation improves, I might want to check this out again. After all, for the year I had it my only two disappointing bags were the last two. All the others rocked my mailbox.