For good or ill, I went out without buying... and Fair, Light and Medium are all on waitlist... so my dithering has saved my wallet again.
Liz Earle the company is now owned by
Walgreens Boots Alliance - bought last year from Avon for a bargainous £140million.
Creating and running a business takes an enormous amount of time, energy and dedication. Growing it into a major brand takes a lot of hard work, single-mindedness and often a different skillset to starting up a business. I have absolutely no problem with business founders selling up as they reach a plateau in many cases, and the danger of the original person at the helm for too long is that they don't always have the expertise to deal with big-company issues (different corporate obligations, governed by different laws etc). I think it is wise, if it is possible, to find a corporate suitor with compatible ethos, in order to retain the existing customer base... if that isn't possible, I hope they are able to negotiate sufficient ring-fencing to protect the company values that built its success. But bottom line, why isn't Liz entitled to reap the rewards for her hard work? Why is she immoral for doing so? Perhaps she had in the past made statements that she would never sell or never sell to someone who didn't have the Leaping Bunny - is that the case?
I don't see Liz's actions in selling the company are any more or less immoral than any other founder selling to a bigger company for a large sum of money. Inevitably there are consequences that may not be palatable, and sometimes these come in the face of public assurances to the contrary (think Kraft purchase of Cadburys), but the vendor cannot control what the purchaser does once the deal is signed, regardless of assurances given during negotiations.
By the looks of things the new regime seems to have ditched the most blatent "Avon-isms", and I believe they are still entitled to the Leaping Bunny and that is at least independently policed, so some trust can be placed in Liz Earle on that basis.
Mally has done the hour with Jill Franks starting with no foundation or lippy. The eyes were already done, so the face looked very sallow at first. You did see the transformation of her skin when applying the primer and foundation and lippy... it's more of an effort than we have had in the past. It's not on the scale of a Stacey Schieffelin (models prefer, ybf) bare-face, but actually a pretty good effort compared to the previous routine.
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I wish they wouldn't demo the lip products on Tiffany. Going outside the line means she looks like CoCo the clown, with lips drawn on by one of her grandkids. It's not a good look on anyone, but especially on Tiffany.
Tiffany rather reminded me of an animated character... finally remembered who...
Lady Tottington from Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-rabbit.