LED light, vibration, and inexpensive rollers

The video I wasn't looking for

I don't use TikTok; it makes me nervous. But I received a link to a political video, a very common occurrence in our era's mental landscape, so I went to check it out. After watching it, the algorithm did its job. And the next thing that popped up was a fabulous influencer promoting an anti-eye bag cream plus neck serum pack. Sixteen euros for the set.

Plastic packaging with gold accents here, silver, and cool shapes there. The kind that already has its own aesthetic: TikTok, Temu, Aliexpress. Shiny, over-the-top. The anti-eye bag cream with a cap that includes a small light and vibration, for massaging the contour at will... I don't know what the light is for. The neck serum with two rollers next to the dispenser—they think of everything. In related videos, several influencers trying it out, with that skin-smoothing filter so overdone they look like CGI.

Heated comments. And selling like hotcakes, I suppose. It makes your eyebrow raise.

What's inside the jar

The first thing I did was look for the INCI. The list was endless, one of those you read and lose track halfway through, but there were some things with real substance: urea, ceramide NP, a couple of long-named peptides. However, they were at the end of the list, where concentrations are minimal, mere traces. At the beginning, where the truly dominant ingredients are, I found: mineral oil, a petroleum-derived hydrocarbon that offers nothing biocompatible with the skin. Dimethicone. Methylparaben. Propylene glycol. Triethanolamine. BHT... and I'll stop there not to bore too much.

Classic synthetic base for fastcosmetics, cheap. And the result on camera is immediate, as it should be. Dimethicone fills like putty, silica blurs, like paint but without effect on melanin. The skin looks different in thirty seconds. A visual patch, for a short while and that's it... for that, there's makeup, come on.

But on video, it looks luxurious. That's what gets recorded, shared, and bought.

Where does the money go?

Sixteen euros for two products with that packaging.

The cosmetic content with that base costs cents. The packaging with the light and the vibrating mechanism: a bit more, but it's not a satisfyer either. The bulk of the budget is not in the jar. It's in the influencers and the algorithm. The "wow" moment that someone records and uploads and replicates until it reaches you, who weren't looking for anything.

The model is perfectly designed and works in a society largely hooked on impulse.

The discomfort

As a cosmetics seller, these things cause me discomfort and frustration.

Market rules favor spectacle: it catches the eye and works in fifteen seconds, because it has light, a roller, and promises. There are products that cost more or the same but are made with a different intention and motivation. With honest formulations, where the packaging is not a performance and what's inside truly helps the skin in the medium term.

I'm not saying that everything natural is better just because it's natural, nor that everything synthetic is crap or a scam. I'm saying that when a product's budget goes to gadgets and commissions, the formula inevitably pays the price.

And the market moves fast. Many people buy the ritual before the product. That pack is a user experience: the gadget, the false sensation of having taken care of oneself.

That the inside is smoke and doesn't deliver is almost secondary. 

For those who ask questions

I don't have a reassuring conclusion to close this article.
This cycle: creating anything to sell it, aggressive marketing, a world that buys it without batting an eye, is worrying, or at least frustrating.

But while that pack remains on TikTok with thousands of comments surrendered to the empty hype, someone somewhere will be reading an INCI for the first time, and will ask themselves some questions.

Welcome, all those someones.

Iván.