The Hunt For The Perfect Lipstick -- CoverGirl Queen Collection Moisturizing Lip Color #Q435 ("Cherrylicious")

I'm about to head out shopping, but first, a couple of quick lipstick reviews. This one's about CoverGirl Queen Collection Moisturizing Lip Color, #Q435, "Cherrylicious".

The short review: Eh. For all the work CoverGirl's put into advertising over the past few years to make their product more hip, now, relevant, etc. (especially to women of color), the reality is that this is still a drugstore lipstick. No less, no more, and it has all the benefits and limitations that come with such.

Longer review follows the jump-cut...


Candidate: CoverGirl Queen Collection Moisturizing Lip Color, #Q435, "Cherrylicious" (Proctor & Gamble, Inc.)

Purchased: Safeway, Laurel, MD

Cost: $4.89 per tube

Brand Info: CoverGirl Cosmetics
"Easy, Breezy, Beautiful...CoverGirl" was originally founded in 1958 by the Noxzema Chemical Company (later renamed Noxell) in Baltimore, Maryland. The company got its name from its days of allowing "Cover Girls" (fashion models on the front pages of magazines) to have their products for free in exchange for advertising, making it the forerunner of M-A-C cosmetics in a way. Their original 6 products (including "medicated face makeup" in keeping with Noxzema's product theme) caught on with the public and took off rapidly after a 1976 ad campaign featuring Christie Brinkley (who recently returned to CoverGirl to promote their anti-aging foundation). The company diversified its line vastly, featuring virtually every cosmetic a woman would ever wear, and Brinkley stayed with the company for almost 20 years, making hers one of the longest continuous sponsorship deals with a single spokesperson in advertising history. Today, CoverGirl is owned by Proctor & Gamble (since 1989) and is the main sponsor of the CWTV show America's Next Top Model.

This particular collection, named for current CoverGirl spokeswoman Queen Latifah, is designed to compliment the skin tones of "women of color", and Latifah has said that includes "all colors", including caucasian.

The Tube: Grey pearlized plastic, shiny finish, bulging-side square shape with a silver ring at the mid-tube join. The overlapping "CG" CoverGirl logo is imprinted in silver on one side of the bottom section of the tube. A red/maroon sticker with white lettering on the bottom bears the color number (Q435), the color name in almost microscopic font ("Cherrylicious"), and the manufacturing center information rings three sides of the label (P&G, Hunt Valley, MD, USA).

The Product: Maroon, with the appearance of shimmering pigments swirled within. The product itself is a traditional bullet shape with a concave tear-shaped delivery point.

The Application: I've commented enough times on how much I dislike concave application tips, so suffice it to say that you should probably keep a Q-Tip handy to clean up the edges of the lips after application. That said, it goes on very easily (and much redder than it appears in the tube--unexpected and very pretty) and gives full coverage with a very nice cream finish.

The Taste: Almost none. CoverGirl has really come a long way from its Noxzema days where everything smelled medicine-like.

The Blot: The first blot removes most of the shine, making the final product appear more matte. Nice, blue-red lip print. A second blot produces only minimal color.

The Wear: Typical edge of the cup, top of the chewed-on pen, bite of sandwich stains, and it does come off on your fingers when you eat finger food. As for lasting...forget it. I put it on early this morning, ate practically nothing for two hours, then had a small breakfast, and by the time I checked for touch-ups, it was virtually gone. This is really disappointing, as CoverGirl is continually touting their long-lasting glosses but appear to have done nothing to add to the wear of their lipsticks.

The Verdict: Normally this is the point where I say about even a short-lasting lipstick that they make great one-errand lipsticks when you can't stand to go out of the house with no makeup, but frankly, CoverGirl should be better than this by now. They have "Stay-Shine", "Outlast", "Long-Lasting" all over the rest of their cosmetic line; when are they going to fix their lipsticks to go along with this image they're pushing? Teens love CoverGirl because it's cheap and it's sold in WalMart/Target/grocery/drugstores, so it's easy to find and easy to purchase; however, as a parent, I think you'd be better off letting your teen find a shade she likes in one of these and then going to a higher-end cosmetic like Bobbi Brown, M-A-C, Sephora, etc. and finding a matching shade there. The cost-per-tube will be higher, but it'll last longer and be a better deal.