It’s your V-Day date, and you don’t want a hair out of place, nor any stains or smudges. And while the vampire genre of entertainment may be in vogue, lipstick that bleeds is not.

A survey by Consumer Voice magazine, supported by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, recently compared a dozen lipstick brands for efficacy, value for money and sensory benefits. It looked at parameters such as heavy metal content, rancidity and contamination. The brands compared were Lakme, Elle 18, Colourbar, 7 Heaven’s, Mac, Maybelline, Toya Paris, Lipps, Lotus Herbals, Meilin, Cameleon and Blue Heaven.

If you use lipstick regularly, you should be concerned about whether it is safe to use frequently. Lipsticks usually contain lead, chromium, arsenic, cadmium and many more elements that are carcinogenic. Their presence cannot exceed permissible limits. An average user, says the magazine, applies lipstick 2.3 times and ingests 24 mg of it during the course of a day.

Under Indian standards, the presence of lead and arsenic cannot exceed 20 ppm and 2 ppm, respectively. All the brands tested were within the limits, though Lakme and Mac had the lowest content.

If you are an occasional user, you should probably worry about how fresh it has stayed since the last time you used it. Rancidity of all the brands was under permissible limits. Lakme, Mac, Colorbar and Cameleon had none at all. They passed the microbiological and breakage tests too.

I recently opened a new lipstick I bought two months ago only to find it coming apart in my hands. It had melted too. It is one of the brands tested — the parameter to look for here is the softening point — and I’m wondering if the fault is mine, the retailer’s, the manufacturer’s or the weather’s. Hmm? Apparently, the minimum softening point of lipstick should be 55{+0} C.

All the brands scored on sensory aspects — application, radiance, moisturisation, improvement in lip texture, appearance and fragrance, to name some. Packaging was rated for being tamper-proof and dust-proof. The brands passed this test. However, not all had the mandatory information on their packs. The lipsticks should legibly indicate the source of manufacture, shade number or name, batch number, year of manufacture and maximum retail price. The net weight of Blue Heaven, Mac and Cameleon were less than what was stated. Most of the brands weighed less than the declared net weight, but were within the tolerance limits.

Vitamin C is a weekly dose of consumer empowerment.

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