The Beauty Industry Has a Trust Problem

And no, buying another serum probably isn't going to fix it. There. I said it. The beauty industry has a trust problem. Which is a slightly inconvenient thing for me to say considering I have spent nearly two decades working in it, own an aesthetics business, perform advanced treatments, and quite literally sell skincare for a living. But perhaps that's exactly why I should say it. Because somewhere between twelve-step skincare routines, faces filtered into oblivion and the internet diagnosing your pores as a personal failing, we seem to have forgotten something rather important: Your face is allowed to look like a face. It can have pores. It can move when you smile. It can develop lines because, tragically, you have continued to remain alive. And sometimes — brace yourself — it can even have texture. Apparently, We've All Been Doing Our Faces Wrong Open social media for approximately seventeen seconds and someone will happily inform you that you've been washing your face incorrectly since 1997. Your pores are too large. Your skin isn't “glass” enough. Your jawline needs snatching. Your forehead needs freezing. Your pigmentation needs erasing. Your lips need filling. Your eyebrows are somehow simultaneously too thin and too thick. And have you considered that the perfectly normal crease beside your mouth might require an immediate financial intervention? It's exhausting. And it's brilliant marketing. Because the easiest person to sell something to is someone you've first convinced has a problem. That's the part of the beauty industry I have never been particularly interested in participating in. I Will Happily Tell You Not to Buy Something This may be a terrible business model. I accept that. But if you come into Pampered Aesthetics convinced you need six treatments and I think you need one, I'm going to tell you that. If you show me a skincare routine with fourteen products and your skin barrier is waving a tiny white flag from underneath them, I'm probably going to start taking things away. And if you ask me whether you need to “fix” something that is completely normal, I'm not going to invent a problem because I happen to own a machine capable of treating it. That shouldn't be revolutionary. Yet somehow, in an industry built around selling improvement, saying “Actually, you're fine” can feel almost rebellious. More Is Not Better This one may get me removed from the Secret Aesthetician Society. You do not need every active ingredient currently known to science applied to your face before breakfast. You don't need retinol, glycolic acid, salicylic acid, vitamin C, peptides, niacinamide, three serums, two toners, an essence, an exfoliating mask and whatever TikTok discovered last Tuesday all fighting for custody of your epidermis. Skincare should accomplish something. That's the point. Every product in your routine should have a reason for being there. And sometimes the best thing we can do for angry, sensitized, over-treated skin is remarkably unsexy: Stop messing with it. Cleanse it. Hydrate it. Protect it. Let it breathe. Then we can decide what it actually needs. Aesthetic Treatments Aren't Supposed to Turn You Into Someone Else I love aesthetics. I love what a genuinely good facial can do for someone's skin. I love watching stubborn pigmentation fade. I love helping someone finally understand acne they've been battling for years. I love when a client looks in the mirror after a treatment and can't stop touching their face. This work can make people feel incredible. But there's a very important difference between: “I'd like to improve something about my skin.” and “I've been convinced something about me is unacceptable.” Those are not the same client. And they shouldn't receive the same conversation. My job isn't to stand over you with a magnifying lamp compiling a shopping list of your imperfections. My job is to understand your skin, listen to what bothers you, explain what's realistic, tell you when something isn't, and give you enough information to make your own decision. Sometimes that decision results in a treatment. Sometimes it results in a product. And occasionally it results in me telling you to go home and leave your poor face alone. Your Before Photo Is Not a Moral Failure Can we also talk about before-and-after photos? Because I love a dramatic before and after as much as the next aesthetician. They're useful. They show what treatments can accomplish. They're satisfying. But the person in the before photo wasn't broken. She wasn't lazy. She didn't fail skincare. She didn't need to become the after photo to be worthy of being photographed. She had pigmentation. Or acne. Or redness. Or wrinkles. Or sun damage. You know. Skin. We can want to change something without learning to hate it first. I wish the beauty industry said that more often. Filters Have Made Our Jobs Weird There are now people sitting in treatment rooms asking professionals to help them achieve skin that does not exist on the human body. Not difficult skin. Not rare skin. Nonexistent skin. No pores. No texture. No fine lines. Perfectly uniform colour. Light bouncing off cheekbones as though the person has been professionally rendered by Pixar. I have some impressive equipment. I do not possess the Photoshop wand. And I'm not going to pretend I do. Realistic expectations aren't pessimism. They're part of ethical aesthetics. I'd much rather have a client trust me for ten years than sell her something today by promising something I know I can't deliver. So Who Can You Trust? Ask questions. Ask what the treatment actually does. Ask about risks. Ask about downtime. Ask what qualifications the person treating you has. Ask whether there are alternatives. Ask how many treatments you'll realistically need. And pay very close attention to how someone reacts when you say: “No, thank you.” A good professional shouldn't be irritated by an informed client. We should want you informed. We should want you asking questions. We should be comfortable saying, “I don't know.” We should be willing to refer you somewhere else when something is outside our scope. And we should be able to tell you no even when yes would make us more money. Trust isn't built by pretending we can fix everything. It's built by knowing when we shouldn't try. Maybe Beauty Doesn't Need to Be Quite So Serious I built Pampered Aesthetics because I love this industry. I just don't particularly love all of the bullshit that comes with it. I don't believe self-care needs to be beige. I don't believe getting older is a disease. I don't believe everyone needs to look the same. And I definitely don't believe your bathroom needs to resemble a small Sephora warehouse for you to have good skin. I believe in science. I believe in good products. I believe in effective treatments. I believe in telling people the truth even when the truth doesn't result in a sale. And I believe you can absolutely want brighter skin, fewer breakouts, softer lines or a really spectacular facial without declaring war on your own face. Maybe that's where the beauty industry starts earning some trust back. Not by finding another thing that's wrong with you. But by helping you take really damn good care of the person who's already there.