One Of The Enduring Greats: The Body Shop Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter Is Worth Stocking Up On!

The Good: Great scent, Decent protectant/moisturizing properties, Feels great on the skin
The Bad: Comparatively expensive.
The Basics: A wonderful body butter that does all it promises, The Body Shop's Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter hydrates skin and leaves it smelling delicious!


Once upon a time, right around when I first met my wife, I spent a lot more time in shopping malls than I do now. The truth is, I live a couple of hours away from any shopping malls and I get a lot more locally now. But, back in the day, I went to a lot of different shopping malls and they were a place I went a lot with my (now) wife. Quite some time ago, we were at a mall and she expressed a love for products from The Body Shop. This, luckily for me, led to many hours of me massaging her feet and me getting on The Body Shop's e-mail list for exclusive offers. A while back, I stocked up on The Body Shop Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter through one of their promotions and after quite a bit of use over the years, it is a product that has held up well - and I'm glad I don't have to hang around malls to get it!

The Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter is a wonderful-smelling product which does exactly what it promises in that it moisturizes skin and leaves it smelling great. In fact, this is such a good product that it easily overcomes the expense of the product, especially when bought in bulk or on sale! This Body Butter truly does hydrate the skin exceptionally well.

Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter from The Body Shop is designed for normal skin. I have normal skin, as it appears that it takes quite a bit for my skin to break out in hives or rashes and is generally well-moisturized. In fact, the driest skin on my body is in the obvious areas; feet, knees and elbows. Not usually inclined to use a product like this on a daily basis, it has been more of a lark for me having some available to me. I've been using it steadily on those three areas as well as my hands for general moisturizing and after a few days, the access to my wife’s body butter has left my feet perfectly well moisturized. My feet had been cracked and dry, but now the skin there is soft and supple.

As with other body butters, a body butter is a somewhat greasy, near-solid cream (like a pomade) that comes in a disc-like container (like shoe polish) that is designed to protect and/or moisturize skin. Unscrewing the top of the container gives the user ample access to the body butter and this is a very easy product to get out of its container and use. As well, this does seem to go rather far. I've used other containers for months and the last few days with Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter has left not even a dent in the container. I feel good about that as these have been in the $20.00 range for a 6.75 oz. container, which makes it impossible for me to call this product cheap!

The Limited Edition Chocomania body butter smells like wonderfully like dark chocolate. The cocoa scent is inviting and pleasant, exactly what one might hope for from a chocolate-scented lotion. The scent is not overly sweet - it is more true to a dark chocolate aroma - but given how much I love dark chocolate, that was a good selling point for me.

I have discovered the scent of Limited Edition Chocomania remains on the skin – everywhere but my feet - for about four hours. The scent remains clear and delicious-smelling for the duration of its presence on the skin.

Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter actually works. This body butter does an excellent job of moisturizing skin that is dried out. As a married person, I have learned the importance of keeping my feet soft, so I was pleased to discover how well the Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter softens the skin. This is an excellent moisturizer. The body butter moisturized and reinvigorated my skin on my feet, knees and elbows quite well. As well, given all of the typing I do, it was nice to have a moisturizer that kept my fingers and hands soft and supple. This body butter is ideal for slathering on one's feet and then putting socks over them so the body butter can effectively moisturize.

But the cost, not the expense, seemed a bit high. This product goes on greasy and leaves a sensation of being coated. When I've applied it, the The Body Shop Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter absorbs nicely into the skin. This body butter does not leave consumers feeling like their skin is coated at all.

The body butter is recommended for maintaining skin moisture in addition to restoring skin to a normal moisture level when it has been dried out. So, for example, body butter is recommended for application after taking a shower (the body usually dehydrates some after acclimating to a long shower or bath) to keep moisture in the skin. The The Body Shop Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter maintains the feeling of cleanliness one has after showering, which is nice.

This particular body butter melts. I have left The Body Shop Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter in my car and the dark brown container heated up and melted the product. It resolidified when brought inside and left for a day in a cool, dark area, but it seems like this is a liability if it is being carried around by someone in a handbag or such. While this product is not recommended for areas like the lips, it should most definitely not be consumed as it is exceptionally sour and bitter when it hits the tongue.

Limited Edition Chocomania Body Butter from the Body Shop is a wonderful skin hydration product that is well worth the price and stocking up on!

For other The Body Shop body butters, please check out my reviews of:
Pink Grapefruit Body Butter
Passion Fruit Body Butter
Strawberry Body Butter

9/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please visit my Health And Beauty Product Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Exciting The Skin And The Nose: The Body Shop Pink Grapefruit Body Butter Works!

The Good: Good smell, Decent protectant/moisturizing properties, Feels great on the skin
The Bad: Pricy.
The Basics: An exciting body butter, Pink Grapefruit Body Butter smells great and moisturizes well for the price!


As the month comes to a close, I’m back with a whole new bevy of reviews! Having just finished my latest script, I am thrilled to return to blogging to review all sorts of movies, television shows and other products I have experienced in the interim. Today, that starts with an amazing product I’ve been using pretty constantly since I left to focus on my writing!

That product is Pink Grapefruit Body Butter from The Body Shop. Pink Grapefruit Body Butter is a wonderful-smelling product which does exactly what it promises in that it moisturizes skin and leaves it smelling great. In fact, this is such a good product that it almost overcomes the expense of the product!

Pink Grapefruit Body Butter from The Body Shop is designed for normal skin. I have normal skin, as it appears that it takes quite a bit for my skin to break out in hives or rashes and is generally well-moisturized. In fact, the driest skin on my body is in the obvious areas; feet, knees and elbows. Not usually inclined to use a product like this on a daily basis, it has been more of a lark for me having some available to me. I've been using it steadily on those three areas as well as my hands for general moisturizing and after a few days, the access to my wife’s body butter has left my feet perfectly well moisturized. My feet had been cracked and dry, but now the skin there is soft and supple.

As with other body butters, a body butter is a somewhat greasy, near-solid cream (like a pomade) that comes in a disc-like container (like shoe polish) that is designed to protect and/or moisturize skin. Unscrewing the top of the container gives the user ample access to the body butter and this is a very easy product to get out of its container and use. As well, this does seem to go rather far. I've used other containers for months and the last few days with Pink Grapefruit Body Butter has left not even a dent in the container. I feel good about that as these have been in the $20.00 range for a 6.75 oz. container, which makes it impossible for me to call this product cheap!

The Pink Grapefruit body butter smells like grapefruit. This is the energizing scent that one expects from anything pink grapefruit. The scent is tangy and recognizably citrusy. The aroma is strong and distinct, instantly recognizable to anyone who likes grapefruit. The scent effervesces well and remains on the skin for several minutes after use.

I have discovered the scent of pink grapefruit remains on the skin – everywhere but my feet - for about three hours. The scent remains clear and delicious-smelling for the duration of its presence on the skin. The smell never turns into anything generic and citrusy, so it remains strongly and rightly grapefruit. That is a nice change from many of the other body butters from The Body Shop.

Pink Grapefruit Body Butter actually works. This body butter does an excellent job of moisturizing skin that is dried out. As a married person, I have learned the importance of keeping my feet soft, so I was pleased to discover how well the Pink Grapefruit Body Butter softens the skin. This is an excellent moisturizer. The body butter moisturized and reinvigorated my skin on my feet, knees and elbows quite well. As well, given all of the typing I do, it was nice to have a moisturizer that kept my fingers and hands soft and supple.

But the cost, not the expense, seemed a bit high. This product goes on greasy and leaves a sensation of being coated. When I've applied it, I've felt coated (something I don't feel with, say Vaseline Intensive Care lotion). While there is no actual film left (I've tested with papers at various points after applying the product), I have a sensation that begs to differ with reality when using this body butter, at least for the first five minutes after application.

The body butter is recommended for maintaining skin moisture in addition to restoring skin to a normal moisture level when it has been dried out. So, for example, body butter is recommended for application after taking a shower (the body usually dehydrates some after acclimating to a long shower or bath) to keep moisture in the skin. Here, the purpose is self-defeating as the body butter makes one feel less clean after getting clean in the shower. Who lathers up in a slimy, greasy-feeling product in order to feel clean after scrubbing off dirt and grime? This Body Butter actually energizes the skin and invigorates the user much like a shower itself does!

I've also noticed that this particular body butter melts. I left it in my car - I took it on a day trip - and the light pink container heated up and melted the product. It resolidified when brought inside and left for a day in a cool, dark area, but it seems like this is a liability if it is being carried around by someone in a handbag or such. While this product is not recommended for areas like the lips, I discovered (by accident) that this has a very inoffensive taste. The flavor is more dry and buttery than the sweet it smells like. It is, however, a little sour.

Pink Grapefruit Body Butter from the Body Shop is a wonderful product and well worth the price and stocking up on!

For other The Body Shop body butters, please check out my reviews of:
Papaya Body Butter
Passion Fruit Body Butter
Strawberry Body Butter

8.5/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please visit my Health And Beauty Product Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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No Bagels Here, Only Skin For The Body Shop's Overpriced Papaya Body Butter.

The Good: Smells good, Offers minor protection
The Bad: Expensive! Scent does not last long, Does not significantly moisturize
The Basics: Outside smelling good and leaving a sensation of being covered in a thin film, the papaya body butter does nothing for my skin, at too high a price.


One of the few products from The Body Shop that I have not enjoyed is their Papaya Body Butter. Oddly, I have stronger associations with the Papaya Body Butter, but like it less than The Body Shop's Strawberry Body Butter (reviewed here!).

Body butter is possibly best described as a greasy-textured skin cream, thicker than a lotion, designed for use on one's whole body. It is well-titled "butter" as it has the same consistency as soft margarine, the same sheen and virtually the same greasy feeling. The only significant difference is when one who is using the body butter rubs it into the skin, the greasy feeling goes away . . . more or less.

This is the Papaya body butter and it is recommended for normal skin. It comes in a 1.7 oz. container for a whopping $7.00! The container is a small plastic disc that unscrews from the top. This gives the user perfect access to all of the body butter within. The actual body butter is a peach colored goo that coats the inside of the container and the screw-off top. I was able to use from the cap for the first several uses before ever diving into the container.

The first thing one notices when removing the cap is the scent. This smells like papayas. Having cooked with papayas, I can honestly say that this scent is a very pure papaya scent, not some fabrication or assumed scent. This smells exactly like fresh-cut papayas and it smells quite wonderful. For those who like papayas, this is pretty much guarantees to make you salivate, the scent is so visceral and encompassing.

The thing about papaya scent, in reality and as part of this body butter, is that it is not the strongest scent and while it might permeate a room, it seldom lasts. The scent from this body butter lasts about an hour under normal use, a bit longer for low traffic areas. I've noticed that even in a confined room, like an office, within an hour, the scent dissipates such that others do not notice it after an hour.

The body butter is a simple enough product to use; one simply scoops out a dab and rubs it on the skin. The papaya normal skin body butter is something of an enigma to me. I purchased it originally for the scent (it's a wonderful scent) and I began to use it because I have normal skin. The best I might suggest is that the body butter might have maintained my normal skin. Then again, it was maintaining itself on its own, too, so I'm at a bit of a loss for the purpose of this product.

Rubbing the body butter into the skin - it's recommended to use right after drying off from a shower to help maintain the body's moisture - results in a pretty gross greasy feeling. This product is like a slime and it's kind of gross. Even after rubbing well into the skin, the body butter maintains a greasy sensation that can be rather uncomfortable and disconcerting. So, for example, I used some of the body butter on my hands over half an hour ago and my fingers still feel greasy and slick. They feel like I've just eaten a very buttery bagel and some of the margarine dripped on my digits. It's uncomfortable and kind of icky.

Fortunately, the body butter does not leave a greasy trail where it goes, despite feeling like it might be (I've dabbed my fingers on paper and there is no residue, despite the feeling). The thing is, I've been using this product for months and this sort of reaction still happens. I consistently feel like there is a greasy coating on my body and that's a poor trait for a health and beauty product; this product is not soothing, relaxing or leaves no noticeable feeling, any of which would be ideal instead of feeling coated by the product even hours later.

But back to the purpose; my skin has not changed in any noticeable way since using this product. My skin is not softer, it is not dryer, it is not greasier (though it feels that way), it has not broken out. Which begs the question, what is the purpose of the body butter? Perhaps it might help someone maintain normal skin if their body was not able to, but I've noticed the drier areas of skin on my body have not been affected by the papaya body butter either. So, its purpose ultimately eludes me. It's a pointless product.

And it's too expensive to be pointless. At $7.00 a mini-vat, this is far too expensive for what one gets out of it. I'm certain there are body sprays that smell like papaya that would offer a much better value. As it is, this may make the user smell good for a while, but it does little else that a healthy body is not already doing.

For other products from The Body Shop or skin care products, please check out my reviews of:
The Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt
Passion Fruit Body Butter
Dial anti-bacterial soap

5/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

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Not So Good Melted, Passion Fruit Body Butter Still Does Something.

The Good: Scent, Good moisturizer
The Bad: Melts, PRICE, Greasy feeling, Foul taste
The Basics: In a close call, this body butter suffers from general body butter problems of a greasy feeling on the skin and a nasty taste, despite actually moisturizing.


As a gardener and someone who has two cats - thus multiple litter boxes I'm constantly emptying and washing up after - I understand the importance of products that keep skin moisturized and healthy. I think there can be certain value in products that restore dry skin to health and when I was reviewing the Body Shop's Strawberry Body Butter (reviewed here!), I found myself underwhelmed because it, at best, maintained my skin instead of actually doing anything. So, I was a little filled with trepidation when I picked up the Passion Fruit Body Butter.

First off, the Passion Fruit Body Butter from The Body Shop threw me in its labeling. It is labeled as "Passion Fruit Normal To Dry Skin." With hair conditioners, the label will express the desired result for a certain hair type (i.e. in hair conditioners, "Normal to dry" would indicate that it would take normal hair and dry it out). So, I was somewhat baffled by the idea of a product that was going to try to dry the skin out. This product does NOT do that, so the labeling is somewhat of a misnomer (or, annoyingly, an example of a need for universal labeling standards in health and beauty products).

As with other body butters, a body butter is a somewhat greasy, near-solid cream (like a pomade) that comes in a disc-like container (like shoe polish) that is designed to protect and/or moisturize skin. Unscrewing the top of the container gives the user ample access to the body butter and this is a very easy product to get out of its container and use. As well, this does seem to go rather far. I've been milking my first container of this for over six months now. This is good because at $7.00 for a 1.7 oz. container, the product is not cheap. In fact, I spent over a week using the body butter off the inside of the lid, as opposed to out of the container proper!

The passion fruit body butter smells like passion fruit, though to be honest, my dining and cooking experiences with passion fruit are considerably less than my experiences with papayas. The scent is good and I found the scent from this though very subtle and fruity, seems to endure quite a while. The main scent, though more faint, tends to last about an hour and a half. I've found the scent on my skin for up to three hours in low-traffic areas.

Honestly, the scent is not the greatest. It smells nice, but it does not conjure up anything for me. If you have a great memory that involves the presence of passion fruit, maybe there is something more for you in this. For my, it was a fairly generic fruit or berry scent and while it lasted, it was not terribly distinctive or evocative.

Then, there's the actual product and here is where things become dicier for me. First, the product actually works. This body butter does an excellent job of moisturizing skin that is dried out. After weeks of gardening, I found some value - the most I found in this product - from using it on my knees and elbows, which tend to be places that get very dried out and damaged by constant gardening. The body butter moisturized and reinvigorated my skin in those areas.

But the cost, not the expense, seemed a bit high. This product goes on greasy and leaves a sensation of being coated. When I've applied it, I've felt coated (something I don't feel with, say Vaseline Intensive Care lotion). While there is no actual film left (I've tested with papers at various points after applying the product), I have a constant sensation that begs to differ with reality when using this body butter. If you can imagine feeling for three hours like you are coated in a thin film of margarine, you have a good idea of how unpleasant this body butter may make one feel.

The body butter is recommended for maintaining skin moisture in addition to restoring skin to a normal moisture level when it has been dried out. So, for example, body butter is recommended for application after taking a shower (the body usually dehydrates some after acclimating to a long shower or bath) to keep moisture in the skin. Here, the purpose is self-defeating as the body butter makes one feel less clean after getting clean in the shower. I mean, honestly, who lathers up in a slimy, greasy-feeling product in order to feel clean after scrubbing off dirt and grime?

Not me.

I've also noticed that this particular body butter melts. I left it in my car this spring (not in the sunlight) and the purple container heated up and melted the product. It resolidified when brought inside and left for a day in a cool, dark area, but it seems like this is a liability if it is being carried around by someone in a handbag or such.

As well, this product has a loathsome taste. I accidentally tasted a bit of the papaya body butter and it had a neutral, lotion taste that was inoffensive, at best. My gosh, this passion fruit stuff is foul! I applied some to my lips to see how it would moisturize them and the result was several minutes of gagging and scraping my tongue. It's gross and my lips are drier now because I insisted on getting every trace off.

Until that happened, I was leaning toward a soft "recommend" because the product does work for moisturizing and revitalizing the skin. But after having the vile experience of accidentally tasting it, combined with the icky feeling on my skin and the expense, I've moved to an equally soft "not recommend" (it was a razor decision). There are products that have more memorable scents, moisturize skin and do not leave such an unpleasant feeling residue to them. I look forward to ditching this product when I find one!

For other skin care products, please visit my reviews of:
St. Ives Gentle Apricot Scrub
Wet Pina Colada Flavored Personal Lubricant
The Body Shop Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt

5/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please be sure to visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Showering Under The Sea; The Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt

The Good: Seems to exfoliate a fair amount, with a gentle quality
The Bad: Not abrasive enough, Does not last particularly long, Not great on sensitive areas
The Basics: Robbing me of dexterity and tearing off dead skin and scabs, the Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt is a fair concept poorly executed.


As I review health and beauty products, I've been critical of foul smelling anti-bacterial hand lotions and generally disappointed with the ineffective apricot scrub from St. Ives , but I think I've found the weirdest health and beauty product yet for me to review with The Body Shop's Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt. I started using the smooth and renew loofah mitt about a month ago and - until it disintegrated, it was what I was applying my prized Cinnamon Bun Heaven 3-in-1 with.

The rough road to smooth skin, the by-line to the smooth & renew loofah mitt, is apparently not a terribly useful or enduring road, either. The loofah mitt is designed to take the place of a washcloth or pouf and it is basically a glorified potholder with texture. There, I said it. This is basically a cotton mitten that has loofah fibers on the palm that one is supposed to use in the shower to clean.

I have nothing against the idea of a loofah mitt, but there are several problems with the execution of this particular idea. First, what does this product do right? The loofah mitt is basically a one-size-fits-all hygiene product. I have big hands and I have no problem fitting my hand into this mitt. So, it has that going for it. Even though the cotton seems to shrink with repeated use (I take very hot showers and the mitt is 100% cotton . . .), the mitt never stopped fitting.

As well, the loofah side is fairly abrasive. Up until the moment the product began falling apart, this was stiff, rough on the skin and seemed to do a good job of exfoliating medium-wear areas. I feared - before using this product - that it would essentially act like spaghetti; get it wet enough and it would simply go limp. That was not the case, though. This was very stiff constantly, which I think is what one wants from a loofah.

But therein starts the problems. The Smooth & Renew Loofah Mitt is poorly designed because it robs the hands not only of the fingers' dexterity, but of any real use of the hand as a useful appendage. The loofah is very stiff, which is what allows it to be abrasive to the skin, in essence acting like a Brillo pad on the skin. That's good. However, because it is so stiff and remains so stiff, the fingers cannot bend inward while wearing the mitt. This means that the loofah mitt is problematic to use around the more abrupt curves on the body. For example, cleaning around the ankles becomes a weird exercise in movement while wearing the smooth & renew mitt. Instead of being able to wash by wrapping the fingers around the ankle, the user is relegated to washing using a sanding motion up and down going around the ankle. Sigh.

Because the loofah is designed to be rinsed out, wrung out, and dried, the "grain" of the loofah mitt is maintained. After a few uses, I could bend my thumb in toward my palm (the loofah mitt does not prevent - in fact it encourages - a cupping motion of the hand) but this barely increased the functionality of the smooth and renew loofah mitt.

The loofah mitt is a weird middle ground as far as function as well. The loofah mitt is nowhere near as abrasive as a pumice stone, so it's not as good for taking care of the bottoms of feet or hand calluses. Conversely, it's way too abrasive to be comfortable on any remotely sensitive areas . . . . sigh. I understand that we want nice looking skin, but tearing up sensitive areas is not the way to do it. Added to that, this loofah mitt will tear off any scabs you might have and that's just not nice.

Why isn't this a complete wash of a product? Knees and elbows. As I've begun gardening for the season, its my knees and elbows where my skin suffers the most and within two showers with the loofah mitt's abrasive qualities, they become human again. The experience of exfoliating using the loofah mitt on the knees and elbows is not so delicate as to be ineffective nor so abrasive as to be overkill. It's just right for that function.

But . . . then it fell apart. After a month's use, the loofah side of the mitt began to break down. Once the first fibers of the loofah began to fall out, I only had a week before the product became useless. After the first fibers fell, it was less than a week before there were two holes in the loofah that were over an inch in diameter. The cotton mitt never gave out, nor did the stitching holding the loofah to the mitt, but it became disheartening to watch the thing fall apart and have to constantly clean up the shower drain. I tossed the mitt when I started finding loofah pieces in my hair (as opposed to vice versa).

Gardeners, I'd recommend this for use on your knees and elbows, but otherwise, I can't justify the expense when a washcloth with a good scrub ought to do what this sells itself to do.

For other health or beauty products, please check out my reviews of:
Burt's Bees Medicated Lip Balm
The Body Shop Strawberry Body Butter
Christmas Tree Vanilla Bean Noel soap

3/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please check out my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.



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Ahh . . . Body Butter, The Body Shop's Strawberry Body Butter Is An Average Moisturizer!

The Good: Good smell, Decent protectant/moisturizing properties
The Bad: EXPENSIVE!
The Basics: A generally good product, Strawberry Body Butter is nevertheless a bit expensive for what it is and what it does.


Have you ever encountered a product where expense truly changes your interpretation of the product? As I return to reviewing body butters from The Body Shop - at least one, as I find myself on the road in the company of women who have some! - I find myself considering that idea as I sit to review The Body Shop's Strawberry Body Butter. This is, in truth, a good-smelling product which does exactly what it promises in that it moisturized skin and smells good. However, with its hefty price tag, it is hard to consider it an outstanding product. As a result, the product falls more into average territory as the benefits of the product are hardly worth the lack of value. Still, it is a good product.

Strawberry Body Butter from The Body Shop is designed for normal skin. I have normal skin, as it appears that it takes quite a bit for my skin to break out in hives or rashes and is generally well-moisturized. In fact, the driest skin on my body is in the obvious areas; feet, knees and elbows. Not usually inclined to use a product like this on a daily basis, it has been more of a lark for me having some available to me. I've been using it steadily on those three areas as well as my hands for general moisturizing and after a few days, I have to say that the product has been decent as far as keeping my normal skin hydrated and the problem areas on my body rehydrated.

As with other body butters, a body butter is a somewhat greasy, near-solid cream (like a pomade) that comes in a disc-like container (like shoe polish) that is designed to protect and/or moisturize skin. Unscrewing the top of the container gives the user ample access to the body butter and this is a very easy product to get out of its container and use. As well, this does seem to go rather far. I've used other containers for months and the last few days with Strawberry Body Butter has left not even a dent in the container. I feel good about that as these have been in the $8.00 range for a 1.7 oz. container, which makes it impossible for me to call this product cheap!

The strawberry body butter smells like strawberries, or rather the produced, assumed scent of strawberries that we are told is strawberry. As one who used to have a strawberry patch and eat a lot of fresh strawberries, I know that strawberries have a much more mild scent than most cosmetic companies would like us to believe. Still, this smells like super-concentrated strawberries and the scent is powerful and sweet and evokes the correct image in one's mind's eye of strawberries. Still, there is a creamier scent to these strawberries that makes it more mellow and less overbearing than one might think. This is a good scent for those who want a subtle scent for when one is close to someone as opposed to a scent that will attract attention from across the room.

With my limited amount of use, I have discovered the scent of strawberries remains on the skin - at least my elbows, hands and knees - for about three hours. After that, the scent becomes something more generically fruity , but it persists for about three more hours on top of that. My partner could not identify the fruity scent after four hours, but later she easily identified it after two, so this is a scent that changed some as time goes on. In the container and for a while on the skin, though, it smells like strawberries and it is a sweet, enticing scent.

Strawberry Body Butter actually works. This body butter does an excellent job of moisturizing skin that is dried out. As a newly married person, I have spent plenty of time on my knees and as a result, I felt I could use a good moisturizer. The body butter moisturized and reinvigorated my skin on my knees and elbows quite well. Given all of the typing I do, it was nice to have a moisturizer that kept my fingers and hands soft and supple.

But the cost, not the expense, seemed a bit high. This product goes on greasy and leaves a sensation of being coated. When I've applied it, I've felt coated (something I don't feel with, say Vaseline Intensive Care lotion). While there is no actual film left (I've tested with papers at various points after applying the product), I have a constant sensation that begs to differ with reality when using this body butter. If you can imagine feeling for three hours like you are coated in a thin film of margarine, you have a good idea of how unpleasant this body butter may make one feel.

The body butter is recommended for maintaining skin moisture in addition to restoring skin to a normal moisture level when it has been dried out. So, for example, body butter is recommended for application after taking a shower (the body usually dehydrates some after acclimating to a long shower or bath) to keep moisture in the skin. Here, the purpose is self-defeating as the body butter makes one feel less clean after getting clean in the shower. I mean, honestly, who lathers up in a slimy, greasy-feeling product in order to feel clean after scrubbing off dirt and grime?

I've also noticed that this particular body butter melts. I left it in my car - I took it on a day trip - and the dark red container heated up and melted the product. It resolidified when brought inside and left for a day in a cool, dark area, but it seems like this is a liability if it is being carried around by someone in a handbag or such. While this product is not recommended for areas like the lips, I discovered (by accident) that this has a very inoffensive taste. The flavor is more dry and buttery than the sweet it smells like, but it does not taste sour or disgusting in any way.

Quite simply, Strawberry Body Butter from the Body Shop is a good product, but not one that is likely to light the world on fire with any extraordinary benefits. Instead, especially with the expense of the product, it is more average, though it does exactly what it claims to. It helps maintain normal skin and that is a product worth recommending in my book.

For other products that help care for the skin, please check out my reviews of:
Burt's Bees Hand Salve
Bath & Body Works Winter Candy Apple Anti-Bacterial Gel
Blistex Herbal Answer lip balm

6/10

For other health and beauty product reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.




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