As a beauty editor, I’m lucky enough to get a lot of free skincare, hair, and makeup products to test—mascara included. Right at this very moment, I have over 30 tubes of mascara sitting in a bin in my closet. (Don’t worry; they won’t go to waste. I’m determined to get through every single tube before its expiration date.)
Because of this access and my years of mascara-swiping experience, I feel like I have a pretty good gauge of what makes a mascara special. Spoiler alert: It has nothing to do with price. In fact, some of my favorite formulas are $15 or less. Take Essence Lash Princess Mascara ($5) for example. It costs less than my morning latte, yet it delivers long, fluttery, and defined lashes in a single swipe. I’m not the only one who thinks so; it happens to be Amazon’s best-selling mascara.
So when I heard it was getting a matching lash primer (yes, really!), I knew I had to test it. If it was anything like its best-selling mascara companion, I knew I would love it. Hint: I did. Keep scrolling to see the major difference it made in the state of my fine, thin lashes.