The Body Shop Drops of Youth Eye Concentrate

A while ago I was finally running out of eye cream and so I was looking to try something new. I went into The Body Shop, because I like plenty of their skincare products. The lady recommended I try the Drops of Youth Eye Concentrate. It should not only be cooling on the skin, but also combat puffiness and tired looking eyes, which is exactly why I use an eye cream in the first place. I was curious to see if this would work and so I took it home and tried it out.

The Body Shop Drops of Youth Eye Concentrate

The Body Shop launched their Drops of Youth line a few years ago. The line is targeted at combating the first signs of fine lines and since I am in my early 30s I think it was about time I started to get more serious about my skincare. This little guy doesn’t come cheap: it retails for €25. It thus falls into the more expensive range of The Body Shop products.

The product comes in this roller ball container with a pump to dispense the product. The roller ball is supposed to enhance the cooling effect. Not too hygienic as you’re supposed to roll over your skin with the little ball. It’s is better than putting your fingers in a jar of course, but still, I prefer a pump any time of day.

The packaging comes with instructions. It says to apply this before your eye cream or moisturizer. You need to use the pump to get some of the product onto the ball, then apply the product in a figure 8 around your eye contour. Pat it in and you’re all set. Here’s what The Body Shop says:

See life through younger-looking eyes. Our unique Drops of Youth™ Eye Concentrate, enriched with Edelweiss plant stem cells, instantly refreshes the eye contour, and smoothes out the appearance of lines, bags and fatigue* for younger-looking eyes

• Smooths the appearance of lines around the eyes*

• Appearance of eye bags seems reduced*

• Eyes appear less tired*

• Innovative cooling roller ball pump applicator

When I had a look at their Dutch website this also stated that this is truly a serum: an extra to give a boost to your moisturizer or eye cream. And that’s how I used it.

When looking at the ingredients there are quite some ingredients that surprised me at the top of the list. Since I don’t know what my skin reacts to, I try to steer clear from anything with very long lists of ingredients. I have tried so many other TBS skincare products and never caused me any problems, so I decided to just go with it. Right at the top is Alcohol Denat. which is not the best for your skin. There are also some good things in there, as far as I can understand the ingredient list to begin with. In any case, I was surprised this product to have such a long list of ingredients. I am not used to that from other TBS skincare products.

The product itself is an odorless gel like texture. It feels refreshing and it feels really nice on the skin. I did feel something, like a little prickle, but nothing too drastic to decide to take this off and get rid of it. In fact, the first few times all was fine. It wasn’t after I had been using this every night for little over a week that I woke up one morning with a less than good looking eye contour. Horrified, I knew that it had to be this product as I hadn’t changed up anything else in my make up or skincare routine.

This is my left eye which was the worst. As you can see there are little bumps and even some swelling on my eyelid. It is also inflamed and red. It didn’t really hurt that much. I would describe the feeling as very similar to a bit of sunburn.

The other eye wasn’t as bad, but there are still some red splotches here and there from where I applied the concentrate the night before. Now I always use a moisturizer on top, so I knew that was not the problem. What I think cause this reaction is the fact that one pump of this stuff and applied according to the instructions is too much for my skin. It is either too potent or the amount dispensed is too generous for my sensitive skin. Thank god for concealer!

To see whether it was that, I continued using this for a few more weeks. I applied only half a pump and that worked. For a little while though. I didn’t get any allergic reactions again, thankfully, but after using this for about 6 – 8 weeks I noticed that my skin simply does not like this stuff. I get milia when my skin becomes dehydrated and that is what this stuff did. Even with applying my moisturizer on top, I noticed MORE lines instead of fewer, and the white zit like bumps that are my biggest skin issue had started to appear multifold.

And that is really why I decided to stop using this product. It is too powerful for my sensitive skin and at the same time it does not do what it promises to do. It is still cooling and my eye contour looked less tired for sure. But I don’t think it’s worth if it creates more dry lines and milia, while potentially damaging my skin at the same time. No matter how hard I tried loving this product, this is one that is not for me.

What eye cream do you use?