The Clinique Take the Day Off cleansing balm is one of those skincare products that so many people have raved about that by now, it has reached a cult status. Therefore I wanted to try it too. Is this really as good as everyone makes it out to be? For my dry, dehydrated and sensitive skin I have found that I usually rate products differently than most people. What’s more, with this product my main use for it would be to take off a full face of makeup and in the past I have found that with many cleansers this can be quite a difficult task. Will this cleansing balm live up to the hype? Let’s find out!
Skincare review: Clinique Take the Day Off cleansing balm
Before we get into the product and how it works, let’s talk price point. I have found three wildly different price points for this exact same product. It comes in a jar of 125 ml which is more than most cleansing balms that seem to come with a measly 75 or 100 ml of product. At one store this costs €36.35, whereas at another retailer it is slightly reduced at the moment and you pay €32.36. The most affordable price I have found is €22.95 which is a huge difference so I am not sure how that came about. In any case, it is still more expensive than the Good Molecules cleansing balm I fell in love with last year. I remember when I bought mine I paid just over €30 for it, which makes this double the price point of the Good Molecules for 50 mls of product more.
What does this cleanser have to offer?
I had a look at what the brand promises this product will do. It is marketed as a gentle cleanser that keeps your natural skin barrier intact (skin barrier is the buzz word of skincare in 2021, so they at least have that down). The brand goes on to claim this should remove any impurities, residue of skincare products such as sunscreen and most importantly: it removes even the most full face of makeup. It should make your skin feel supple, hydrated and not stripped like some cleansers can do. This is why I bought the product: I was looking for a good cleanser that can take off makeup without making my skin feel dry and stripped afterwards.
How does this product work?
Clinique’s Take the Day Off cleansing balm is indeed a very gentle cleanser. So gentle in fact that I feel I need twice the amount of product to take off my makeup completely and then I feel I am still left with a bit of residue afterwards. I also think the texture of this product is a bit weird. First of all, it comes in a pot and you simply have to dig some product out. At first this wasn’t such a big deal, but after using the jar up nearly completely the product started to feel lumpy as if there are big clumps of cleanser stuck together. Not sure that is due to the actual texture or whether that started happening because of opening the packaging and exposing it to air and my fingers’ bacteria: who can tell at this point.
Secondly, the jar this comes in is deceiving as it makes you feel as if you are getting more product than you actually do. After just a few uses I already started to notice some purple shining through at the bottom. When I stuck my finger in, I found out that much of the packaging is a false bottom that takes up nearly half the container. Such a waste of packaging and something that Clinique is quite well known for as their Pepstart Moisturizer had the same sort of packaging where half the container is nothing but a thick chunk of plastic.
What are the ingredients like?
Clinique is a brand that is often recommended to people with dry and sensitive skin as they are marketed as a sensible brand that is void of nasties. This is definitely not true of all their products and for me, Clinique has been a bit hit or miss with their products as a result. While some of their ingredients are okay, I also feel that in my case not all the products are as effective and therefore I have only dipped my toe into a few of their products, but have never really committed myself to the brand. In the case of this cleansing balm the ingredient list is as follows:
Ethylhexyl Palmitate, Carthamus Tinctorius (Safflower) Seed Oil, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Sorbeth-30 Tetraoleate, Polyethylene, Peg-5 Glyceryl Triisostearate, Water\Aqua\Eau, Tocopherol, Phenoxyethanol
It’s a short ingredient list but after badly reacting to a skincare product with just 2 ingredients, I know that it is not the amount of ingredients but how something is formulated that really makes the difference. In the case of a cleanser I actually don’t really mind the ingredients all that much as I rinse it off immediately anyway.
My final thoughts
This cleansing balm does what it needs to do but it doesn’t beat my favorite Good Molecules cleansing balm that’s for sure. The Clinique cleansing balm sounds like a good deal on paper, but I just felt I didn’t get the same experience and the fact that I need a lot of product to not even take off all my makeup has made me not fall in love with this product. In fact, I will be very happy when this is done in a few days as I am looking forward to just using it up. I know I have tried it now, but for me, it just wasn’t the product I feel everyone makes it out to be and therefore did not live up to the hype. The Good Molecules one comes with a spatula and is therefore easier to use. It doesn’t have a weird lumpy formula, I need far less product, and it retails for half the price. If you add all that up, it’s just a much better deal (even if I have to ship that in from the US!) than the Clinique.
Would I recommend the Clinique Take the Day Off cleansing balm?
I don’t say don’t buy this, but I am not raving it into the sweet heavens either. This is a cleanser that can be right for those people who don’t wear much makeup (certainly not waterproof mascara) and that are looking for a good basic cleanser to just rinse their face at the end of the day. There is no greasy weird layer this leaves either (like many cleansing balms) so that’s a huge plus for me. It truly is non-stripping and my skin feels great after using it, but since I try a lot of products, I feel I get to be just a little bit picky. And then my picky little self says: this is not the cleansing balm of my dreams.