I have always been a massive fan of reading, I still have every single book I have ever owned, they are something I just can't part with. I think that due to my love for reading, I have always been interested in writing. If you have read my blog posts for a while, you will have noticed a change in the content that I am writing about. I used to write blog post after blog post, all dedicated to LUSH releases and LUSH products that I enjoyed and lately, I haven't been writing any LUSH related. In fact, this is the first post that I have written in two months that is solely dedicated to LUSH. I have started to ask myself lately, am I falling out of love with LUSH?
I have been a fan of LUSH for as long as I can remember. I've most definitely told this story before, that I was around 6 or 7 the first time I purchased a LUSH item. It was a Blue Skies and Fluffy White Clouds bubble bar and I purchased it for my Mum for Mothers Day. I would save my pocket money as a kid and spend it on bubble bars and bath bombs, and then in 2013, when I started working and earning a good wage, I started buying a lot more than I had ever before. Ever since then, my collection has just kept growing, until as of late. I used to be in my local LUSH shop all the time, so much so to the point of where they all know me by name now. I would be in there every Friday, when I was paid weekly, spending tonnes of money on bath bombs and all the products I used frequently, and forever trying new things. I would be that person that they could hand anything to and I would purchase it, just because it was LUSH. But since the Easter launch, I've been in my local store twice. That's really odd for me, for a place that I used to visit at least once, sometimes three times a week, to then only shop there twice in the space of two months.
I don't feel like I am the only one who is feeling this way towards LUSH lately. I feel like there is a massive part of the LUSH community at the moment, that feel the same way as I do. Underwhelmed, bored, disappointed, just to name a few. I also think that there are many reasons why the community is feeling this way.
I think the first major thing to annoy most Lushies is the failure to even attempt to provide products that are in demand. I have never in my life, known a company to not provide to their customers what they ask for. Not even slightly! I understand that ingredient sourcing can be hard, so sometimes a specific product that may be requested can't be made easily, but some of the products we ask for, they'd be able to create right there and then as the ingredients are used in mainline products. There are so many highly sought after LUSH products, take perfumes for example, that LUSH would be able to make, but just don't. I remember an image being shared on Instagram a few months ago by someone pretty high up in the hierarchy. of some perfume samples. Near every single comment was asking for a perfume version of all the scents us Lushies love so much. There were requests for Big, American Cream, The Comforter, Snowcake - so many requests for so many loved scents. The response was 'Making new ones, not rehashing all that old stuff from the past!!' Like what?! Old stuff from the past? Last time I checked, these scents were all still available to purchase in one format or another. You can't expect people to fall in love with a scent that you have created and not ask for more products in the same scent! I don't think that LUSH make very business savvy decisions, do they understand how much money they would make by released mainline scents in perfume form? An absolute killing! LUSH not listening to our requests has made me spend my money elsewhere, on other companies who listen to their customers, make products they want, bring back products they love and restock their limited edition items! I am spending so much more money on smaller businesses and I'm a little happier that way too, knowing that my love for the products is appreciated, and so is my money.
Another topic that has irritated most of the LUSH community has to be the naked ranges. I don't even think it's the naked range itself that has rubbed people up the wrong way, it's the fact that Lushies were bare face lied to at Christmas. We were promised that we would have the option, we would always be able to choose between liquid and solid shower gel. Then Valentines Day comes around and Tender is the Night is only available in solid format. Then Mothers Day comes and Antiope is only available in solid. And then Easter comes and Here Comes the Sun is only available in solid. Three shower gels that most people would have loved and there is no liquid version, as we were promised, in sight. I also think that LUSH's take on the naked shower gels is ridiculous too, trying to press on the fact that it is a shower gel and not a soap. No, it's a bloody god damn piece of soap, okay. I totally understand and agree with the less packaging option, but there are so many other ways that us as customers can still have our much loved liquid gels back and it be more eco-friendly.
One of the main things for me, has to be the fact that so many really good products have been discontinued and have been replaced with crappy products. We lost the likes of Frozen and Yoga Bomb and we got the infamous rank jelly bombs in their place. We lost Refresher, Needles and Pines and 93,000 Miles, and we got Deep Sleep, a retro product that I barely heard anybody request in the Kitchen days. We had so many products discontinued last year and I don't see them being replaced. We have had products that have barely been put on the shelves, take Cherryish for example, and they've been made permanent, yet we had to work so god damn hard to keep Scrubee last year and there were so many people asking for April Showers to be made main line and for Mother of Pearl to stay. It's as if they see what we want and do the complete opposite!
Another thing that has majorly pissed me off, is the LUSH reaction to the Sleepy hype. For how long have Lushies been in love with the Twilight scent? Literally years. Lushies have been asking for a body lotion, a body spray, the perfume, a bubble bar, more bath bombs for years. Literally every single request was pushed aside until the general public stumbled upon Sleepy and before we knew it the body spray was available in stores, the solid perfume was available twice within the space of months, Sleepy was mainline and some seasonal products were reinvented with the lavender and tonka scent. Don't get me wrong, I have grown to love the scent and it's one of my go to baths, but to ignore all your loyal fans requests for years and then give in to the general public, your occasional shoppers, is just a bit of a kick in the teeth.
Besides the lack of requests being fulfilled and besides the naked range, the ultimate annoyance has to be the closing of the Kitchen and the opening of Lush Labs. The Kitchen was amazing, getting to use your most loved discontinued and retro products again was brilliant. I don't see why the Kitchen had to close. I get that the standards of the product weren't up to scratch, but that could have been resolved by reducing the number of products created a week or by moving more staff into the Kitchen! When the Kitchen was closing, we were promised that what was coming next would be better. We were promised that there would be monthly products available, in much bigger batches and we would have combined shipping. What a load of rubbish! Looking back, I've never heard anything so comical. The live stream that was held to inform us that the Kitchen was closing was a complete and utter shambles and told us nothing apart from the fact that the Kitchen was no more and everything else that was said was either a lie or a mess. Since the Kitchen closed, we have had maybe a handful of releases. The Christmas products, which made me have a little bit of faith in the new style Kitchen, then we had the Christmas body sprays and then the second bout of body sprays, Honey I Washed the Kids and The Olive Branch. So that's four releases since before Christmas 2017? And then Lush Labs is born and destroys any of our hopes for retro products coming back, 3D printed soap is all we have had so far!
So with all that being said, plus a few other things that have ticked me off that I won't majorly go into (like free Showcase tickets being dished out to 5 minute fans who managed to rack up 10k followers on social media within months, because they're 'working' the event, even though their doing the exact same that I am, posting on Instagram and writing blog posts and don't even get me started on their window displays for their recent campaigns) I was falling a little out of love with LUSH. I feel like as a loyal fan who has spent a small fortune in on their products over the a span of years, I am totally worthless to them. I felt like mine and many others opinions weren't recognised, because I don't have a massive following on social media, because I don't like the naked shower gels and because for once, I don't like the route they seem to be taking. I have been very disappointed in their seasonal releases so far this year, so much that I haven't stocked up on anything. My money has been going elsewhere, where I used to feel like I needed to own 10 of every bath bomb ever, I now have a taste for other things, like travelling, that mean more to me than a bath bomb ever could.
In saying all of this, my favourite time of the LUSH year will soon be upon us, Halloween and Christmas. I just hope to dear God they don't screw these releases up. LUSH, please don't release everything in naked format, give us the option to choose liquid or tubbed if we want. If for some bizarre reason you discontinue any good products, (don't you dare even think about not bringing back Christmas Sweater and Monsters Ball!) at least bring them out online and allow us to pick them up one last time. Just be straight up and honest with your customers and stop telling me to 'keep my eyes peeled,' they've been peeled for too bloody long and I don't see shit.
Despite the disappointment of last year, I will be attending the Showcase this year in Manchester and I am excited to see all the new products and hopefully some old favourites making a comeback. I really hope that this year is a lot better than last year, I literally want to throw my money at you, give me something good in return! And before then, some liquid shower gels would be very much appreciated!
Being honest, I'm not falling out of love with LUSH, I'm just overall, disappointed.
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**Disclaimer: All views, opinions and photos are my own.**