Almost too sweet, in fact. This brown sugar lip scrub from Not Soap Radio is a simple concoction of oils and brown sugar and should be applied directly to the lips using your fingertips. Scrub in a circular motion, rinse and ta-da! Soft, smooth lips.


The texture is like sand and smells of delicious almond oil and brown sugar. It reminds me of freshly baked almond cookies with caramelized sugar drizzled on top. The scent is almost overpowering, and yet I find it impossible to stop myself from cracking the lid on the container and just inhaling the scent.


And the oils...lots and lots of oils. There's almond, there's avocado, there's coconut and just for good measure they threw in some beeswax, mango seed butter and cocoa seed butter.


PROTIP: If you have naturally oily skin, use this product sparingly. The concentration of oils really is over the top and will only exacerbate the issue. For everyone else, use this product before you wash your face with your daily cleanser (you do have one, right?). If you wash your face, then scrub your lips you're probably just going to end up washing your face again which is worse than not washing it at all.


The container is just large enough to get a fingertip or two in so you can scoop it out, but I found that a lot of the product ended up on the bottom of the bathtub. It was difficult to scoop it out, then close the lid quickly---and tightly, then get the stuff up to my lips. In one shower, I must have dropped three scoops while attempting this deft maneuver.


As far as how well the product works, it gets an "S" for satisfactory. My lips were indeed smoother than they were before and almost all of the dead skin was removed, what little remained I was able to rub off with my towel afterwards. They weren't moisturized though. I suppose if you can stand heavily scented things on your lips for a significant period of time that your lips may benefit from the oils, but I found it off-putting and wanted to get it off my mouth as quickly as possible.


Does this make a great bridal, wedding, baby-shower other girl-orientated party gift? Yes. Is it something I would purchase for myself, had it not been a gift? No. I have an apricot scrub that I use on a daily basis to exfoliate my face and it makes no difference to me if I use that or the lip scrub. My husband hates the way the brown sugar scrub smells. He says it's too sweet, smells like Blistex (and it kind of does because they have similar ingredients) and is a real turn off. Luckily, he isn't able to smell it if I use it a couple of hours before he gets home. You could also make this stuff at home with a bag of brown sugar, a teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil and a dash of almond flavoring.

It took a few different techniques to get this to work in the shower, but it works much better over the sink. It only took a month of every day use to dwindle it to nothing and I don't think I'll be restocking even though it wasn't too bad in the end.