Like most women, I try to take good care of my skin. I want to age gracefully, and the best way to do that is to make sure that I treat my skin well all the time. I use sunscreen religiously–I’d rather be pale than have to worry about skin cancer. I am constantly using lotion–especially after a shower, but even more often during the dry summer months. And I always remove my makeup each night, taking special care to use a gentle remover around the eye area.
Another way I take care of my skin is to use a cleansing scrub on my face. I really love the St. Ives Apricot Scrub–I’ve been using it for years. At least three or four mornings a week, I apply this scrub to my face to get rid of any dead skin cells and it works to leave my face feeling soft, smooth, and moisturized.
But, being a beauty product junkie, I can’t resist trying new products that come out on the market. So, I have tried several other facial scrubs over the years. There have been a few that aren’t too bad, but none that have come close to replacing the St. Ives Apricot Scrub as my favorite. It is fun to experiment with new products, though, so I’m always eager to give any newcomer to the market a trial run.
Such was the case when I saw that Garnier had come out with a skin-care line. I was already a fan of many of their hair-care products, so I was excited to see that they had branched out into the skin-care field. One product in their new line that I definitely wanted to try was the Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub. I bought it and decided to compare it to my current fave, the St. Ives Apricot Scrub, to see which one would come out on top.
Price was what I compared first. Neither product was too costly, but there was a difference in their prices:
St. Ives Apricot Scrub: $3.99 for 6 oz
Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub: $5.99 for 5 oz
I wasn’t surprised to see that the Garnier scrub was the more expensive scrub–it is common for new product lines to be a little more pricey when they are first introduced. Actually, I was kind of surprised that the Garnier scrub wasn’t a little more expensive than it was–some of the other products in the Garnier Nutritioniste line were more than twice that price.
But, price doesn’t matter if you don’t like the product, right? So I had to give it a try. I took the St. Ives Apricot Scrub out of my shower for a couple of weeks and replaced it with the Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub, deciding to use it on the mornings I would have normally used the St. Ives scrub. I ended up using the Garnier scrub three or four mornings a week.
Before I get into my impressions of the two facial scrubs, I want to give a little more information on each because they have very different formulations. Yes, they are both scrubs, which, by design, are intended to smooth the skin and remove dry skin. But, they each contain different ingredients:
St. Ives Apricot Scrub: made from 100% natural exfoliants (tiny pieces of walnut shells) along with skin-nourishing Swiss botanicals and pure Swiss glacial water
Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub: contains gentle microbeads to scrub the skin, along with Vitamin E, Grape Extract, and Vitamin B5; also has Green Leaf Extract to naturally soothe and refresh skin
As you can see, the scrubs are quite different in composition; however, they feel remarkably similar against the skin. Both are used in the same way–squeeze a small amount out of the tube and massage onto your moistened face with your fingertips, then rinse. With each of these facial scrubs, it is important to be diligent about your rinsing of the product–take extra care to make sure that you have removed all of the scrub, a quick and light rinse won’t do the job.
As I said, both the St. Ives Apricot Scrub and the Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub felt very much the same on the face. You would think by looking at the ingredients that the St. Ives scrub (with the walnut pieces) might be a little harsher than the Garnier scrub (with the microbeads), but that isn’t the case. Judging by the feel of the products alone, I would be hard-pressed to tell the difference between the two.
So which facial scrub did the better job of exfoliating my skin? Well, it’s hard to say. Both of the scrubs did very well at this; both left my face feeling smooth and soft and looking radiant. And, neither the St. Ives scrub nor the Garnier scrub had a drying effect–both of them left my skin feeling moisturized, not tight and dry.
What about scent? Is there a clear winner in this category? Again, not really. Neither of the two scrubs has a very strong scent. The St. Ives scrub reminds me a little bit of apricots, of course, but it also has a note of lemon to its scent. As for the Garnier scrub, it has a light fruity scent (if you are familiar with any of the Garnier product line, you are likely aware that their products generally have a fruity-type scent; however, the face care products do not have as strong of a scent as the hair care products do).
After my two-week test, I have to say that I am quite impressed with the Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub. It works well, smells good, and leaves my skin looking refreshed. But, is it better than my St. Ives Apricot Scrub? Well, no. It isn’t better. But–it isn’t worse, either. I really don’t think I can choose which product is best because I like them both equally! I suppose I could take the easy way out and fall back on price, saying that because the Garnier scrub is marginally more expensive than the St. Ives scrub, I will stick to buying my St. Ives…but I wouldn’t be honest if I said that. I actually plan to stick to both of these facial scrubs–I’m making room in my shower for both tubes.
So do I suggest that you do the same? Do I think that everyone should purchase both of these facial scrubs? Probably not, unless you are a real beauty product junkie like I am. If you want to buy only one, take a look at the ingredients that each scrub contains (that’s why I listed them) and choose the one that you feel is right for your skin. Or, since these two scrubs work in such similar ways, just go to the store and get a whiff of the scent of each scrub–then choose the one that has the scent you like best. You could even decide to just buy the one that you have a coupon for, or the one that is on sale.
I really didn’t expect for the Garnier Nutritioniste Nutri-Pure Microbead Cream Scrub to be so much like the St. Ives Apricot Scrub that I already loved–I figured I would have a clear-cut winner after I tested the products against each other. I guess that goes to show that things don’t always go how we expect, right?
