No-buy / low-buy for 2021 – my rules and why I’m doing this

Even though I published some products/brands I want to try this year – I should probably tell you about my bigger goal for 2021. I have decided to go on a no-buy (quite strict one at that) this year.

Why?

I have accumulated a lot of beauty products – from PR as well but mainly – from just buying too much. I have way more makeup that I could ever use up before they go off.

I have also listed my skincare items – and for now I have backups/similar products to pretty much every single step on my skincare. And way too many masks…

Here are some example of unopened products I have per category:

Cleansing oils / makeup removers (not including wipes since I only use them for makeup application/clean up): 6
Facial sunscreens: 4
Lip balms: 17 (including night lip masks)
Serums: 6
Facial washes: 7

Brow products (gels and pencils): 10
Powders (loose and pressed): 7
Mascaras: 4 full-sized and 3 travel-sized

So yeah, you can see that I don’t need more cosmetics anytime soon!

Another big reason why is money. Simple as that. And not that I would have less money than previous years to spend, but the fact that we should be moving hopefully this year to a bigger house – and that eats up money (both mortgage and items new house would need).

My rules

After answering, let’s go through my rules, which are quite short.

1. I can only buy new product if I don’t have backup of a product that is ending.
   I have repurchased this year few items: CeraVe PM lotion and lip balms (ordered from US). CeraVe PM lotion is my HG product for nighttime moisturizer and US has bigger bottles than in Finland. Also I go through lip balms like no tomorrow – and my daughter uses them as well – so I keep buying them.
2. I can buy from one limited edition collection if something really catches my eye.
   This is because I would’ve broken the rule last year anyway with Melt Cosmetics’ Beetlejuice collection. So if this year brands come up with awesome collabs with my favourite bands, movies or TV shows – I’m able to get one.
3. I can buy cosmetics for my daughter.
   My daughter has acne-prone skin and she uses some makeup so I’m allowed to buy her cosmetics if I don’t have any I can/want to give her.

That’s it! Not really any exciting rules but with that one exception I don’t think I should be buying anything at least until later this year. I might not have dupes for everything I currently use in my daily skincare routine – or makeup routine – but I think I can keep my skin looking healthy with the ones I have in stock.

Do you have cosmetics budget or are you going on low-buy/no-buy this year?