Review: Biore Skin Preservation Moisturizer

Good for summer, bad for winter. That should be Biore's disclaimer for the Skin Preservation Moisturizer ($12.99 @ Target), which is for "transitional skin", that is to say skin that is past teenage acne but not yet dealing with wrinkles. The bottle has a dual pump that dispenses moisturizer and SPF 30 separately. According to Biore, keeping the two fluids in separate chambers preserves each one's potency, but I'm thinking that might just be a marketing gimmick.


I must say, I adore this product's consistency and scent. It's kind of thicker than Clinique's Dramatically Different moisturizer, which allows the product to sink into the skin in like 5 seconds. The scent is a mild cucumber/soapy smell, which fades quite fast, so the experience of putting it on is nice, but you're not in danger of smelling like a cuke all day. Also, the SPF 30 does not make my skin look super white and goes on smoothly, not greasy at all. For the summer, this is drugstore perfection.

The first negative is is the tricky packaging. The dual pump does not initially dispense equal amounts of the two fluids. You have to 1) tap the bottle hard on a surface, and 2) pump 7-9 times before both fluids come out! Hello, that's a lot of wasted moisturizer! I put the excess into a an empty sample jar from MAC.

The second negative is that this does nothing for dry, flaky skin. Its already quite cold where I live, and my skin has gone from needing blotting sheets to being flaky dry (lucky me right?). I found that just a few minutes after putting on the moisturizer, I had dry patches around my mouth. Even two pumps right after a warm shower wasn't doing the trick. So its pretty simple, this is a wonderful drugstore moisturizer in the summer, but in the winter, go with something thicker.

Final grade: A-