This $43 Eyebrow-Tinting Kit Has Saved Me Roughly $2,700
Save this article to read it later.
Find this story in your account’s‘Saved for Later’section.
Comment
While I will happily fork over my dough to have a brow artist carefully tame my brows into perfect arches one plucked hair at a time, I will nevereverpay for eyebrow-tinting. This wasn’t always the case. I used to add a tint to every brow service, spending an extra $20 to $45 to darken my brows. This felt essential — my brows can be sparse, especially at the tails, and the tint helped them look much fuller and thicker than they actually were. I’m admittedly not a big DIY-er and usually prefer to leave my face in the capable hands of professionals.
Then COVID hit, eyebrow-waxing was deemed an unessential service, and I got stuck at home with untamed brows. But, as they say, necessity is the mother of innovation. I lasted one month before I decided to report a story abouthow to tint your eyebrows at homefor reasons both professional and deeply selfish.Joey Healy, founder of Joey Healy Eyebrow Studio andJoey Healy Eyebrow Collection, who had done my brows in the past, pointed me to RefectoCil, a vegetable-based cream dye. I immediately ordered an at-home kit to try myself.
New! You can now save this product for later.
Five years later, I haven’t paid for eyebrow-tinting since.
The kit comes with (almost) everything you need: one tube of dye, the oxidant, a little cup for mixing, and a brush.
While there are plenty of shades to choose from, after experimenting over the years I now stick with dark brown and black, mixing those two shades together for my best color. At one point, I used only dark brown but found the tone was a little flat, so I recommend buying two shades for the best result. For me, that’s 75 percent dark brown and 25 percent black pigment mixed together.
The steps are simple. First, I cleanse my brows with a swipe of a micellar-water-soaked cotton round to remove any excess oil and dirt. Then I block the outline of my brow with Vaseline and a Q-tip. This step is essential since the dye does tint your skin, so you don’t want any excess staining. Then I add ten drops of the oxidant to my dye mixture and stir together until I get a consistency that’s slightly thicker thanbrow gel.
Once the dye is ready, I take an eyeliner brush and paint it onto my brows, leave it for ten minutes, and wipe it off with another micellar-water-soaked cotton round to reveal perfectly tinted brows every time.
A good rule of thumb to remember is that the longer the dye sits on the brows, the darker it will develop. I have overshot it and ended up with Groucho Marx brows a few times, so I advise starting out with five to eight minutes and then adding more time to find the sweet spot. Sometimes I will go back in and apply a second coat of dye to the areas where my hairs are especially sparse, usually just focusing on my tails for a few extra minutes. When I first reported the story, I was told those with finer hair types, lighter brows, and fairer complexions need less developing time, while those with thick hair types, darker brows, and darker skin tones will need more. Since then, I’ve used this kit on multiple members of my family, including my mother, father, and a few aunts, and following that general rule of thumb has never led me astray.
The kit will set you back $43, as does rebuying a twin pack of the dye every few months. But since I used to spend that mucheachtime I visited my brow artist, it’s a no-brainer. In fact, while I’m admittedly very bad at math, I’ve crunched the numbers and believe I’ve saved roughly $2,700 over the past five years of doing my tinting at home.
More From The Strategist
- The Back-to-School Hall of Fame
- The Best Things Strategist Editors Have Bought This Year (So Far)
- Everything You Need to Outfit Your College Dorm
- The Strategist Summer 100
The Strategistis designed to surface useful, expert recommendations for things to buy across the vast e-commerce landscape. Every product is independently selected by our team of editors, whom you can read abouthere. We update links when possible, but note that deals can expire and all prices are subject to change.
