VIB Rouge Holiday Soirée

If you're a makeup addict like me, you probably spend way too much of your disposable income at Sephora. Last year, to accommodate the growing number of makeup addicts looking for better perks in their Beauty Insider rewards program, they instated the top tier 'VIB Rouge' level - spend $1,000 in a calendar year, and you attain this level. Free 3 day shipping, better samples, bonus shopping events. When you're a Rouge member, you begin to see invites like the one below pop into your mailbox during the year, for closed door shopping events.

This year's holiday shopping event was on a Wednesday evening, meaning they actually closed down the store for everyone but Rouge members, which was actually really cool! In the past, Rouge events had been on Sunday mornings at 9 in the morning - meaning the store was opening early, but us Rouge members had to get up early and drag ourselves to the mall when we would normally be in bed - not making us feel very catered to (me, at least...) These events usually promise gifts or samples - this year was a Shashi bracelet and a tote bag. There's always a tote bag, and I really like the tote bags, since they're great as reusable shopping bags, and who doesn't love to have those on hand? However, here is the bracelet that was given out:

...this is a seed bead bracelet on some embroidery floss. I'm not very familiar with Shashi, but a 30% off coupon was also given out, so I'm sure they also offer some better merchandise. I could go to AC Moore and buy the materials to make this myself for less than $5. I've spent well over a grand at Sephora over the past year (I re-qualified for Rouge back in March) and honestly, with a shoddy gift like this, I'm not feeling very appreciated. The usual makeup bag of small samples would have made me feel better than being given this, ESPECIALLY around the holiday season, where I go and dump a lot more of my hard earned money into Sephora in the form of gifts for my friends and family. 

I do think that it was pretty cool of Sephora to shut down their store and re-open it for Rouge members only during regular business hours to giver us some private shopping time - they knew they would make money, as they clearly know we already spend it there! But if you're going to push that we are so special and that you want to show your appreciation with "limited edition status gifts" - don't make them things that we can make for ourselves in our spare time. ...get more of those adorable mini Le Rouge lipsticks, THOSE were fantastic!