Skin Renewal Facial Peeling Cream for under £10, SAY WHAT??

I have been saving this post for a good long while. I basically bought this skin cream on a whim during my honeymoon because I was intrigued as to whether something which costs £6.99 would actually deliver results that a glycolic acid skin peel would. I've been using it as my daily and nightly moisturiser for about six weeks now, read on to find out more about the results and my experience with it!

Where and how much is it?

Glycolic Acid Skin Renewal Cream by Holland & Barrett is my new best friend, for an 85g tub it costs £6.99 and lasts for ages. You can see a link to it here. It can be used all over the body, even around the eyes. It leaves my skin soft, supple and smooth. I don't know if I've said before but I have very sensitive skin, most sensitive skin products are too harsh for me! So if this product hasn't reacted on me then it must be very gentle. I always recommend trying a product in a patch test on the arm or neck to see if you react, do this at least 48 hours before applying to the face for the first time.

What is Glycolic Acid and am I going to end up with a crispy face?

Glycolic acid is a fruit acid and can be derived from sugar cane, pineapples and unripe grapes to name a few sources. It works on the skin in a similar way to salicylic acid (or aspirin), I've seen numerous skin care videos about using aspirin masks which can help with acne scarring, hyperpigmentation and wrinkles. Glycolic acid is the acid most commonly used in skin peels, you know the ones on 10 years younger where the person looks like the undead for a few weeks before revealing baby soft skin! But don't be frightened, to get that effect you'd have to use a product with a 70%+ concentration of glycolic acid, this cream has less than 20% so it's not going to make your skin peel that quickly or noticeably.

What happened?

I have been using this cream for over six weeks now, I always give treatments a month of my time to see how they work. The other day I finally noticed that my skin looked brighter, wrinkles were less obvious and it feels wonderfully smooth. Do you remember that on my eye make up remover video someone left a comment about Milia (those little fat filled white bumps that appear around the lips and under eyes)? Pretty much everyone has those, usually related to high cholesterol diets and lack of vitamin A. Glycolic acid is a great treatment for those as it gently breaks down the fats holding dead skin cells on your newer skin underneath, which can help release dead skin and clear up the milia. This has also been a great reliever of my rosacea which makes the skin on my cheeks look red all the time and sometimes I get a painful red rash which doesn't go away for ages. So far I haven't had any bad episodes and if one does come up this cream seems to make it go away faster and leaves the skin smooth instead of dry and flaky. Oh the joys of acne!

The only caveat with this cream is that it may increase your sensitivity to sun exposure, so you must wear an SPF during the day if using this cream as your moisturiser.

My recommendation

It's a big fat YES, I've recommended this product to everyone I know as I think it's a really effective and cheap way to get brighter and softer skin. I'm going to keep using it as it's proven its worth to me already. I've just ordered four more tubs of this, just in case there is a national shortage. I am a bit concerned as I ordered them a week ago and still no sign of them... hmmm.