Tips & Tricks: 5-Minute Makeup Challenge—Results are Hysterical!

Do you enjoy getting your makeup done? It’s relaxing isn’t it, letting a trained professional pick the shades of color that compliment your features and highlight your beauty? Well, what if I told you here at the UnitWise headquarters, we threw relaxation out the window when we let some of our fellow Heroes try their hand at a five-minute makeup challenge. But here’s the catch, these aren’t your normal makeup wearing Heroes, and the results are far from being ordinary. 

• The Challenge: Four male Heroes had to makeover four female Heroes. 
• The Makeup: All Mary Kay products, with makeup consisting of concealer, foundation, eye primer, eye shadow, blush, mascara, and much more.
• The Rule: The guys had to use all of the product types, makeover their partner, and explain their process in five minutes or less.
• The Results: Probably years of blackmail.

As one of the volunteers to have my makeup done, I can say my experience was at times terrifying, nerve-wracking, and a trust building exercise, but completely worth the end result. My Hero partner, Max, seemed to be more nervous to start the makeover than I was; you would think we just asked him to climb Mt. Everest or something!

“Well, right off the bat I was nervous because of the amount of makeup to choose from,” said Max. “I think that gave me crippling anxiety for two minutes straight.” It’s true; he hesitated for several minutes before he would even touch a brush or pick up a product. Max continued, saying, “I see terms like ‘foundation’ and ‘primer’ and I start thinking about how houses get built.” Not a strong start.

Max’s first dilemma was to figure out which foundation he should use. For the record, I consider myself an ivory foundation user. Max thought I should be wearing a tan/bronze shade of makeup. Luckily, he compared the bottles and my skin like paint chips before deciding to go with the ivory shade. And don’t get me started on eye primer. I was afraid I might never be able to lift my eyelids again after the amount he applied. Of course, the eye treatment didn’t end. Max’s favorite part was the mascara. “I really enjoyed applying mascara, because I got to see instant results. I went too heavy on that, though. I was having so much fun doing it,” said Max. His ending statement, “I was pretty happy I didn't stab out your eyes.” Thanks, Max.

As for the other contestants, their results were pretty amusing as well:

Eli, who was partnered with Alicia, seemed more confident about his makeover abilities than everyone else. Here’s what he had to say about the ordeal, “I thought it was really interesting seeing the hassle that girls go through to make themselves look nice and presentable. Also, even though I think I did a pretty decent job of applying make-up and am considering quitting my day job to pursue a career in the industry, I'm glad I wasn't testing my skills on my own face.” Well Eli, I think we’re confident in your business decision but may we suggest you look into starting a spray tan company. Alicia replied that, “I enjoyed myself; I laughed more than anything. I wasn't nervous, only when Eli said he was going to put green eyeshadow on me. He also only put the liquid foundation on my chin but the bronzer everywhere.” Oh my, Eli!

Steve, Misty’s partner, surprised himself by how much he knew about applying makeup. He said, “Mostly it went OK, but some of the colors didn’t match her skin and the eye shadow I chose looked almost black over her eyes.” But Misty never lost faith in Steve. “He kept making me laugh because he was like: ‘This color will go really well with your skin tone, oh wait..maybe not.’ I was dying. He did a smokey eye without even knowing it and I assured him that the raccoon look was really in this season.” Seems like you are a makeup artist, Steve.

Another Hero, Charles, seemed to have the advantage over the other contestants. Charles at least had some experience applying makeup for local theatre production. However, he states, “[B]ut I have never applied makeup to someone else before this. I would like to offer my deepest sympathy to Casey for the terrible things I did to her.” And how exactly did Casey feel about it all? “I thought I was going to be traumatized by the makeup application from Charles,” Casey says. “But he was very gentle and it was actually not too terrible of an experience. Then I looked in the mirror. And then I was traumatized.” A bronze highlighting pen is supposed to be used directly under your eyes, right?  

If there is one major aspect we all learned from this makeup challenge, it’s that as a Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultant, Director, or NSD, you have a tough job. Makeup has it’s challenges, especially when you’re doing it for someone else. So from all of us here at UnitWise, we want to say that we appreciate you and all the hard work you do. Oh, and be sure to check the video out on our Facebook page. You won’t want to miss it!