My First Trip to a CCO

For a long time I’ve heard YouTubers and beauty bloggers mention CCOs and for a long time I’ve seen the store listing at the outlets I’ve gone to. I never went though either because I didn’t have enough time while at the outlets or I would forget about it until after I already left. In case you don’t know, CCO stands for Cosmetics Company Outlet. It doesn’t get a lot of mention, but when I would hear about it it sounded like this amazing place where luxury brands were sold at discount prices. I imagined it to be this big, wonderland of products that would normally cost an arm and a leg, being sold for a fraction of the price.

A few weeks ago, I finally went in – twice. Once to a CCO at an outlet about 30 minutes from me and again to a larger outlet mall in upstate NY. Both were so much smaller than what I had imagined. I’m not sure if all of them are like that, but they were very small. It didn’t bother me though — it was just surprising to me since I had this idea in my head that it would be pretty big. The variety of brands and products wasn’t as much as I had hoped for either, but I guess what can you expect when you’re getting high end products for a serious sale price!

Here’s what I got:

MAC: Quad in “Showstopper” – I don’t remember how much I paid for this exactly, but I think it was around $20 and MAC quads normally run around the $40-45 dollar range so it was about half off.
Lancome: Illuminating Powder in “Moonlight Rose” – This is my first Lancome purchase. I looked up the product and I’m not sure it’s sold anymore (aside from at CCOs) but the original price was $42 and I got it for $12!!! I can’t believe I got a product from a company like Lancome for $12.

I tried doing swatches, but the pictures didn’t come out too well. I need to work on my swatch abilities before I can share with the world! But, here are two pictures of me wearing these products. I used the illuminating powder as a highlight and I incorporated all the colors of the quad into my eye look. I went for a subtle eye look, but I did use all the shades.

My first trip to the store was not what I expected, but it was by no means a bad experience. I’m happy with my purchases and even happier with the prices!