 |
| Sugar Polish, hair gloss, Nectar facial serum, and perfumes |
Blooddrop's themes and branding reflect the owner Astrid's background, centering around Art Nouveau, Francophilia and horses--probably a good half of the permanent perfume names are French, like Bisou, Bonne Nuit, and Cafe Zazou, to name just a few, and there is a section called "L'Ecurie de Blooddrop" that features a rotating selection of perfumes inspired by horses.
You can also purchase Blooddrop via The Rhinestone Housewife--there are scents exclusive to this retailer that cannot be purchased through Blooddrop's site directly.
Packaging:
The packaging is lovely--Blooddrop is a retailer that puts a great deal of attention into the packaging and overall presentation of packages, so you feel like you're getting a really special, indulgent treat in the mail when you tear into one of the packages. In a recent package, the bog standard USPS Priority Mail box was sealed with decorative lace-printed tape, everything was wrapped in colored tissue outside the bubble wrap, and custom postcards with a handwritten note were tucked away inside along with the order.
 |
| The nicely decorated Priority Mail box |
 |
| Postcards and pretty tissue paper wrapping |
Selection:
- permanent collection, 39 scents with some out of stock (perhaps permanently)
- The Aviary, a limited edition collection of 13 bird-themed perfumes
- limited edition seasonal blends--currently these are the 14 Halloween and Autumnal scents, but I'd expect the winter collection to replace this soon, since these are only listed as being available through mid-November
- limited edition seasonal single notes, or Simplicities; currently there are 18 of these
- L'Ecurie de Blooddrop, a rotating limited edition series of horse-themed perfumes. There are currently nine scents in this collection.
- The Possibly Not So Accurate Historical Liquids for a Collection of Dis-Eases, a mini-collection of four scents themed around "the famous ladies of History," with silly little stories about the characters featured in the collection. It's either permanent or a long-term limited edition; it's been there for the entire span of several years that I've known about Blooddrop.
Outside the perfume selection, the Bath and Powder Room includes bath bombs, bath melts, bath oil, bath salts, facial mist, Flutter (whipped body cream), deodorant powder, lip balm, body oil, facial serum, and sugar polish.
Cosmetics includes nail polishes, eye shadows, and lip colors (looks to be somewhere between lip gloss and liquid lipstick), all of which look to be shimmery and rather muted--no blaring brights or vampy oxbloods.
And then, entirely outside the beauty/bath and body realm, we have Jewelry and Trinkets, Corsetry, Miou! (cat toys), and Home and Linens (duvet covers and scented linen and chamber spray).
Blooddrop's selection is mostly vegan, aside from the cosmetics, many of which contain carmine, and products containing honey or milk. I would suggest emailing them if you have questions about the status of a particular product.
 |
| A recent deluxe sample and full-sized perfume |
Every order comes with some fun freebies inside--I've received mini hand creams, bath bombs, or perfume samples in my packages before. Perfume samples from the permanent collection and the "Possibly Not So Accurate Historical Liquids for a Collection of Dis-Eases" are available individually for $4 each.
Blooddrop's most interesting sample policy is this: if you place an order for $50 or more, you receive an entire, full-sized bottle of perfume from a series of mystery perfumes labeled with Merci and a number. The batches of each Merci are limited, and the notes are almost never disclosed, so it's fun receiving a Merci perfume and trying to detect the notes yourself, without any clues from the marketing--also fascinating to compare notes with others on the perfumes from the same batch of Merci. This Livejournal page has some reviews of various vintages of Merci from Blooddrop customers.
Quality:
I generally find Blooddrop's perfumes to be very high quality--they have a higher success rate for me than many other indie perfumers I've tried, perhaps because their catalog is relatively small and well-edited. I suppose this means Blooddrop isn't cashing in as much on the "gotta catch 'em all" mentality that can crop up with more prolific indie perfumers, but I appreciate the smaller, more approachable catalog and the smaller number of seasonal limited edition releases--it makes shopping from Blooddrop feel more manageable.
Cost:
Permanent collection perfumes, discontinued perfumes, and the ones from the "Possibly Not So Accurate Historical Liquids for a Collection of Dis-Eases" collection are $12.50 for 5 mL of perfume oil, which is on the low end for indie perfumes.
The "special" perfumes--limited edition seasonal, L'Ecurie de Blooddrop, are $15 for 5 mL.
By comparison, a bottle of perfume from Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab's general catalog is $17.50 for 5 mL.
You can also purchase a mystery bottle of perfume for $7.50 or a grab bag of 10 mystery bottles for $49.99.
Sample prices for a few other items:
- 4 oz. of the Flutter body cream is $20 (almost twice the price of Coconut Body Butter from The Body Shop, $20 for 7 oz)
- A 4-6 oz. bath bomb is $6.50 (around the same price as LUSH bath bombs, but weighing slightly less)
- A 4 oz. jar of sugar polish body scrub is $13 (Burt's Bees is $13 for 8 oz)
(Of course, these are large commercial enterprises, so it's definitely not an apples to apples comparison, but I thought the comparisons would be useful).
Customer Service:
Excellent, from my experience (I've emailed to ask questions a couple of times before and received polite, swift responses; I asked about a discontinued scent once, and was offered a custom Etsy listing so I could buy a bottle.). I haven't had any problems with the wrong items being shipped, breakage, or other issues that would require resolution from Blooddrop.
TAT:
Fast, although not the absolute fastest I've experienced. I looked through my old emails with receipts and don't seem to have received tracking numbers/shipment notices, only the initial receipts, so I don't have a record of how long most things took to get to me--I can only find one order where I had replied after getting the package, so I know I got the package just three days after ordering. However, I don't think it's ever taken longer than a week from clicking the order button to receiving the package. One of my fellow bloggers informs me that in a recent order she placed with Blooddrop, it was two days from order to shipment notification, and another three days until she received the package.
Shipping:
Shipping info is listed as follows on the website: "USA Shipping rates (via Priority Mail): under $101: $6.50, under $201: $12.50, under $301: $18.50, $301 & up: $26.50, Non-USA Shipping rates (Priority Mail): Under $175: $25, Under $275: $35, Under $375: $70, PLEASE EMAIL FOR BASIC AIRMAIL RATES"
 |
| Apple Cider Doughnuts and Durprise/Chocolate-Covered Apple Cider Doughnuts |
Unlike many other online retailers, you don't hit free shipping at a certain point; shipping increases as the actual shipping cost increases.
Personal Thoughts:
Blooddrop is one of my favorite perfumers--as I mentioned, I've had a higher success rate with Blooddrop's scents than with many other indie perfumers I've tried.
I particularly enjoy the tea-scented perfumes (the tea note in Killing Time in Taipei is one of the best, most accurate black tea notes I've ever smelled) and the seasonal single notes I've tried, like Apple Cider Doughnuts and Chocolate-Covered Apple Cider Doughnuts, which I reviewed recently.
The pear scents, like the main note in If Wishes Were Horses or Frau Von Schtinklestein’s Partially Completed Barvarian Love Essence, are also very nice.
Les Madeleines is one of the most realistic baked goods scents I've ever encountered, but I prefer to wear something a bit less sweet most of the time.
I've had mixed luck with the bath and body products. I don't think the hair gloss is in production anymore, but I really liked it while it was around (you can see it in the photo at the top of the post).
I quite liked the Nectar facial serum, which is essentially just a blend of oils in vacuum pump packaging, but it's expensive for what you get--$26 for one ounce, when I can get straight oils for a lot less via Garden of Wisdom, like $5.25 for one ounce of plain maracuja oil, which I like just as much.
I disliked the Flutter hand cream--found it a little too light and fluffy and a bit sticky--but I do like the sugar polish a lot. It has a fairly sticky, bouncy feel, almost like bread dough, instead of the rather grainy feel of most other sugar scrubs I've tried.
I have not yet tried the eye/lip/nail color cosmetics; the lip colors mostly look too shimmery for my taste, and nothing in particular caught my eye (so to speak) from the eyeshadow selection, but many of the polishes look very pretty.
Overall, I think Blooddrop is very reliable and high-quality, and I love receiving the fancy packages with surprise goodies inside--I would definitely recommend them for a fun pick-me-up or gift order anytime!
Make sure to like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and/or follow us on BlogLovin to get all of our updates!
Blooddrop is great! I've had nothing but good experiences with that shop. I really enjoy her perfumes.
ReplyDelete