Inside the high-end makeup store Sephora, you would expect to find adults and older teens testing foundation shades and eyeshadow colors, but what you might really find is 10-year-olds\ destroying testers and buying products that should be out of their budget.
#SephoraKids currently has more than 300 million views on TikTok. There are thousands of videos online talking about kids ages 12 and younger entering these stores to purchase skincare products and messing with displays and testers.
Chris Morrison, a science teacher at Maize South and Maize Career Academy, is the father of a “Sephora kid.” He says that even at a young age, his daughter has a whole skincare routine.
“She has a nightly makeup routine, she has a morning makeup routine, she makes us late for school because she’s doing her facial routine,” Morrison said. “She wants to go to Sephora to buy makeup. She wants to go to Ulta to buy makeup, body washes and perfumes. She’s only 8 years old.”
One way these products have been used by tweens is by making a ‘skincare smoothie,’ a mixture of different products. However, some products are reported to separate or interfere with absorption when mixed, despite what those within the movement may believe.
“It does the same thing as if you put it on normally,” Ali DeVasure, a 10-year-old “Sephora kid” said.
What’s causing this trend? Some think it’s because of the pandemic, which made everyone go to school on Zoom. Others think it’s because kids just want to seem older than they are or feel included in what older teenagers are doing.
“They want to feel included because they see their parents and all these people on the internet doing it,” Emily D’Annunzio, sister of a Sephora kid, said.
Some parents are trying to find ways to educate their kids on proper skincare and appropriate behavior in stores.
“My wife and I are trying to put limits on what our daughters can buy, and what they can purchase from beauty stores,” Morrison said, “I told our daughters that they have to earn the money to buy stuff because I’m not going to buy it for them. They can earn money from chores and getting good grades, and they can buy it for themselves.”
Some products that these kids are using, such as harsh acids and anti-aging chemicals like retinol, are damaging their younger, more sensitive skin.
“These kids don’t know how to use these products correctly and it could do long-term damage to their skin, and they’re using products that they just don’t know how to use correctly.” Morrison said.
DeVasure experienced the effects of a skincare slip-up herself.
“My face got red and itchy the day I didn’t do my skincare,” DeVasure said.
Because of these concerns, people are saying that the stores themselves need to take charge.
“[The kids] need to be stopped, or Sephora needs to get rid of the testers, it’s crazy,” D’Annunzio said.
