One of the most commonly asked questions I am asked f is "What shade of foundation do you think I am?". In simple terms the answer is that I have no idea. Shades differ so much from brand to brand and can be given names, numbers or letters so I advise to go to a make up counter and get shade matched.
This may seem simple enough but can also encounter some problems such as staff inexperience or harsh shop lighting which can lead to the wrong shade being matched. Something that has happened to myself on several occasions and is so annoying!
Now any new technologies or developments in the make up industry gets me excited (this geekiness is allowed as it is part of my job!) but I definitely believe No 7 have come up with something spectacular with their new Match Made service.
No7 have spent the last 3 years putting a lot of time and investment into the brand and today (29th August) they will be revealing their revamp which includes new counters, packaging, colours, products, and even uniform.
Part of their relaunch included redeveloping the formula and shades of their foundation and they have joined forces with US company X-rite who are the owners of Pantone. Together they have come up with cutting edge scientific colour measuring equipment and have photographed and measured the skin tone and under tones of over 2000 real woman from all ages and ethnicities. From this research they initially identified 17 distinct skin tone "clusters" and a range of 50 shades of foundation which they have then whittled down to 17. Another advantage is that these shades are consistant across all the different formulas, something quite unknown in the make up industry. You may be aware that NW20 is a different shade in almost all of MACs foundations!
The technology that they have developed is a small hand held device which has 8 LED and 1 UV lights which enter the skin at different angles and take 27 skin photographs. These are then processed by the device and the shade match is shown on a display. Allowing the consultant to help you decide on which formulation to go for. The device works is any light which is brilliant considering the harsh unnatural light of the stores!
The Match Made service will be available in most of the stores but you can also head over to Boots.com to find out if it is available at your local store. Also if you wish to read/listen to more information about this then check out Lisa Eldridge's Blog and YouTube Channel which is where I discovered it. I will certainly be heading down to my nearest counter tomorrow to have a good nose about and try it out for myself!
I hope that this technology is something that they will sell on and be made available at all the different brand counters as it certainly is exciting stuff!
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