I bought my first Chantecaille Brilliant Gloss in the shade ‘Love’ three years ago. I was at the Neiman Marcus in downtown Dallas—the one with the weirdly quiet elevators and the air that smells like old money and expensive air conditioning—and I felt like I needed to buy something just to prove I belonged in the building. It cost $38. For a tube of goop. I remember walking back to my car feeling a mix of adrenaline and immediate buyer’s remorse. I’m not a makeup artist. I work a regular desk job where most of my ‘glamour’ happens through a grainy 720p webcam. But here I am, three years and four tubes later, still handing over my credit card. It’s a total scam. But I can’t stop.
$40 for a lip gloss is a scam, let’s be real
Let’s just get the price out of the way because it’s the most offensive part. $38 or $40 depending on where you shop. You can buy a whole meal for that. You can buy five tubes of Revlon at the CVS down the street. Chantecaille likes to pretend they are different because they’re ‘botanical’ and ‘clean,’ but let’s be honest: we are paying for the heavy acrylic tube and the little elephant on the box. What I mean is—actually, let me put it differently. It’s not that the ingredients aren’t good, it’s that no amount of green tea extract actually justifies a 400% markup over a drugstore brand. I used to think drugstore gloss was the same. I was completely wrong. There is a texture difference, but it’s a subtle one that only people who spend too much time looking in a 10x magnifying mirror would notice.
The Brilliant Gloss is thin. Not thin like water, but thin like… okay, here is my first metaphor: it feels like that specific kind of expensive hotel water that somehow tastes wetter and smoother than normal tap water. Most glosses feel like they’re sitting on your lips. This one feels like it’s actually part of them. It doesn’t fix your lips, by the way. If your mouth is a dry, peeling mess, this gloss will just make those peels look shiny. It’s not a miracle worker. It’s just a very expensive coat of paint.
The truth is, Chantecaille doesn’t make you look like a supermodel; it just makes you look like a slightly more hydrated version of your tired self.
The Vermont incident and the “Stickiness Scale”
I have a very specific memory attached to the shade ‘Mirth.’ It was October 14, 2022. I was at my friend Sarah’s wedding in rural Vermont. It was one of those outdoor ceremonies where the bride insists on ‘natural vibes’ even though it’s 45 degrees and the wind is whipping off the mountains at thirty miles per hour. I was wearing a silk dress and a fresh coat of Chantecaille. Within ten minutes of the vows starting, the wind caught my hair—which I had spent an hour curling—and plastered it across my face.
Now, with a Fenty gloss or a MAC Lipglass, that would have been a disaster. Your hair gets stuck in the gloss, you pull it away, and it leaves a sticky pink trail across your cheek like a snail was crawling on you. But with the Chantecaille? It was weird. My hair hit my lips and then just… slid off? It didn’t glue itself to my face. I still had three streaks of pink gloss on my cheekbones afterward, but they weren’t tacky. I just wiped them off with my thumb and kept shivering. That was the moment I realized why I pay the ‘annoying person’ tax for this brand. It’s the least sticky gloss I’ve ever owned.
Anyway, I digress. The wedding was beautiful, I guess, but I mostly remember the cold and the gloss. But that brings me to a point I know people will disagree with: I think a little bit of stickiness is actually good. If a gloss is too slippery, it disappears in twenty minutes. This one walks a very fine line. It’s ‘polite’ stickiness.
Four hours and twelve minutes of actual data
I’m a nerd for tracking things. I once tracked my caffeine intake versus my productivity for a month (it was a disaster, don’t ask). Last Tuesday, I decided to actually test the longevity of the Brilliant Gloss during a back-to-back Zoom marathon. Here is the data from that highly scientific study of one person:
- 7:45 AM: Initial application. Two swipes. The brush is exactly 8mm long, by the way. I measured it.
- 8:30 AM: First cup of coffee. Significant transfer onto the ceramic mug. Most of the shine is gone, but the ‘slip’ is still there.
- 10:15 AM: Two glasses of water later. My lips still feel coated. Usually, by this point, a cheap gloss has evaporated into the ether.
- 11:57 AM: The gloss is officially dead. There is a slight lingering moisture, but the aesthetic effect is gone.
Total wear time: 4 hours and 12 minutes. For a non-sticky gloss, that’s actually insane. I’ve tested about 12 different luxury glosses over the last two years, and most of them (looking at you, Dior) quit at the 90-minute mark. Is 4 hours worth $40? Probably not. But in the world of lip products, it’s a marathon runner.
Why I’m probably wrong about Fenty
I’m going to say something that might get me kicked out of the ‘beauty enthusiast’ club. I hate the Fenty Gloss Bomb. I know, I know. It’s the holy grail. Everyone loves the smell and the shine. To me, it feels like industrial-grade syrup. It’s too thick, the scent is cloying, and it makes my lips feel heavy. Chantecaille is the exact opposite. The applicator is like a tiny, high-end paintbrush that’s given up on its career in fine art to paint your lips instead. It’s precise. It’s small. It doesn’t glob.
I refuse to recommend Fenty even though my sister swears by it. I think people just like the branding. Chantecaille’s branding is equally manipulative, but it’s targeted at people like me who want to feel ‘sophisticated’ while sitting in their pajamas. It’s a different kind of lie we tell ourselves.
The elephant in the room (literally)
Chantecaille does this thing where they align every collection with a charity. Elephants, cheetahs, bees, sea turtles. I genuinely believe they only put the animals on the packaging to make us feel less bad about the markup. It works on me. I’m a total sucker for a turtle. I’ll buy a shade I don’t even like if there’s a picture of a disappearing rhinoceros on the box. It’s a brilliant, slightly predatory marketing tactic that preys on the guilt of wealthy-ish women.
Does the money actually help the elephants? I hope so. But even if it doesn’t, the packaging is beautiful. That’s the shallow truth. The tubes are heavy, they don’t leak in your bag (I’ve had one in my work tote for six months and the seal is still perfect), and they don’t look like a teenager’s makeup.
I don’t know if I’ll ever find a ‘perfect’ gloss. Maybe it doesn’t exist. Maybe we’re all just chasing a feeling of being ‘finished’ or ‘put together’ that a plastic tube can’t actually provide. But for now, I’ll keep buying the Chantecaille. I’ll complain about the price every single time, and I’ll probably keep losing them in the couch cushions, but I haven’t found anything else that feels quite like this.
Worth every penny. And also a total rip-off.