Looking good for less
Pure Radiant Energy...
You get what your pay for – nothing more and nothing less. At Pure Radiant Energy, that means that when you buy hair and skincare products, you’re not getting a bunch of ingredients you don’t know about and you’re not paying extra to cover the costs of high-price marketing campaigns featuring supermodels.
The shop, located in Kensington, is based on a simple concept – the goal is to sell designer-quality products at a fraction of the price by manufacturing in Canada and using minimal packaging. It also takes the mystery out of cosmetics shopping by listing every product’s ingredients on its label, which is not required by Canadian law.
"Absolutely everything that’s in the product is written on the bottle," says...
One of the reasons they’re happy to tell you what’s in the product is because there’s nothing to hide. Rosemarie Sanchez, who runs the Calgary store with her sister Rosalind, says all the products contain natural, safe ingredients, and the company does not use sodium lauryl sulphates or ammonium lauryl sulphates, which are known to be skin irritants and can lead to yeast infections or a dry scalp, or animal and petroleum products.
"That’s one of the first things some customers ask when they come in the door," says Sanchez. "They’ve been in search of products without sulphates in it."
In fact, she adds that if your child or your dog decides their bubble bath smells like punch and decides to drink it, they’ll be fine – not that she recommends trying it.
"Everything in our producs is food grade – if someone was to accidentally eat it or drink it, it would be safe."
Pure Radiant Energy was started about seven years ago by a couple in Vancouver after the wife had spent $250, which angered her husband.
"He took the stuff his wife bought and sent it to a chemist and said, ‘What’s in this stuff my wife bought and why does it cost so much?’"
Sanchez said he learned that the ingredients themselves didn’t cost much – the price was high because of the cost of the fancy packaging and the pricey marketing campaigns. So, the couple decided to open their own shop and offer the same type of skincare products in simple packaging, and to rely on word of mouth instead of big advertising budgets. They use quality ingredients, but take out what isn’t needed and use food-grade preservatives instead of cosmetic-grade.
As a result, Sanchez says, they can offer better products at a lower price. For example, she says Pure Radiant Energy’s most expensive product is its revitalizing skin therapy cream, at $29.95, but a similar designer product would cost between $50 and $100.
Since the first store opened, Pure Radiant Energy has expanded its product line to include soap, bubble bath, hair care and makeup, and moved into Alberta. Sanchez says her sister used to live in Vancouver and was a customer of the original store – she got to know the owners and encouraged them to open in Calgary. Next thing Sanchez knew, she left her job in drafting and her sister left her job in publishing to open the shop in Kensington.
"My sister and I were in completely idfferent fields, and here we are," she says.
She adds that they love the job... |
