Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards 2015 Winners: Part Two (Bath & Body and Fragrances)

Hey everyone! This is Part Two of the Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards 2015 winners. If you missed it, I posted Part One of the winners, focusing on the Cosmetics categories. This is focusing on the Bath and Body and Fragrances category. I hope you find something nice to pamper your body and to smell nice with. I did want to say that I greatly appreciate everyone's support this year, we got twice as many responders (over 1000!) and the votes for each category was even closer than last year. I hope you enjoy reading the winners for both the Cosmetics and Bath & Body and Fragrances categories.

Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards 2015 Winners: Part One (Cosmetics)

Hey everyone! I know it's Thanksgiving Day but I wanted to get the results of the series out before Black Friday/Cyber Monday started. I'm splitting the results into two parts, Part One (this post) where I'll cover the Cosmetics categories and Part Two where I cover the Bath & Body and Fragrances categories. Like last year, for each brand that won in a category, there is an accompanying blurb including where they ship from and if they ship internationally. If they won multiple categories, I listed the blurb once.

Click thru to see the results!

Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards: Voting Period Open!

Hey everyone! My apologies for being late on opening up the voting period but I've finished compiling the nominations and it's time to vote in the Best of Indie - Reader's Choice Awards. If you're not familiar with it, this is a series specifically for indie brands where you as readers nominate and vote on your favorite indie products.

Voting will go for a week until Wednesday and I will compile the results in time for Black Friday/Cyber Monday. 

Feel free to vote in as many or as few categories as you'd like. There's no real "prize" to the award but I do hope this gives many brands the opportunity to get the adoration that they so richly deserve! I will edit this post to include all the nominated brands so you will be able to check out their offerings before the final awards.

Best of Indie - Reader's Choice Awards 2015: Nomination Period Open!

It's near the end of the year and it's time for the Best of Indie - Reader's Choice Awards. If you're not familiar with it, this is a series specifically for indie brands where you as readers nominate and vote on your favorite indie products.

I received feedback about the timing of the series and am doing it now in November instead of December. The nomination period will be open for one week until the 8th, voting will happen for one week from the 9th to the 15th, and the results will be tallied in the third week from the 16th to the 22nd. This way, the results will be available before Black Friday/Cyber Monday so you will be able to take part in any of the holiday deals once the results come out.

All nominated brands will be included as long as they handcraft their products, I won't be including them if they utilize a lab to manufacture their products. For ease, I've generated a Google Form that you can use. Feel free to fill out as few or as many categories as you'd like. There's no real "prize" to the award but I do hope this gives many brands the opportunity to get the adoration that they so richly deserve!

If there's a category you'd like to see added during the nomination period, please leave me a comment and if enough people want to add it, I'll be sure to edit the Google Doc. I'm focusing on specific products and not colors at this point. 

Voting will take place next week and the results compiled a week after that. I hope you will participate in the nomination period now and will be back next week to vote!

Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards Winners: Part Two (Bath & Body and Fragrances)

I greatly appreciate your patience everyone when it comes to the Best of Indie Winners. School has been taking up a ton of time so it took a little while to edit all the badges for the post. If you missed it, I posted Part One of the winners, focusing on the Cosmetics categories. This is Part Two, focusing on the Bath and Body and Fragrances category. I hope you find something nice to pamper your body and to smell nice with and be sure to read to the bottom for a nice surprise!

Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards Winners: Part One (Cosmetics)

I'm so proud to announce the final results of the Best of Indie - Readers' Choice Awards Series. I'm splitting the results into two parts, Part One (this post) where I'll cover the Cosmetics categories and Part Two (the next post) where I'll cover the Bath & Body and Fragrances categories. Here is Part Two! For each brand that won, I wrote up a little blurb about them including where they ship from and if they ship internationally. If they won multiple categories, I listed the blurb once so as not to be repetitive.

Also, I wanted to thank Joana for designing the badges with me! She was very patient in spite of all the changes I wanted to make. She was great to work with so feel free to check her portfolio out if you'd like to commission work from her.

Click thru to see the results!

Best of Indie Reader's Choice Award Series - Voting Time!

After many hours spent compiling and cross-referencing responses, it's time to cast your votes in the Best of Indie Reader's Choice Award Series! I've set up a Google Form as usual and you can vote in as many or as few categories as you'd like. Voting ends in two weeks on January 12th and the winner (and top three) of each category will be announced soon after.

The nominees are listed in random order to ensure that no brand receives any ballot order effects. 

Companies: Feel free to "campaign" if you'd like to by linking to the blog post but no spamming please! There's no true "prize" for winning other than a badge (which I'm hoping will be done soon) and the knowledge that the indie community supports your company and your products! 



I've also linked to all the companies nominated below to show my support. If you found any brands you were intrigued by, feel free to check them out. I tried to do my best to include all brands but if your brand was nominated and not included in the list below, feel free to leave a comment. Some of the shops are closed for the holidays but will reopen in January (in time for you to shop!)

Disclaimer: I haven't shopped at all of the stores listed so do not take the fact that they're listed below as an endorsement. The companies listed were crowdsourced from the nominees. Some companies will be listed in multiple places due to selling beauty, bath and body, and/or perfume.

Indie Beauty Companies

A-England
AFK Cosmetics
Aromaleigh Cosmetics
Aromi Beauty
Baroque Cosmetics
Beauty Bar Baby
Blackbird Cosmetics
Blanche Neige Cosmetics
Chinovi Cosmetics
Cirque Colors
Contrary Polish
Corvus Cosmetics
Darling Girl Cosmetics
Dawn Eyes Cosmetics
Detrivore
Digital Nails
Dolly's Polish
Dreamworld Hermetica
Eccentric Cosmetics
Emerald and Ash 
Esoteric Aesthetic
Femme Fatale Cosmetics
Fierce Magenta
Fyrinnae Cosmetics
Geek Chic Cosmetics
Girly Bits Cosmetics
Glamour Doll Eyes
Glory Boon
Hare Polish
Hello Waffle Cosmetics
ILNP
Impulse Cosmetics
Innocent + Twisted Alchemy
Kae Q
KBShimmer
Kiss My Sass
Life's Entropy
Limnit Lipsticks
Liquid Sky Lacquer
Little Sparrow
Lucky 13 Lacquer
Lucy Minerals
Lunatick Cosmetic Labs
Meow Cosmetics
Morgana Cryptoria
My Beauty Addiction
My Pretty Zombie
Native War Paints
Nayll
Notoriously Morbid
Octopus Party
Parlo Cosmetics
Performance Colors
Portland Black Lipstick Company
Powder Perfect
Pretty Zombie Cosmetics
Pumpkin & Poppy
Rainbow Honey
Shiro Cosmetics
Silk Naturals
Spectrum Cosmetics
SweetPea and Fay
Ten Three Labs
The All Natural Face
Tilt/Shift Cosmetics
Victorian Disco Cosmetics
Violet Voss

Indie Bath and Body Companies

Alchemic Muse
Arcana Soaps
Bath Sabbath
Black Violet
Bunny Butt Apothecary
Chagrin Valley
Charming Frog
Clean Cauldron
Cocoa Pink
Crushed Pepper
Edens Secret
Epically Epic
Firebird Bath and Body
Fortune Cookie Soap
Future Primitive
Glory Boon
Haunt
Haus of Gloi
Kheimistrii
Kiss My Sass
Lou Lou's
Luxury Lane Soap
Missouri River Soap
Naiad
One Geek, Two Geek
OHWTO
Paintbox Soapworks
Purple Cat Creatives
Queen Bee Apothecary
Savor 
Silk Naturals
Sixteen92
Soapy Sweet Treats
Solstice Scents
Uponaworld Cosmetics
Vapid Lacquer
Villainess
Wholly Hemp
Wicked Soaps

Indie Perfume Companies

Aftelier
Alchemic Muse
Alchimia Apothecary
Alkemia
Antimony Blue
Arcana Soaps
BPAL
Black Violet
Blooddrop
Cocoa Pink
Common Brimstone
Darling Clandestine
Deconstructing Eden
Deep Midnight Perfumes
Firebird Bath and Body
For Strange Women
Haus of Gloi
Midsummer Dreams Apothecary
OHWTO
Possets
Purple Cat Creatives
Sarawen
Sixteen92
Smelly Yeti
Solstice Scents
Sweet Anthem
Sweet Tea Apothecary
Ten Digit Creations
Ten Three Labs
Wiggle
Wild Hybrid
ZOMG Smells

Thanks for taking time to vote (if you did) and be sure to support some of the great indies that were nominated!

Best of Indie - Reader's Choice Awards Nomination Period

Hi everyone!

For the holiday season, I wanted to do a Reader's Choice Awards series specifically for indie brands. There are tons out there that focus on mainstream cosmetic brands but there really isn't one specifically for indie brands.

The way I have it set up is that you can nominate your favorite indie brands and indie products, with a focus on handcrafted products. This means that brands like OCC, Sugarpill, and Makeupgeek wouldn't be applicable since their products are not manufactured in house by the owner. That's not bad of course (especially on the scale that they operate), but I'm wanting to focus on the smaller, handcrafted brands.

The nomination period starts now until the 26th (or until nominations peter out). After the nomination period, I'll compile the results and let everyone vote on the brands and products for another two weeks. After everyone votes, I'll announce the top three winners for each category and will hopefully have it up by January 12th. By then, most indie shops will have returned from their winter hibernation and you'll all have new shops to purchase from!

All nominated brands will be included as long as they handcraft their products, I won't be including them if they utilize a lab to manufacture their products. For ease, I've generated a Google Form that you can use. Feel free to fill out as few or as many categories as you'd like. There's no real "prize" to the award but I do hope this gives many brands the opportunity to get the adoration that they so richly deserve! The focus is primarily on makeup brands but there are a few categories for handcrafted perfume and bath and body products.

If there's a category you'd like to see added during the nomination period, please leave me a comment and if enough people want to add it, I'll be sure to edit the Google Doc. I'm focusing on specific products and not colors at this point. The complete results will not be public as I don't want to hurt the feelings of brands who may not have received an expected number of votes. I will include all brands in the nomination period (again, excluding brands that utilize a lab).