Brand Sisters: Cosmetics companies you never new were related

If you're like me who has spend 5 USD for a very entertaining and enlightening read about personal care and cosmetics from Romanoski and Schueller's It's Okay To Have Lead In Your Lipstick, then you've probably seen a lot of nifty, money saving advice which felt like "insider information". One of such is to keep note of which companies own your favorite cosmetics/ skin care brand. Apparently, brands which are owned by a common company sometimes the same ingredients even if those brands are sold in different price points. In other words, cheap and high end may have the SAME ingredients if they're owned by a common company!

So I compiled a list of companies which own several cosmetics and skin care brands for our reference. Here's what I've Googled.

Before this post, I've always thought L'Oreal as the go-to brand for quality hair products only. Little did I know that it has a lot of brands catering to hair and skin care under its wings. L'Oreal owns Lancôme, Kiehl's, The Body Shop, Shu Uemura, Clarisonic, Urban Decay, Vichy, La Roche Posay, Skinceuticals, Garnier, and Maybelline.

While I do know Olay is owned by Procter and Gamble, there are other cosmetics / skin care brands in it. No, they're not just Safeguard, Camay, Ivory, Covergirl and Maxfactor. Surprise: Anna Sui and SK-II both are under P&G. I admit, I didn't want to try Olay because P&G Philippines had Kim Chiu as an endorser (because jologs), but I might now that I know Olay had sassy sister brands.

Unilever is notorious in my book for the constant barrage of commercial on whitening <insert product type> here in the Philippine market thru Pond's. I despise Pond's not just because of the lack of product variety (not all wish for fairer skin), but also because I had a bad experience with one of its products. However, my immense disdain for the brand is replaced by my fervor for Vaseline (I still somehow call differently branded petroleum jelly "Vaseline"), Dove and St. Ives.

Whenever I hear Johnson & Johnson, all I can think about are the cheesy baby-mommy commercials on powder and cringe-worthy teen-centered adds on pact powder. I didn't notice that it carried skin care brands too, like Clean & Clear, Neutrogena, Aveeno and ROC.

I've always thought Shiseido was just another high-end brand with quality products not meant for working class gals like me. I was wrong. In fact, Shiseido has some notable brands which can be reached by meager wallets. Some notable brands under the group (all together now, high and mid-range) are the following: Bare Minerals, NARS, Za, Ipsa, Maquillage, Majolica Majorca, Tsubaki and Ma Cherie.

Probably the cosmetic company I always fall for is Amore Pacific as I obviously am biased to Korean skin care lines. While I would very much like to check out their premier brands such as HERA, Sulwhasoo, IOPE and Mamonde, I'll probably just stick with Laneige, Innisfree, and the most affordable Etude.

Other honorable mentions:
Nivea, Eucerin and La Prairie are all brought to you by Beiersdorf.
Jergens, Kanebo, Curel, Sofina and Biore are all musume of Kao Corporation.

So the next time you're thinking of buying from a high-end brand, try to check out their mid to low-end brand sisters - you might get the same quality for much less.