French Box Expired Product Update

I send an e-mail to Pierre Auge and I ask about the batch number.
For the Lanvin body cream…I couldn’t find any information…seems they sell only this product via other website in USA not in France…Suspicious…On my bottle it’s written : 122011, does it mean dec 2011 ?? What’s written on yours ? I think, I am not going to use it anymore…
If I get an answer from Pierre Auge. I let you know !

I’ve been charged but have not received the box or any of the emails. I wonder what that means.

I am taking this as a wake-up call for checking the content of sub boxes and my daily routine… like grocery/drug store shopping… many things have shelf lives. And now I have to take a look at stash of my cosmetics… I am not familiar a lot of the ingredient that goes in the products, so I need to learn.

I received my box over the weekend and immediately checked the manufactured dates. Nov. 2014 for L’Oreal lipstick and Jun.2012 for the nail sticker and both have the icon that they expire after 24 months from opening. I have used below links that were posted on review thread. Thank you for the ladies who posted them.
http://checkcosmetic.net/
http://www.checkfresh.com/

It is hard for me to believe that FrenchBox didn’t know about the freshness of the products when sourced and also hard to believe that the customers will overlook it.

Also, I wonder if sub boxes are required to disclose the manufacturer of all the products they send out. As far as I see the reviews of boxes here, we know which company makes what. But in this particular box, we don’t know who makes the bath beads and nail file. Because they don’t tell us, I am assuming that they are not made in France or from French company.

I would like to see a refund or replacement box to justify Feb. box. Depends on what they do in the next few days, I have to decide my own action for my yearly subscription.

I find it interesting that their Facebook likes have increased

So I did some investigating on the company that owns this service and found the name France in a Box, LLC out of Miami FL. I searched the company owners name and got some questionable info that i think is concerning: http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2009-11-26/news/air-platinum-club-owner-mickael-cohen-under-siege-from-creditors-and-business-associates/full/

I cancelled my subscription when the February box arrived. I was really excited with the box at first but it went down hill from there. So disappointed. Guess I will have to find another box to take it’s place!

I find it interestin that everyone is upset and demanding refunds from FB dues to them sending out expired items.

Yet Beauty Box 5 has sent out expired items 3 months in a row and barely anyone is demanding they refund everyone.

I for one think any company that sends out expired stuff fully knows it, and should refund every customer. It is shady, and I refuse to do business with shady companies.

I cancelled my subscription the same day I received the February box. Not only were the products questionable with regard to the age but it all seemed rather cheap. I subscribed to this box to get unique products from France. Not to be inundated with products I can buy in the locally. Every month has had some issue with the box; delayed product, missing product, replacement. I’m done. It’s not worth it when there are much better options in the market. As for the expired items, already in the trash.

I’ve sent them 3 emails with no response. I know they probably have a lot of angry people sending them lots of messages, but they need to make a statement, and fast. This is not acceptable.

I will be disputing the charges on my credit card, on the grounds that I was sent products that I was then told by the company not to use with no replacements or reimbursements of any kind. I would advise everyone else to do the same. We deserve refunds for this and nothing less.

Speaking as an attorney, I would advise a client in this situation to immediately and without need for individual requests, to refund all subscribers in full immediately. This was not an oversight. There is evidence of deliberate attempts to obscure product age/origin. When it comes to products you put on your skin and especially those for the eyes and lips, it is indeed a matter of safety. Will you die if you used old lipstick, highly unlikely. Do you want to roll the dice and hope for the best? Probably not. But subscribers here weren’t even given the option to choose since the product age was very likely deliberately withheld by removing the packaging before shipment to subscribers. Oil-based products have a significantly shorter shelf life than most other skin and makeup items so I find this scenario particularly egregious under the circumstances. Old lipstick isn’t as much of an issue from a safety standpoint but sending what they did in the manner some received it (sans packaging of any kind) is equally dishonest.

Sourcing from third party resellers is unfortunately common among beauty sub start ups. Few are able to recover when caught though some do manage to make a comeback. The key to survival is transparency and immediate response with refunds. No credits – refunds. I had this experience with another sub and their response was like a manual for how to ensure you don’t live to see another business day. Denials, excuses, online shilling, and in general minimizing will only make things worse, in the “here’s a shovel, keep digging” kind of way.

Those among us who are diehard beauty sub customers generally want only a few things from a new sub: good quality products, decent value, and interesting/thoughtful curation. I don’t think any of us want a startup to fail. On the contrary – we tend to root for the little guy and support them as they grow, even if it means the value ratio isn’t as high as with a corporate competitor. But as is the case in any kind of relationship, personal or business, once trust is broken it’s a difficult thing to redevelop. Whether this company can rebuild that trust is almost exclusively up to them now.

This is disappointing. I emailed them the other day about how bad the box was and they emailed back yesterday to say they were going to update Facebook soon about it. This was the final box for the 3 month gift subscription I got my Mom, so I emailed her this post today since they never sent me any further information. I hope they’re going to do something to make up for this. The December box was pretty nice!

I think this is a bigger problem. I’ve been a little suspicious about the Sothy items and never used them because I couldn’t find them on the internet and thought they were bought in lots from elsewhere. I pulled the nail polish I received in the September box and there is mold. I sent a picture of it to Liz. Maybe it is a one off. How long does it take for mold to grow in nail polish?

I got the email. My box arrived today and I had to email them about the issues. It was a long, contemplated email. In it, I asked them where did they get the Alexis serum since the company didn’t sell it. And where, in general, do they source their items. And I asked them to be sure to specifically address these questions when they respond to me.

I have a year’s subscription so I hope they can rectify and recover from this.

i can’t believe they don’t know that before sending the box….it’s not possible or they are not paying attention at all about what they are sending…

I still think they bought the cosmetics off of Alibaba. Alexis Cosmetics is available through them along with the bath beads. Thank you for keeping us informed. I’m not sure how they are going to recover from this.

I received the email as well, unfortunately I did try the lipstick. It was the perfect color too. :-(. Hope i don’t get the cooties. What I personally thought was both timely and shameful for the FB fiasco… Pop Sugar had a slideshow on France/French based beauty products. Some were not too expensive and I thought it would have been nice to receive some of those items. Oh well, another one bites the dust.

I sent you an email with links. Thank you!

Thank you Liz for letting us know this. I too just received my email. I was very disappointed in this box overall and now to hear this. But I thought the same thing that you put in your review about the packaging of the lipstick. I just hope they are not going downhill.
I hope they either replace the items or offer a credit.

Is anyone else receiving strange emails that appear to be from MSA? I received three. They were titled ‘hello world’ ‘staging test’ and ‘second staging test’

These are not from Liz. Please be cautious and do not open them. It may be hackers sending viruses.

Liz, I forwarded these emails to you so you could see what is happening.

I just do not see a scenario where they didn’t know about this. We are talking about products that expired two plus years ago. They clearly didn’t buy them from the companies that make them. So whatever buyer they are purchasing from isn’t reputable and they have to have known this. To me, apologizing now is just trying to cover up the giant mess they have made. I don’t buy it.

Liz, there should really be an expiration date field in the listing in general. I see a lot of swap items from 2 years ago and have to wonder….

I don’t know, guys. I dropped for this month’s box, but a lot of the comments and reviews I’m reading mention that there was an overpowering musty smell as soon as folks opened the package.

My understanding is that they do their own fulfillment. It seems so unlikely to me that the FB people truly had no idea these products were old stock.

It’s looking more and more like an act of desperation.

Why don’t cosmetics, skin and haircare items have expiry dates like food? Surely, it would be in their best interest to post one, as people would buy more of their product if it was past its prime.

Liz, is there anything you can do about these products on your swap page? I would hope no one would swap a product they know to be expired, but I’m concerned about anyone unwittingly swapping an expired product.

Seriously what were they thinking ? They had to know those products were not good but yet they sent them out. I wonder if they just didn’t have any other products to send, and thought perhaps not too msmt people would notice. Its just terrible when companies do shady stuff like this