Bargain-hunting Gen Zers are using a back-to-school staple for lip liner. It burns.
Neyman said she found a red Sharpie in her brother's room and asked to borrow it. She then tried out the viral TikTok trend of using the arts and crafts tool as a lip liner.
"It lasts long and doesn't rub off or smudge. I use it very often now, almost every time I do my makeup," Neyman told BI.
Neyman isn't the only person who's ditching the drugstore for the stationery aisle. TikTok videos of the markers have racked up millions of views, showing how frugal Gen Zers are moving away from clean-girl makeup and veering toward a messy aesthetic.
"It would appear that Gen Z is leaning away from influencer trend adoption and more into accessibility," said Alexandra Carmody, a senior vice president at Front Row, a NYC-based marketing consultancy that has worked with beauty brands like Summer Fridays and Ouai.
"The era of the clean girl seems to be dwindling within the younger generations. I think the Sharpie trend is indicative of that," Carmody said.
She's also a millennial who remembers using Sharpies as nail polish in middle school.
Of course, the markers aren't made for nails or lips. They don't contain toxins in harmful quantities, but Sharpie's website says that they are "not intended for medical or body use."
Brooke Jeffy, an Arizona-based dermatologist, posted a video of the trend on YouTube, saying people should "absolutely not" be using Sharpies as lip liners.
Sharpie's parent company did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
A cheap, transfer-proof alternative to lip liner
Rachel Carlisle, a Bahamas-based content creator, was one of the first to bring the trend to TikTok.
In June, she posted a video in which she used a Sharpie in the shade Cabochon Coral to line her lips, finishing the look with a lip gloss. As of press time, the video had been viewed over 2 million times and had more than 130,000 likes. She's since posted several videos using her Sharpie pen in makeup looks.
"I felt it was the perfect shade, and the markers said non-toxic. It worked extremely well," she told BI.
She said the Sharpie lip liner works just as well as Huda Beauty's Lip Contour stains, and she now judges lip stains by how well they match the Sharpie look.
I, begrudgingly, tried the hack
To see what the hype was all about, I nervously decided to try out the hack.
I picked up the berry pink Sharpie from a local bookstore for 2.20 Singapore dollars, or about $1.70.
The moment I put it near my mouth, I knew it was a terrible idea.
It burned as soon as I started lining my lips. I'm no stranger to lip-plumping products, but this was more intense than any menthol-based lip gloss I'd ever used.
I topped it with a coat of pink lip gloss, but I could not blend the Sharpie's harsh line into it. The result looked more like a kid playing with mom's lipstick than lip liner, too embarrassing to photograph.
I washed it off as quickly as I could.
Some content creators told me they also tried the hack but found that it was not for them.
Gabriela Arias, a US-based cosmetologist and beauty content creator, said she tried it because it seemed like a fun and unconventional tool. She only used the marker as a lip liner twice, worried about the long-term effects.
"Even though I don't see myself using it in my routine, I do think it turned out really nice and am curious to try out brands that might carry something that performs similarly," she said.
Olga Bezrukova, a beauty influencer on TikTok, said she tried the trend after seeing another influencer do it.
"I would not recommend using it every day, just maybe like a substitution if you have nothing else," Bezrukova said.
The era of cheap, alternative makeup
Lin Dai, the CEO of Superlogic, a technology company that researches consumer trends, said the Sharpie lip liner trend appeals to Gen Zers who might be interested in alternative, low-cost ways of using products in unlikely ways.
"They are skeptical of traditional brands, and attracted to indie brands and unconventional TikTok-viral products that give them a sense of identity, relatability, or belonging," he said.
I felt more stinging than camaraderie, so I'm sticking with my Sephora lip liner.
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