Product Reviews and Free Samples

I've always been a fan of free stuff, (hey who doesn't love something for free) and I'm a member of several sites that provide free product samples for you to try at home. It was recently suggested that I start a new blog talking about the different products, (and sample sites) that I've tried.
It's also come to my attention that many people give positive reviews of products they have received from sample sites, just because they want to have a good reputation, and get more free samples; when reality is half the people claim things just because they're free, and not because they'll be used.

This Blog is going to be different though. If i don't like a product, then I'm going to say it.
So here I am ready to share my experiences, and here you are looking for answers about new products.

Got any questions about products that I've tried, feel free to ask.

To get you all started at to give you all the opportunity to try some of the items that I have reviewed try these websites. Underneath each link there is a little bit of information about the 'catch' with each site.

Pinchme
pinchme.com.au   (Australia)
www.facebook.com/PinchmeAustralia
The Site:
Pinchme offers people samples to try in exchange for reveiws. And if you dont review your sample within the set amount of time, then you cant claim anymore. Samples vary from face wash and handcream, to babys nappys and dishwasher tablets.
The Catch:
1.To register with Pinchme you need to provide your mobile number to verify your account - you cant order samples until you do this.
2. Pinchme operates on a reward system, so until you have a high enough number of points you can only claim one sample per week, and samples are often out of stock within minutes of being released.

BrandPower Home Tester Club
www.brandpower.com (Choose from 16 country's including Australia)
The Site:
Brandpower and the Home tester club sends out samples for you to share with your friends and family. Then sends a link o your email address for you and your friends to complete surverys and share your thoughts about particular products. In Australia BrandPower makes TV ad's based on reviews of products.
The Catch:
1. You cant just choose a sample and trial it. To test a sample you put in an 'expression of interest' and answer a few questions about yourself, then THEY choose who they send samples to. So there is no guarantee that you will get the sample you asked for. (or any sample at all)
2. Its often weeks or months between different samples.

Mouths Of Mums
mouthsofmums.com.au (Australia)
The Site:
Mouths Of Mums is a site especially for all you Mothers out there. The website has an interactive community of mothers who offer help, advice and opinions on different topics. (Amber teething beads has been a huge topic for discussion) Mouths of Mums also do product reviews on items that are relevant to mums. samples include books, kids tablets and learning games, health and fitness items etc.
The Catch:
1.There are often a limited number of items available, you are required to answer a survey about the items you would like to review, and more often that not, you dont get chosen.

The Soup
www.thesoup.com.au
The Site:
Soup has a huge range of products to sample from books, to face wash, to pet food. Soup also sends samples for you to share with your friends.
The Catch:
1. You cant just select a sample you would like to try. You fill out a questionnaire, then you are sent invitations to different sample trials, which you must then go through another questionnaire saying why you would be a good person to try the product. There is no guarantee that you will get chosen though.
2. Soup often sends requests for people to arrange parties or get togethers with friends where they can discuss the product theyre trialing, so unless your a social butterfly, this may not be the site for you.

Contagious Network 

http://www.contagiousnetwork.com.au/
The Site:

Contagious network has a website that a lot of the time malfunctions, so that you cant actually sign up, but its worth persevering, because the sample campaigns are awesome.
The Catch:
1. With contagious network you cant sign up for all the trials, in fact due to the website not working most of the time, you cant even see samples. However, if you fill out your profile, contagious network will send you emails with trials they think you might enjoy. From there you fill out a short survey and they let you know whether or not you have been selected, then they send out our sample in the mail.
2. As part of contagious network you are required to share all your samples with friends, not just use them all yourself. You're also required to take photos of you, your children, or the parties you have and include them in your review to be considered for future samples.

Head and Shoulders Apple Fresh

This Sample was sent to me by PinchMe
I think everybody knows the brand head and shoulders, its been around for years,  I parents always had some in the cupboard, and growing up, you still have some stuffed in the back of the cupboard - but its generally something that I always viewed as used for getting rid of dandruff, and not nice for every-day use for normal hair. Until apple fresh came along!

I was sent several sample sizes of this for the whole family to use - kids included, this isn't just for the grown-ups. The first thing I (and i now many of you) do when getting new shampoo for the first time is smell it. and true to my word - right after receiving me package in the mail i ripped off the lid to give it a good smell - I was surprised to find it actually smelt great! Just like an apple fruit rollup that I ate as a kid, much better than the standard menthol smell of the regular head and shoulders.

I will note that just like the original of this brand - this shampoo is also designed to get rid of dandruff - which it does just as well as the original flavor. I found that only a small amount was required to be used and that it froths and bubbles quite easily. After washing and drying my hair I was pleasantly surprised to find that my hair actually carried the yummy smell of the shampoo! It also left a great smell in my husbands hair (better than the dirt and sweat that it normally has)

Verdict: 

Head and Shoulders has made a come back. It smells great, works just like the original to get rid of dandruff, leaves hair healthy and shiny. Its now something to use every day, not just something to hide in the back of the cupboard for when the dandruff hits! Leaves a fresh clean feeling and smell.

Uncle Tobys Oat Crisp Cereal

This sample was from Pinchme.

My first preference in cereal is a good muesli stuffed full of fruit, so when trialing a new cereal having real fruit pieces in it is important to me. I trialed both the hazelnut strawberry and almond flavors of this cereal.
My thought about the cereal was that it didn't look much different to other products that are on the market. pouring my cereal in the bowl, I was on the look out for the promised strawberry fruit pieces. This lead to disappointment, in my whole bowl I counted two pieces of fruit, which were not much larger than the size of a pin-head. they were also more brown in colour than the juicy looking red pieces of strawberry depicted on the box. In the almond flavor cereal however, I found that there was considerably more almond pieces or clusters than its hazelnut strawberry counterpart. While eating the cereal, he texture is no different to eating a bowl of sultana bran. I found the taste of the Hazelnut cereal to be a bit lacking, and very plain tasting. The flavor of the almond cereal to be quite sweet, and overall have more flavor than then hazelnut strawberry cereal.
After finishing the cereal I found that there were lots of pieces left stuck among my teeth, which is not really something i look for in a cereal. Overall given the lack of fruit and flavor of the hazelnut flavor, I probably wont buy this product. However the almond flavor does make a nice change from my current cereal, but I wouldnt eat it every morning, as the bits getting stuck in among my teeth does get rather annoying.

Verdict: The flavor and amount of fruit pieces in the hazelnut oat crisp was extremely lacking. The Almond had a pleasant sweet flavor, and I will be eating or occasionally but not making a permanent switch.

Billie Goat Soap (Original)

This sample was sent to me by Pinchme.

One of the first things that comes to mind when I think of soap is the smell. The first time I smelt the Billie Goat Soap, I found it to be quite a different smell, almost milky, but very pleasant; definitely something I could use every day. After reading the instructions on the box, I noted that this soap was to be 'stored away from the flow of water,' to which I thought yeah yeah, it doesn't make that much of a difference to the life of the soap if it gets splashes. (Turns out I was very wrong, but we'll get to that later.) Using the soap for the first time, I was quite surprised to find that once in contact with water the soap becomes very 'slimy' not, just slippery like your average soap, but a very gooey constancy. This in its self wasn't so much of a problem, it just takes some getting used to, and after a while, it actually becomes a pleasant sensation. After using the soap for about a week, I found that my skin was softer than normal, and I stopped having any issues with sensitive skin. As an added bonus, I also found that if I used the soap on sensitive areas after shaving, (such as legs) I didn't come out with any razor burn, or lumps on my skin.
Now, back to where you store the soap, because this soap gets so gooey in contact with water, it literally drips goo on the shower floor if it is stored where it can be splashed. and if you keep it with your regular soap where it may get a little bit of spray, your soap will have dissapeared and dripped allover your shower floor in less than 7 days. Which makes the soap bad value for money, considering it costs around $9 per block. The solutions I cam up with was having a shower caddy sit up higher than the shower head, and storing the soap there. (doing this has allowed to soap to last about a month). Overall I absolutely love this soap, and its something I now cant live without, however, it can be hard to find a retailer. I personally buy online, but you may be lucky and be able to buy this product in a store near you.

www.billiegoatsoap.com.au

Verdict: This soap makes your skin feel great, it soothes and reduces the appearance of razor burn and doubles as a moisturiser. Its perfect to use on sensitive skin and has a beautifully unique smell. I would definitely recommend the use of this soap to anybody!

Pantene Aqua Light Shampoo & Conditioner 

This sample of Pantene Shampoo and Conditioner was from Pinchme.

My hair is pretty normal, I use a hair straightener sometimes, but don't really do anything to damage my hair so have no problems; so I was pretty interested to find out what this 'aqua light' shampoo could do for me.
The first time i used the shampoo I was surprised to find that it was clear! Although being clear and looking like water is great, the look of a shampoo itself won't influence me to buy it. I found that this shampoo made a really easy lather with only a small amount of the shampoo needing to be used, which is something that I like. However, when it came to rinsing out the shampoo I found that my hair felt really 'squeaky' and that it was really 'grippy' to run my fingers through, and felt absolutely awful! You know that sound that people cant stand when fingernails are run down a blackboard.... yeah, that's the feeling I got when touching my hair after rinsing the shampoo. Keen to get rid of the horrid feeling I quickly followed by using the conditioner, which I left soaking in my hair for a few minutes, just to make sure I got rid of the gross feeling left by the shampoo. After rinsing out the conditioner, (which seemed to take forever to rinse out ), and drying my hair, I found that it didn't feel any to different to my regular shampoo, (which is just a supermarket brand).

After giving my hair a day to see how it felt, I found that it felt very greasy, more so than normal. So in the spirit of giving the shampoo a proper trial I washed my hair with it again and had the same result, feeling really yuck after washing out the shampoo, and being really greasy at the end of the day. I think its safe to say, I'll be discontinuing use, and not buying this product in the future, it's really not for me.

Verdict: Made hair greasy after only one day. However, even if this shampoo did work better than my regular shampoo, I wouldn't use it simply because I hate how my hair feels after rinsing out the shampoo. 

Neutrogena Norwegian Formula Hand Cream.

I was sent this sample from Pinchme.

The first thing I do when looking at or using a new hand cream its to give it a bit of a sniff. Opening the tube and giving a cautious sniff found that there isn't much of a scent to this product. The smell is slightly bland, and has no more smell than your average face cream.
The next thing I look at is the colour and texture; The Norwegian formula has a cloudy white colour, and the texture feels quite gooey and its quite a thick formula compared to normal hand creams, which was a bit of a surprise.
I rubbed it into my hands, and to be honest, it felt a little odd. It didn't feel like it was rubbing in properly or absorbing into my skin. It also left a bit of a greasy film on everything I touched for the next half hour. and half an hour on, my hands still felt quite gooey. I decided that instead of using this during the day like a would a normal hand cream I would use it at night, where I didn't need to worry about touching things and getting them greasy. (Un-stacking my dishwasher and all my glasses got greasy prints on them, not so nice)

I found that using this product at night was more beneficial and allowed the cream to sink in to my skin. (wasn't rubbing it off touching everything.) It did make a huge different to how my skin felt and made my skin much softer, but just isn't practical for every day use. So going out on a whim, I decided to use the Norwegian formula on my cracked and dry heels. I rubbed a generous amount of it on my heels after showering, and before bed then covered it up with socks. After about 3 days I can say that my heels didn't even look the same. they were smooth and without cracks, and generally nice to touch. So in trialing a hand cream I actually found a solution to dry cracked heels!

Verdict: Not great for general every day use. Works best used at night, (so you dont leave greasy fingerprints everywhere). Works especially well on severely dry cracked skin such as the heels of the feet.