The Sephora employee who tried to save me

All I wanted was a tinted sunscreen that could stand up to Texas in summer and, perhaps, a little mountain biking.

Despite an unusually rainy spring, we’re officially at that point in summer here in Texas where it’s hot. Or, as our local weekly rag put it, the point that separates the transplants from the natives.

My husband (not a native) has largely suspended all outdoor activity until October, maybe November. When I do occasionally get him out on the mountain bike, he spends the entire ride complaining about the heat (and humidity).

I, however, remain committed to mountain biking, hiking, and generally spending enough time outside to warrant heavy SPF.

Which brings me to today’s topic.

No, you do not need a summer body.

But what about a summer tinted sunscreen?

I recently became far more invested in this question than I ever expected to be.

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It started with an accidental Amazon purchase. Who knows how many months ago. Probably years actually.

At some point in my past, I accidentally bought Elta MD tinted sunscreen. Not just one bottle, either. No, I bulk ordered the tinted version and didn’t immediately snap to my mistake. I’ve been a fan of the regular Elta MD face sunscreen for years and use it daily before I go out into the world, so while this oops wasn’t ideal, it wasn’t the end of the world.

I should have sent it back the moment I knew I got it wrong, but I decided I could wear it on the days when I didn’t need full makeup. It would be my un-makeup option for bike riding and hiking days. Something for those days when I don’t need to be super polished but want to at least look like I’m trying.

But I was dubious. How can one tinted product work on all skin colors?

By the first pump, I was even more concerned. What would this orange-beige glob look against my much-lighter skin tone?

Still willing it to work, I slathered it on my face, where it seemed to just sit until I blended it out with a sponge. The result was a weird orange cast with almost no coverage.

Strangely, this wasn’t enough to make me give up.

No, that came later, when I was sweating in the sun and discovered said sunscreen burns when it gets in your eyes. Not a little. A lot. I’d half to apply it so carefully, more carefully than I’ve ever applied moisturizer before, and then on top of that, I couldn’t use it for summer mountain bike rides because the runoff from my forehead would set my eyeballs on fire.

For years now, I’ve been dutifully working through these endless containers of tinted sunscreen in my quest not to be wasteful, even though they bring me to tears. Then one day an ad for tinted moisturizer popped up in my Facebook feed.

My curiosity was piqued.

With my bad experience fresh in mind, I immediately went to ChatGPT to tell me the good and the bad of the product that had landed in my feed. After learning it wasn’t so great, I shared my long history with Elta MD, what I was looking for in a tinted sunscreen, why I needed it … basically my entire life story, and it spit out some recommendations.

At the top of the list was ILIA. I’d used their foundation before and remembered it having good coverage and a good color match, so I made a mental note to look it up the next time I found myself in Sephora, which I generally try to avoid.

A few weeks later, in between appointments with time to kill, I suggested Sephora to my oldest daughter, a beauty and skincare junkie, knowing there are few things she enjoys more.

This was my first mistake.

Now, she knows both how clueless and stubborn I am in my refusal to get on board with a skincare routine. It horrified her to learn that I use drugstore shampoo as both my face and everywhere-else wash. She’s tried for years to get me to change (and maybe add a retinol) but has finally given up, which I am really grateful for.

Here’s the way I look at this. I already have too many things I’m supposed to be worried about as it concerns my body: black plastic kitchen utensils, BPA on grocery store receipts, whether I’m getting enough vitamin D, microplastics, forever chemicals, the continued availability of HRT, what exactly is inside Cheetos that makes them so good, my Coke Zero addiction.

I don’t want to be worrying about whether I need salicylic acid or retinol. I’m doing the most important thing, which is using sunscreen. I’m out in the sun a lot.

My second mistake was talking to one of the salespeople.

She immediately wanted me to stay away from the ILIA tinted moisturizer.

“It’s very light coverage,” she started with.

I replied that it didn’t matter, this was basically the makeup I was going to wear mountain biking.

She said I wouldn’t even be able to see it on my face.

To which I replied, then why are there so many different shades?

She immediately steered me to another product. A tinted moisturizer. The problem was it didn’t have sunscreen. She said I would need to wear sunscreen underneath it (or maybe it was over it, I can’t remember.)

To which I replied: I know myself. I will not do it.

My daughter tried to politely interject at this point, but the lovely salesperson wouldn’t take the hint.

She proceeded to tell me that as an aesthetician, hearing that I didn’t use moisturizer was like a knife in the heart. And she said it, something came over her. Even I could sense the shift. Her new mission in life was to convert me, as if I could somehow be reasoned with about skincare.

To be clear, I didn’t know my Elta MD sunscreen wasn’t a moisturizer. To think all these years before I stepped into Sephora, I hadn’t been moisturizing.

The horror.

Finally, when she could not convince me to double up on tinted moisturizer and sunscreen, she pointed me toward Saie, which has a lightweight tinted moisturizer with a mineral zinc SPF 35 sunscreen and (bonus!) hyaluronic acid. (I have no idea what hyaluronic acid is.)

She asked if she could color match my skin, which I reluctantly agreed to. The last time Sephora color-matched me I ended up buying an overpriced foundation supposedly in my perfect shade that somehow never looked right on me. I spent months trying to finish that bottle.

She then put a little dab of the Saie stuff on a Q-tip, which she then dabbed on my jawline, and directed me to a mirror. It actually looked … good. The coverage was good. The color was good. It just felt a little weird on my face. Petroleum jelly-like. Almost sticky. These are some of my sensory triggers.

I asked to try it on myself and then did some internal debating. Could I deal with this or would this be one of those sensory nightmares that would be too much to overcome?

I wished this woman would just scamper off to her next victim so I could go back to ILIA, but she wasn’t budging.

I finally asked if we could just try the ILIA, and she relented.

Lo and behold: barely any coverage.

The sales person was triumphant. I went back to the SAIE and put it in my basket. She had won.

I’ve been using it for a month now, and it’s mostly terrific.

Yes, it’s still got that slight sticky feeling. Occasionally I have to use a sponge to blend it out. But overall the results are exactly what I wanted, and the color is perfect.

So there’s my summer tinted moisturizer.

I still have no intention of developing a skincare routine.

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Now it’s your turn …

What’s your hot summer must-have?