Comments on: Why I don’t recommend The Ordinary’s Niacinamide and L-Ascorbic Acid powders

By: Nam

Nam — Wed, 09 Mar 2022 10:01:41 +0000

I worked for Deciem for about a year and I constantly had to dissuade people from buying the L-Ascorbic Acid powder. That’s consistent with internal training. (Yes, it’s confusing that these products are manufactured and sold but employees are told not to sell them. But that’s Deciem for you.) People have an idea that stronger = better results, which is exactly why pure L-Ascorbic Acid should not be in the hands of most consumers.

By: Walter Wehmann

Walter Wehmann — Thu, 29 Jul 2021 07:48:01 +0000

In reply to Jenny. Yes, please consider the gram scale, like $15-20. Just weigh the friggen powder for 2 weeks of use and be done. Yes it takes a few minutes but IT'S NOT HARD.

By: Fatmanur

Fatmanur — Sat, 26 Dec 2020 12:19:10 +0000

Hi, I’ve got the ordinary powdered vitamin C. I don’t know if it’s harmful for me to mix it with my cream and use it. But I don’t put a quarter spoon or a full spoon.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Wed, 11 Nov 2020 16:55:41 +0000

Hey Michelle, thanks for the video :-> Got the niacinamide powder today and can already tell that me eyeballing a quarter scoop is going to differ a lot from day to day. Thinking a possible solution could be to find out approx. weight in grams and buy the appropriate scoop or use a small scale… did you happen to measure this yourself?

By: Rose

Rose — Sat, 17 Oct 2020 19:20:31 +0000

Thanks for this info. Love your site which has taught me a lot and led me to many great products. When I was younger (until I was in my late 40’s) I had cystic acne and lived with constantly irritated skin. Now I’m almost 70 and I can use most products and combinations without any irritation. I use LAA powder mixed with a serum fairly often. I don’t rigorously measure and nothing bad has happened. I use 0.1% tretinoin and an LAA at night anytime my skin feels relaxed and not tight. After all my early skin issues it’s weird to be frequently told I have beautiful skin! Age has made my skin bullet proof. The only time I’ve overdone anything is when I exfoliate too often on top of the tretinoin use. I think the take away is, know thy skin!

By: Ian

Ian — Tue, 06 Oct 2020 14:48:23 +0000

In reply to Cass. Interesting. Just curious, what kind of "experimental" ingredients do you use in your skincare routine?

By: Cass

Cass — Fri, 21 Aug 2020 09:16:10 +0000

Michelle, do you think that the focus on these few ingredients are leading towards a saturation of the market. I understand why everyone wants a piece of this pie and I’m all for using ingredients with more evidence behind them but at the same time I’m a big fan of ingredients that might not have as much research behind it but is promising and has the potential to be effective. I know these get dismissed among in the more “serious” skincare circles but honestly I like a healthy competitive playing field which might result in discovery of better compounds and more research on lesser known ingredients too. I’m noticing that skincare industry is becoming a bit more polarised with the “no chemicals” bunch on one end and the ” need 10 peer reviewed studies” bunch on the other end. I feel that in some ways it’s detrimental but good in other ways.

Idk maybe it’s my imagination haha. Personally I do use the scientifically backed ingredients but also have a step in my routine (serum or toner) where I use more “experimental” ingredients. Would love to know your thoughts

By: Anne

Anne — Tue, 11 Aug 2020 15:14:36 +0000

I agree with your concerns. With The Vitamin C I did at least see the point in having a powder, given that it is “fresh” every time you add it, but as Niacinamide doesn´t really strike me as unstable or tricky to formulate with, I don´t get why you would want a powder to mix into the rest of your skincare anyway.

By: Cass

Cass — Tue, 11 Aug 2020 08:45:51 +0000

In reply to Amanda. I want the tea on which brands have black listed her for honestly reviewing products

By: das_ein

das_ein — Sun, 09 Aug 2020 05:34:41 +0000

Hi Michelle, what a coincidence. I had just started a conversation with AliceintheRabbitHole a couple of days ago to see what she thought of the Good Molecules version of the Vitamin C powder (they call theirs a “booster”). I bought it on a whim and used their tiny scoop (it looks much smaller than the one you showed that was provided with The Ordinary’s version) to mix some powder into a random serum once in a while. They recommend to use half to one scoop per application. It definitely seemed prone to error and I think that’s probably what made me uneasy enough to not use it consistently ??‍, so I don’t have any positive or negative results personally. There’s something very appealing about having a powder at the ready - knowing it’s not degrading like in solution-based VitC products and therefore not having to worry about freshness or wasting product. And it really does dissolve very quickly, so it felt effortless. But yes, playing half-ass chemist with something that could be really irritating is risky. There were a couple of questions on the product page where people were trying to get at the concentration issue, but the response was vague (e.g. ‘mix it into the usual amount of serum you put on your face’) . Thanks for bringing up several good points in this post and hope you aren’t blacklisted ?.