Recently I told you about Influenster, but they’re not the only place you can score free products to review – I’m also signed up for BzzAgent and they were kind enough to send me a complimentary full-sized L’Oreal Paris Hydra Genius Daily Liquid Care Moisturizer for Normal/Dry Skin in exchange for my honest review. Officially, a BzzAgent is a member of BzzAgent.com who receives free or discounted products and/or services, then shares their opinion about them with friends. I’m a beauty-and-skincare-obsessed weirdo who writes reviews in her spare time anyway, so this is obviously awesome for me.

Anyway, this is a review for moisturizer, isn’t it? So the packaging itself was quite luxe – a sturdy glass bottle with a pump at the top. I was into that. But while the box advertised the moisturizer’s aloe and hyaluronic acid content, things like glycerin and dimethicone were closer to the top of the ingredient list. Denatured alcohol was also close to the top of the list, which I found very off-putting as it’s very drying on the skin, but I tried the product nonetheless.

As I suspected, this was a bit drying for me which defeats the purpose of it as a moisturizer. I used this in place of my normal moisturizer and sure, it made my skin soft at first, but within four days, I was getting dry patches on my cheeks. My skin also got oilier due to dehydration. The packaging boasts 72 hours of “continuous hydration,” but my skin starts looking more dehydrated than it normally does after just 8 hours (or less) when I use this. It’s also heavily fragranced which can be irritating to sensitive skin, so if you find that to be an issue, I’d avoid this. As much as I wanted to love this moisturizer because the packaging is so nice, it’s just not for me.