Nobody has ever died from bad skin, although many have died a thousand deaths of sheer embarrassment when a monster blemish chooses to make an appearance.

If your budget won’t allow frequent professional skin treatments, don’t despair. Using the right products at home, with advice from a licensed skin therapy professional (versus a makeup sales person), can keep your skin in premium condition without the hefty price tag.

Price does not determine the quality of a skin care product. Effectiveness will be determined by the ingredient mix, and by the product education which accompanies your purchase. There are some very expensive skin care products on the market which won’t do a thing for the health of your skin, so don’t presume that spending big means good quality.

Still, you may need a budget strategy to stay stocked with a professional-quality cleanser, exfoliant, moisturizer, treatment products, sun products and so on. So here are three changes you can make today in order to fatten your skin care piggybank:

BREW YOUR OWN COFFEE IN THE MORNING—A barista-made latte costs 100x more than a home-brewed cup. This would be the equivalent of a $1,000 pizza.

DROP YOUR CABLE TV SERVICE—57 channels and nothing on, as Bruce Springsteen sang. You can save $750 a year if you give it up.

DRINK TAP WATER. Unlike bottled water, it contains fluoride and is not stripped of its minerals. And, you won’t be clogging up the landfill with your thousands of empties.

Hey – give up whatever you have to save your skin! Well, what advice would you expect from a skin therapy diva?

This entry was posted on Monday, July 27th, 2009 at 8:01 am and is filed under under my skin with jane wurwand, founder of dermalogica.