DEB vs. Charlotte Russe

Being a rather girly girl, I enjoy such things as shopping, clothes, make-up and nail polish. Some high end nail polish brands include Deborah Lippman, OPI, and Essie. However, they brands tend to be ridiculously expensive for not that much nail polish. These brands are very popular because they are high quality and they do not chip as easily as a brand that is cheaper. Deborah Lippman is probably one of the most popular among the high end nail polish brands, but it is horribly expensive, ranging from  $12 to $20. OPI is another good brand, but it runs between $5 and $15.  Essie is another one of the high end brands of nail polish, but they can cost anywhere between $5 and $10. While these are very good quality nail polishes, every day people cannot afford them. These $5 to $20 nail polishes have the same amount in their bottles as a $1 bottle of nail polish from a drug store. The problem is that the nail polishes that most drug stores provide are not good quality and chip very easily.

I recently went shopping and got two different nail polishes from two different stores: DEB and Charlotte Russe. I decided to test out the quality of each of the nail polishes by taking a photo right after painting, then another photo testing how they compared. I did not use a top coat or a base coat for either of them.

DEB is overall a clothing store, but scattered throughout the store, there are little accessories, like jewelry, hair things, belts, shoes, purses and nail polish.

This was the nail polish that I got from DEB, as it says on the label, for $3. Their selection was not the best, but this color caught my eye. I opened it slightly before buying it and I saw that it was a very thick polish, which was just what I was looking for. 

         

This photo was taken right after I painted the nails. 

This was taken the night after I painted the nails, which was only a few hours later.

 

While the color and thickness was exactly what I was looking for, the quality was not. This nail polish chipped extremely easily and there was an imperfection not long after I finished painting them and let them dry. 

Charlotte Russe was the second store that I went to and it is a very similar kind of store to DEB, but focuses a little more on the accessories. They had a much larger variety of nail polish colors and types than DEB did, so it was very difficult in deciding which to buy. 

I ended up buying this color, called Cherry Bomb.  It was $2.50 and has about the same amount (if not more) in the bottle than the DEB nail polish did. This polish is much more watery than the gold nail polish, so I didn't have high hopes for it to begin with.

This is the photo taken right after the painting.

This was taken the night after I painted the nails. 

The Charlotte Russe nail polish seems to be of much higher quality because it is now days later after I did this little experiment and the red polish is just now starting to chip. It was cheaper and better quality than the DEB brand.