Beauty 360 | Good Times

New makeup/skincare store opens in Santa Cruz
Until recently, you had to brave sketchy Highway 17 in order to get your large-scale beauty fix. No longer. All of that changed when CVS—yes, the drugstore on Mission Street—launched a classy, glamorous sidekick—Beauty 360.

On a whim, I swung by CVS one day, and was more than shocked to discover its offshoot—Beauty 360—with its sparkly makeup bottles and skin care creams that beckon beauty aficionados with tempting fragrances, skin care solutions, and lip glosses galore. The store is spacious, well designed and spotless. It offers myriad products from recognizable lines, and the staff is quite generous with letting you sample products. Beauty 360 has become an exclusive beauty destination in Santa Cruz. Good-bye Sephora. It was nice knowing you.

Here’s why we’re obsessed: Beauty 360 is stocked with lines like the well-known B Kamins and BioElements skin care products, the celebrity friendly skin care line of Mario Badescu, hair care products by Neil George (their flagship salon in L.A. is responsible for the manes of many Hollywood starlets), sophisticated makeup products from Cargo, Bloom, Vincent Longo and Paula Dorf (among many others), and an extensive array of well-known fragrances. Think of it as a similar concept to Sephora or Ulta, but there’s a hook—the staff at Beauty 360 are fine-tuned and well educated on every line in the store, and everyone has a pedigree. There, you’ll meet an expertly trained makeup artist and licensed estheticians; the staff is educated, experienced, welcoming, accommodating, intelligent, and will help you solve whatever beauty blunder you’re dealing with.

The store also offers an array of services—both free and for a charge. A series of facials are available, including ones that use the Mario Badescu products, and prices range from $50-$65 for an opportunity to get your face expunged of gunk, and back into its intended glowing visage. There’s an entire wall of free gifts with purchase available, as well as a handful of free services for anyone that walks into the store—like the “Hot Toddy,” where you can get a quick hand massage, or “Perfect Pout,” where a staff person will give your mouth a once over and help get it back into kissing shape again.

In addition, this Beauty 360 in Santa Cruz has chosen to get involved in numerous “give back to the community” endeavors. Check out the store for more details, but one way to be a recipient of their generosity is to swing by downtown Santa Cruz retail shop, Stripe (107 Walnut Ave.), on Thursday, April 22 for the Lex Designs trunk show. There, during the trunk show from 5-8 p.m., will be an enormous raffle basket full of fashionable finds from local stores, including a gift certificate from Stripe, tons of beauty products and a gift certificate for a facial and makeover from Beauty 360, and much more. This Beauty 360 has us covered from every angle.