Biore Charcoal Pore Strips Review

Have you ever said to yourself "I don't understand why most other people have a different experience with these strips than I do."? When it comes to the products that most people say work great for them but not so much for you, it's usually because they never really had a huge problem with what they are trying to fix in the first place. Ask anyone with severe acne how Proactive worked out for them and they will tell you it didn't work at all. Ask someone with moderate acne and they will tell you it was a miracle.

Biore Strips have been around for a while now. I used them back in the 90's when they were white and now they have coal elements to them which make them black. Coal is beneficial to your skin, teeth and hair, and can be found in a lot of personal hygiene products nowadays due to it's ability to natural extract toxins.

The first time I used it back in the day it did an awesome job removing whiteheads. I found my experience with the coal strips to be very similar. In my teenage year's blackheads were not really a concern of mine so I thought it did a great job. 20 years later, I have "a few" blackheads and have tried quite a few remedies to remove them. From drenching my face in egg whites, scrubbing my face with lemon and salt, to just squeezing them out, nothing I have found can pull these blackheads from my skin. So as I said previously, some people have a great experience with these things because black heads are not an issue for them.

(NOTE: The difference between blackheads and whiteheads is that although they are both the result of clogged pores, the pore of a white head remains closed. While the pore of the blackhead is open. Not only does more dirt collect in the open pore but the fact that the affected pore is now bigger than it was makes blackheads much more visible than a whitehead.)

So the past 2 times I have used these strips it has made my nose super itchy. It wasn't itchy when it was on my nose but after I had removed it I wanted to scrub my nose with a Brillo pad. Once I had removed the strip my nose was very irritated and uncomfortable. The first time I thought maybe I had been nuzzling with the dogs a bit too much and that was the cause of the irritation but then I tried it a second time and although it was not as intense, the itch was still there. So because of this you might want to try the strip at night. If you do it in the morning and put makeup on there after and have the same experience I did, you're going to look like one of those hobo clown figurines with a big red nose all day. It was most likely an acute allergic reaction. The tingle sensation on the tip of my nose was rather uncomfortable for about an hour after the strip had been removed then went away without consequence.

As you can see from the pic of the strip itself it removed a lot of whiteheads but as you can also see in the before and after pic it really didn't do that great with blackheads. As mentioned previously, all clogged pores are whiteheads but not all whiteheads are blackheads. As you can see from the picture the tip of my nose and on the sides of my nose the blackheads were not disturbed at all. They are still very dark and visible. The strip should have cleaned it out leaving a larger but empty pore and as you can see that is not the case.

So here is my conclusion.

If you are young and already have great skin these things work great. Whiteheads are very hard to see with the naked eye so most people have no use for these strips. If you use these as instructed and do not get the desired results you need to go to a dermatologist or esthetician.

(A dermatologist is more like a doctor and can do anything an esthetician can. A dermatologist needs more schooling than an esthetician and has the ability to perform more procedures. In this particular case, I'm pretty sure both would work just fine and have very similar if not identical methods of ridding your face of blackheads.)

***3 out of 5 Stars***

I give it 3 out of 5 stars because it does not remove blackheads like it says it will, but it does remove white heads.