Review: Milk Makeup Watermelon Brightening Stick Serum

INGREDIENT ANALYSIS

Full ingredients list:

Water/aqua/eau, butylene glycol, bis-PEG-18 methyl ether dimethyl silane, sodium stearate, pentylene glycol, glycerin, oleth-2, citrus aurantium amara (bitter orange) flower water, citrullus vulgaris (watermelon) fruit extract, fragaria vesca (strawberry) fruit extract, pyrus malus (apple) fruit extract, lens esculenta (lentil) fruit extract, lens esculenta (lentil) seed extract, cichorium intybus (chicory) root extract, prunus domestica fruit extract, opuntia ficus-indica stem extract, lepidium sativum sprout extract, acacia senegal gum, sea water/maris aqua/eau de mer, tocopheryl acetate, sodium lactate, hydrolyzed rice protein, lecithin, sodium PCA, polysorbate 20, palmitoyl tetrapeptide-7, palmitoyl tripeptide-1, sodium hyaluronate, ethylhexylglycerin, xanthan gum, stearic acid, carbomer, ascorbic acid, citric acid, BHT, hexylene glycol, caprylyl glycol, sorbic acid, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate, phenoxyethanol, chlorphenesin, red 40/CI 16035, yellow 5/CI 19140

 Highlights:

- Paraben-free, sulfate-free, alcohol-free, silicone-free, and EU allergen-free 
- According to Milk, it is also vegan, cruelty-free, talc-free, gluten-free
- Unfortunately, this product is NOT fungal acne safe due to the presence of stearic acid and polysorbate 20

Notable benefits (and which ingredients are responsible for it):

-  Brightening (ascorbic acid)
- Anti-aging (ascorbic acid, citric acid, tocopheryl acetate)
- Moisturizing (butylene glycol, sodium PCA, sodium hyaluronate, glycerin)
- Skin regeneration and elasticity: ascorbic acid  

Cautions:

- Contains stearic acid which has a comedogenic rating of 3. This can potentially clog pores, especially on oily skin
- Contains citric acid, which can potentially irritate skin at high concentrations especially on sensitive skin. However, I don't think this product contains enough citric acid to be irritating for most people

Overall ingredient safety:

- 93% of ingredients are low risk, 5% are moderate risk, and 2% are unknown risk.
- Unknown: Lens esculenta (lentil) seed extract
- Moderate risk: BHT (fragrance, antioxidant), Phenoxyethanol (fragrance, common preservative)

See the full Skincarisma analysis here

THOUGHTS

Fragrance: A few ingredients provide fragrance, but the actual product has no smell at all. Disappointing because you would expect it to smell like watermelon (look how pink it is!), but it’s good news for people who are sensitive to or dislike fragrance.

Safe to try: This serum is composed of mostly low risk ingredients, meaning unless there’s an ingredient you know your skin doesn’t agree with, this product most likely won't lead to irritation. Of course, this product isn’t entirely bland and has quite a bit of variety in its composition, so it’s always a possibility that you may have a reaction to something. But a majority of the ingredients are common and known to be safe. 

Design: The stick form is quite handy and convenient-- you never have to worry about this spilling in your bag or struggling to pack for travel with the TSA rummaging around being trash-it-happy. You can apply this to your hands and then to your face, but much product will be lost that way (well I guess you’d have super soft hands). Milk advises to apply it directly to the face in order to have zero waste. However, for the stick to stay sanitary, you would need to make sure your face is clean before application, and you would probably want to apply this first in order to avoid wiping off any other skincare products you want to use.  

Application: As you would expect, the application of this stick serum is quite easy. I just roll it over my skin after washing my face and it glides quite smoothly, with minimal tugging of the skin. It has a cooling effect similar to the Milk Cooling Water Stick, which I think is a result of the bis-PEG-18 methyl ether dimethyl silane (silicone wax) used to make these products into their stick forms. It feels quite moisturizing. The serum leaves a slightly tacky finish, which goes away when I apply my second moisturizer (Cosrx Brightening Rice Mask) but I think it would act as a good makeup base/primer. Additionally, something I love is that it leaves a naturally dewy finish! Not one of its advertised effects but one I welcome warmly. 

 

EXPECTED RESULTS

According to Milk...

As the name says, we should expect to see a brightening effect and reduction in dark spots thanks to the swiss garden cress sprout extract, AKA sepidium sativum sprout extract, which has been shown to inhibit melanin formation as well as having skin brightening and evening properties. It is also an antioxidant, meaning it reduces free radicals and can help mitigate UV damage in the skin.

This serum also contains matrixyl (palmitoyl pentapeptide). Matrixyl is a man-made peptide that promotes the production of collagen and elastic in the skin, leading to anti-aging effects such as smoother texture and greater elasticity. It was originally developed by a French company named Sederma Inc. It works by mimicking the natural collagen decaying process: typically, when collagen breaks down, the resulting polypeptides will trigger the production of more collagen to replace what was lost. Peptides can be applied directly to the skin to attempt to trigger this same process. However, one potential issue is that the molecular size of peptides is quite large and may not penetrate the surface of your skin. Although matrixyl has been shown to reduce wrinkles in some studies, the true efficacy of peptides is debatable. Source

Finally, this Milk serum contains watermelon extract, which adds some simple skin hydrating properties.

According to Skincarisma...

The main stars of this serum are vitamins C and E. Benefits of vitamin C include brightening and increased collagen production. Benefits of both vitamin C and E include being an antioxidant. When applied together, they act synergistically and improve the effectiveness of each other. Ferulic acid is another ingredient that works well with vitamins C and E, but isn’t present in this serum 

What other reviews say...

I’ve seen mixed reviews on this serum, with some people claiming that it did work to brighten their skin after only a few weeks of use, while others report seeing no effect at all. 

My expectations
My skin has been through a lot, but currently has very little active acne. My main concerns are PIH and PIE, in additional to small ice-pick scars. Although this serum contains collagen inducing ingredients, I do not expect to see any improvement in my atrophic scars (the only topical treatment that has been shown to be somewhat effective with atrophic scars is retinol!). However, I do hope to see some improvement in PIH. I have one particular blotch of PIH on my left cheek that I will be focusing the product on. Let's see the results!

Note: I applied the Milk watermelon stick in the morning first thing after washing my face. I followed this up with the Neutrogena Hydrating Serum, Cosrx Rice Mask, CeRave Moisturizing Cream, and Cosrx Aloe Sunscreen. The Cosrx Rice Mask has some brightening effects as well, which I kept in mind for my final thoughts.

 

PROGRESS PICTURES

This is what I'm starting with:

Week 1

I started out by adding this product to my morning routine. It is quite pleasant and fun to use, and feels cooling and moisturizing. Downside: I started seeing some bad clogged pores, which I didn't put down to the Milk serum just yet. I did not see any notable changes in PIH but you can look for yourself below.

Week 2

 The clogged pores cleared up but they left some new PIH and PIE in their wake. These photos were taken a few days apart over the second week.

Week 3

Again, I continued to have some minor clogged pores. I do think some of my pre-existing PIH lightened slightly; however, I decided to discontinue the Milk serum after this week since it seemed to be adding new comedones and PIH.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Here are the final results! On the left is what I started with; on the right is my skin at the end of the three weeks.

On my left cheek (top row), it looks like the large splotch of PIH improved by a bit.

My right cheek (bottom row) appears to have stayed mostly the same, with maybe some additional dark marks from the clogged pores. My atrophic scars look a bit worse but I think it's just the angle of the lightning in the photo.

Overall, the Milk watermelon serum is moisturizing and fun to use, as well as convenient to travel with. I did see some improvement in PIH but gained PIH in other areas due to the clogged pores. I think my Cosrx Rice Mask, which has 2% niacinamide, had the majority of the brightening effects-- the progress that I saw was very close to the progress I see from my normal routine without the Milk Watermelon Stick. The serum may have contributed to some of the improvement, but the downsides outweighed the benefits. I actually had the same experience with getting clogged pores and comedones from the Milk Matcha Toner and Holographic Stick, which makes me think that I may be sensitive to the silicone wax ingredient. This is a no-go for me. 

I loved the idea of a serum-as-a-stick and the adorable, practical packaging. Unfortunately, the actual serum just didn't work out for me. I will likely not be repurchasing any of Milk's stick products.

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