You want to be prepared for any possibility when you travel. As you’re packing your bags for a trip, you try to imagine any situation that could come up. Phone chargers? Check. Clothes for different types of weather? Check. When you’re packing your bag of beauty products and supplies, it can be tempting to throw in as much as possible. But especially when you’re traveling by air, the restrictions on liquids and increasing cost to check baggage makes you think twice about how much you really need to bring. Here are some beauty products you can probably leave at home.
Shower Gels and Lotions
Unless you have skin conditions that require specific products, the bath and body products your hotel supplies in little containers should be good enough. Bring perfume if you want to make a statement with your fragrance.
Full Size Fragrance
Thanks to the TSA’s rules about 3-ounce containers, you may not be able to bring a full-size bottle of perfume. Even if you did bring it, you’d have to wrap it in bubble wrap and put it in a plastic bag to avoid the disaster of a broken perfume bottle all over your luggage. Try looking for your favorite scent in a rollerball for easy traveling.
Shampoo and Conditioner
Like the shower gels and body lotions, your hotel should provide mini bottles of shampoo and conditioner. Even if they’re not the brands you would normally use at home, they should be good enough to get you clean. However, even if you don’t want to bring full-size bottles of shampoo and conditioner, this would be a great time to bring small bottles of dry shampoo, so you’re not wasting valuable sightseeing time on doing your hair.
Nail Polish and Remover
Chipped or peeling nail polish is a minor beauty disaster and you might be tempted to bring along your nail polish for touch-ups. Avoid the temptation and leave your nail polish and remover at home. Much like perfume bottles, the risk of breaking it and ruining the other things in your luggage is just too great. If you’re worried about keeping your nails nice, invest in a longer-lasting gel manicure right before your trip.
Your Whole Skin Care Routine
Even if you have a complex, multi-step skincare ritual at home, in most cases you can skip it for a few days while traveling. Pack travel-friendly cleansing wipes instead of separate eye makeup removers and cleansers. Leave the scrubs, masks and treatment serums at home. Be sure to bring a good moisturizer, though, since your skin is likely to be drier than usual if you travel by airplane.
Multiple Colors of Makeup
How can you possibly pick your favorite colors of makeup to take with you? You don’t know in advance if you’ll want to choose dramatic or natural eye and lip colors. Instead of loading down your makeup bag with multiple different cosmetic colors, consider getting a do-it-all palette that offers multiple choices and may include blush and several eye shadow colors.
