Let's Compare: DIY Make Brush Cleaner vs Store Bought

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon a stat from a past survey, conducted by Allure Magazine, that astounded me. Results from their survey showed that 45% of women never clean their make-up brushes. My first thought was, what the what?!? Harmful bacteria loves to grow on make-up brushes, most of which touch your eyes, lips, and face. Our faces have enough to combat each day; you don’t want to introduce bacteria first thing each morning, right?

While I’m not on a perfect cleaning schedule, I do clean my brushes at least twice a month. I’ve been using the beauty blender cleanser recently and just love it. It does a wonderful job cleansing thoroughly and doesn’t leave any residue behind. But after reading that stat, I became curious if the simple ingredients most have at home would work just as good. If it was easy to make and required no extra purchases, maybe ladies would find it easier to clean their brushes regularly. I took to Pinterest and settled on the simple, all natural cleaner recipe below. I tested both the store bought and homemade cleaner and shared some thoughts below.

BlenderCleanser Solid VS D.I.Y. All Natural Cleaner 

(Ingredients: 2 Cups Hot Water + 2 Tsp. Distilled Vinegar)

Let me start by saying that I see three benefits in making your own cleaner: cheap, easy to make with household items, all natural and chemical free. With more focus on the latter, I found a simple recipe with no chemicals and decided to test it. I used the same brush for the test and first cleaned with the DIY cleaner. I dipped and swirled it around for a minute and saw almost no residue coming off the brush so I used my hands to work in the cleaner and message the brush before rinsing it. 

Then I moved to the BlenderCleanser Solid. I wet the disk with hot water and swirled the wet brush around before rinsing it. As you can see after I cleaned it with the DIY cleaner, the solid got off much more make-up.

If you went the non-natural route, I'm sure there are DIY cleaners that will clean much better then the version I tried. For me, I'm a BlenderCleanser Solid believer. The price point is fair ($15.95), it's easy to use, cleans very well and leaves no residue on my brushes. 

Few Cleaning Tips: Use very hot water to clean brushes, form brushes to the original shape for drying, don't forget to clean the handles (mine always get so dirty).

What do you use? Do you have a DIY cleaner that works well?

Happy cleaning, ladies!