During the summer, a lot of Japanese magazines show how to get dead skin cells off of your feet, especially your heels. Having cracked, powdery heels in considered unattractive by Japanese media. There are a lot of products, such as pumice stones and heel files, designed to help you get rid of the dead skin cells.
Baby Foot is an innovative product in that it promotes getting rid of dead skin cells without using physical abrasives. There are a few other brands of the similar products, but this was the first one that I learned of.
This product has attracted a lot of attention in Japan, partially due to their marketing. They prominently show pictures of the product in action (links to their website).
The main purpose for me to review this product was to assess whether it was worth the hype. Is it just great marketing, or does the product actually work well?
What it does: (from http://babyfoot.co.jp/e/product/)
Baby Foot series is developed in particular to care for the dead skin cells which produce problems with the sole. The principal ingredient of Baby Foot is Fruit Acid which is very gentle compare to other acid. Fruit Acid penetrates into the layer of dead skin cells and works on the desmosomes between the skin layers, enabling easier peeling. The dead skin peels off naturally due to natural turnover (*1) and friction which occurs every day. In addition, Baby Foot contains 17 types of natural extracts with a high moisturizing power. The foot may be reborn just like a baby’s after peeling. The Baby Foot series is a total foot care series not only for peeling but also for maintaining a healthy foot.
Price: 1680 JPY (around $22 USD). I felt this was pricey even for Japan, where most drugstore products are above 1000 JPY ($13 USD).
Instructions:
Instructions are printed on the back of the box.
Put a clean foot inside the bag and tape it shut. After 2 hours, take the bag off and wash your feet.
Here are some additional thoughts I had about using this product:
1. Since the bags have gel inside them, it is really dangerous to walk around with these bags on your feet. Your feet will slide around when trying to walk.
2. Because of the this, consider how you will spend your two hours.
3. There is no immediate peeling. I started peeling 2 days after I did this treatment.
4. I started peeling from the parts of my foot where the skin is thinnest, such as the arch of my foot.
5. The part of the skin that remained the longest was my heel, meaning where my skin was toughest.
6. The skin peels when there is a combination of moisture and friction. I walked outside on a hot, sunny day with sandals and my skin began to peel a lot. Consider where you'll be while the skin is peeling (for example, I would probably not go on a date until my skin stopped peeling)
7. This product only took off the outermost layer of skin. The skin on my heel remained tough.
Here is my foot on Day 3
(yep, that gross thing on the floor is a piece of skin)
Here is my foot on Day 5
The red area is where my skin already peeled. You can see that part of the skin is pinker than the rest.
The blue area is where my skin hasn't peeled yet. My heel is where my skin is toughest, and the part where I wanted the most dramatic change.
Pros:
- Actually removes the dead skin cells on the outer layer of your skin
- Visually interesting
Cons:
- Does not have a dramatic change on the parts where your skin is thick.
- The effect is not long lasting, since your skin will keep regenerating
- Expensive
Would I repurchase? No. Yes, this is an interesting product, but it did not work well on my heel, which is the area I needed it to work the most on.
My heels are really horrid, as you can see from the picture. If you have had a spa treatment or a pedicure which really gets rid of cracked heels, please let me know!
Hope you enjoyed this review!
xoxo, K
