Social Bliss Style Box April 2014 Review

Ok, so this is technically an April review, but I don't know what happened - somehow I didn't get my April Social Bliss Style Box till like a week ago. I even emailed them about it, never got an email back (probably my only complaint about them - I don't feel their communication is terribly great - I'll make a little note on that again near the end of the post), but my box magically showed up like 3 days later with a Priority 2 day shipping label on it and some extra goodies inside that made it seem like they knew it was late. I would've liked an email, but that'll do. Anyway. In spite of this little snafu, I do really, really like this subscription! It's just so fun and feels like a real treat to get in the mail.

The Social Bliss Style Box is a pretty new (started in January) subscription. For $39.95 plus shipping and handling (or less if you go with a longer plan), you get a box of style goodies worth at least $100 and sometimes up to $200 (that's what they're saying May will be!). The boxes I've gotten (and the 1 I didn't) so far have included items like jewelry, makeup or nail items, scarves, and a "big ticket" item like a purse or clutch. I have LOVED almost everything they've sent so far. I even bought the clutch I missed out on in January because it was so me (and I was tempted to find the necklace as well!). It is a slightly more expensive subscription, but every month so far has felt like receiving a pretty extravagant gift!

Opening the box

The boxes are nicely packaged. Tissue paper and a ribbon tied around everything and bubble wrap around anything even slightly fragile (I have to admit, I had already dug through the box before taking the above picture, so it doesn't look quite as nice as I found it!). The box usually ships the last week of each month (which makes it kind of nice if you get more than one subscription box during the month, since most companies ship out early or mid-month! Spread out the joy!)

Info card (descriptions and values)

As I mentioned above, my box was obviously a bit late and I'm pretty sure they realized that because I got 2 bonus items in my box that weren't listed. One of them was actually an item that subscribers were eligible to get by using a special code applied to their account. It was put out on Facebook I believe and I'm not sure if that one was limited to a certain number of subscribers or not, but either way, I wasn't able to use it because I didn't have an actual account page with my gift subscription. But, looks like I got it anyway because my box was late! It was a set of cute Bohemian Circle Motif Earrings from Fig Tree Jewelry ($22). I haven't really done much with my earrings beyond metal studs or rhinestone studs since Emily was born, even though clearly she's out of the "yank earrings" phase (though I'm about to enter another!), but these are pretty cute. They're actually quite delicate for larger earrings. These also came with a 15% off coupon code and the site does have some really cute bracelets, but hoo, they're not cheap. Even with 15% off.

Bohemian Circle Motif Earrings from Fig Tree Jewelry

My second bonus item was a She Smoked Matte Collection nail polish in a gray color. I'm not really sure where to price this because I can't find their website, but Amazon sells a set of 24 including what looks like this color for $31, sooo, not much ($1.29). Everyone actually got one of these in the February box, but I think everyone got pink in that box. I don't have many matte nail polishes, so I'll probably keep this one. I haven't swatched it yet though, so I'm not sure how it looks or how the formula is yet. 

She Smoked Matte Collection nail polish

Onto the items everyone got in the April box! First up, we got a sample size Too Faced Better Than Sex mascara in black (Social Bliss says $15. Full size is $23, so sure). I have actually gotten a sample size of this in some other subscription, though I can't remember which. Although Too Faced does make my current favorite mascara, Better Than False Lashes, I'm not as much a fan of this one. It winds up a little too thick and clumpy for me. Oh well, I know a lot of people do really like this one, so I'm sure more people were happy with this.

Too Faced Better Than Sex mascara

I'm not sure of the brand of the next item, so I can't find a link for it to confirm price, but the next item was a set of Touch of Sparkle Cubic Zirconia earrings ($50 - I'm really not sure these are worth quite that much, they don't really feel like $50 earrings). These are fine, but definitely not my favorite item I've gotten from Social Bliss. Apart from the value issue, I'm just not into fancy looking jewelry. I don't have very many occasions where I'd even think about wearing these. Even at weddings, I tend to stick to my own style. They're not bad, just not my style.

Touch of Sparkle Cubic Zirconia earrings

Next, we got a really cute black flower mirror compact. Again, I'm not sure on brand, so I can't really link this either, but their value was $5, which seems reasonable. Definitely useful, too - it's a double mirror with regular and magnified. Inexpensive, but cute! And going in my purse!

Little Black Compact

The last of the smaller items was a nail art kit by Stella. Again, not something I'm finding online, but their value is $7, which seems reasonable for something sold in America, although technically you could order similar kits from China for less on Amazon (and just wait ages for it to arrive!). It's a cute set of various sized clear rhinestones for nail art.

Stella Nail Art Kit

Finally, the big item of the box was an Izzy & Ali bag ($129). Oddly, I can't find this on the Izzy & Ali site anymore, but I swear it was there less than a week ago (I think it was called a Hannah bag) - I checked to see the other color options. Maybe it's an older style and was just taken off. Anyway, although the info card shows 3 color options (black, gray, and navy) all of which are perfectly nice, I did not get any of those colors. Which is kind of a shame. I got yellow. Hm. Well, at least I can honestly say I do not own any other yellow bag! It's kind of a mustardy yellow and definitely isn't a color I'd choose on my own, but I may hang on to it and see if it grows on me (I do like it more today than I did the day I got it, so maybe it will!). It's still a bit more classy of a style than I'd go for in addition to being not my favorite color, but maybe I should shake up my accessories from time to time? If not, I actually think my sister might really like it, so either way, I'm not too disappointed.

Izzy & Ali shoulder bag (also, you can't really see it, but the strap is mostly a chain)

April 2014 Social Bliss Style Box

Writing this up, I do notice kind of an interesting thing. I'm not entirely sure where they find some of what they send. It's not easy to look up brands for everything (or check their values). However. Usually, the "big ticket item" is branded or at least appears to be very nice quality, at least to me. And even if some of the items are slightly less expensive wild cards, so far, I've been happy. February's slightly more boho themed box in particular was a fantastic box where I loved almost everything - a really awesome clutch/wallet, a gorgeous scarf, and an amazing ring were the big highlights of that box! I'm also pretty sure I would've liked most of January's rockstar themed box had I gotten it (that was the box that had the clutch I bought!). The past 2 months have been a bit classier in theme, which isn't really my style, but I can at least appreciate that for someone who does like that style, they were pretty great too!

Overall, this month is kind of up in the air for me - I'm still kind of undecided on whether or not I like the bag, but I do still think it's well worth what I paid for the box. Social Bliss's value totals up to $206, not including my bonus items and even if it's worth slightly less than that (like those earrings), it's still well over the price of the box. It really comes down to personal style preference for the monthly theme of the box and in particular, for the big item of the box, since that's where the majority of the value tends to come from.

So, now the one potential negative thing I do want to point out is that their communication with gift subs seems to be a bit odd, for me at least. During my 3 month gift sub (I only signed up for the gift sub to avoid the auto-renew, just in case I didn't like the subscription), I didn't get one email from them. No confirmation that I subscribed, no tracking emails, no promotional code emails, nothing. I didn't even have a "my subscription" page in my online account, so I couldn't check anything (or add the bonus item code to my account last month, though funny enough, that didn't turn out to be a problem!). After a week of waiting for the initial confirmation of my subscription (I only had a credit card charge for proof), I just emailed them and got a response a few days later confirming that I had in fact subscribed, but I still didn't get any tracking from that point on. I think maybe the reason for this is simply that it was a gift sub. This was my only experience with a gift subscription from any company I think, so maybe they're all like this. It's meant to be a bit more of a surprise for the recipient (even though the recipient in this case was just myself).

Either way, I'm glad I switched over to a regular auto-renewing 3 month plan instead (since I do love the sub!) because now I seem to be getting those emails.  I got an immediate subscription confirmation email and I expect that this month, like everyone else, I'll actually get a tracking email. I definitely prefer getting emails - I like to know that things are confirmed and I like the ability to track my packages.

If you'd like to subscribe to this really cool subscription, head on over to their site!

(And just a disclaimer: I bought this box myself and was not compensated for this review in any way. All opinions are my own. I have included referral links.)