In my job I work with Excel all the time... so that's what I do with my makeup too...so bear with my extremely detailed list.
I have 5 worksheet tabs:
# 1 is called "Input"
Here I put in all the details I need to know:
Category (Eye, Lip, Face, Cleanser, Skincare, Tools, Nails)
Brand
Product Name (Lipglass, Chromeglass, Beauty Powder Blush etc)
Product Type (Gloss, lipstick, liner, blush etc)
Shade (Blacktrack, Spice etc)
Color family (greens, blues, pinks)
Finish (Veluxe Pearl, Frost etc)
Tone (Warm, Cool, or Neutral)
Collection (Permanent, Discontinued, LE name)
Date of purchase (the month and year, so I can tell what's getting old)
Score (1-5)
Cost
Retail Value (if different from what I paid)
Weight (so I can calculate the value per gram)
I then put an autofilter onto this list, so I can look at all my products that are say Product Type "Blush", or that are Color Family "Blue".
#2 is called Upcoming
Here I put several lists:
Wishlist (item name and cost)
In progress (stuff I have purchased but not yet received)
Upcoming Collections (collection names, dates, and approx how much I plan to spend)
Other (non-MAC stuff I might want to get)
Collection details (the names and descriptions of products coming up in new collections. I grey out the stuff I dont want, and bold the stuff i do)
#3 is called Retired
for the stuff I no longer have, I list the following:
Brand
Product name
B2M (Y/N)
Reason (used up, lost etc)
Date of Purchase/First Usage
Date of "retirement"
Cost
Retail value
This way I know how much stuff I can B2M or how long it takes me to go through a cleansing oil etc.
#4 is called Stats
I track how much I've spent, how much the retail value of my collection is worth, and break down by category. For example, at the moment I've spent:
42% on eye stuff, 13% on Tools, 12% on Lips, 18% on Face, 2% on Skincare, and 4% on Nails.
I also keep monthly line graph of how much I spend (Nov and Feb seem to be my "bad" months
)
I also keep a area graph of how much I spend by category by month
Last tab #5 is called Pivot
this is where the magic happens... or the OCD. If you dont know how to work a pivot table, it's pretty much a table that you can sort and organize any way you want. Like right now, I can see how many products I purchased from each MAC collection, sorted by popularity (I seem to have bought a lot from Fafi (13) and Strange Hybrid (7)). Or I can see how much I've spent on each brand... 73% on MAC, 3% at the Body Shop, and 1% on Bobbi Brown. Or how many shadows of each finish I've got. I've got 64 Frosts, 21 VPs, 23 Satin, and 9 Lustres. And it goes on and on...
Why? I must be obsessive, but I enjoy updating this list almost as much as using the makeup....
Now if I could only harness this skill into better making money as I do spending it.
