{Such A} Redkat Review: Sally Hansen Color Quick Nail Pen

I'm very particular about my nails. At any given moment, I have a bottle of nailpolish sitting on my desk, one in my laptop bag and yet another in the glove compartment in my car. I have been known to paint my nails after getting in my car, fastening my seatbelt and starting it, just so that they can dry on the way to the office. I'm sure I've amused many a driver as I've gone down the expressway, hanging one hand, and then the other out the window to speed the dry time. My motto is, no chipped nails!

Flipping through an issue of Glamour one evening, I was intrigued to see an ad for Sally Hansen's Color Quick Fast Dry Nail Color Pen. Having tried several of these so called quicky manicure pens in the past, I didn't have high hopes for this one, but finding myself with a set of chipped nails this past Friday morning, I decided to give Sally's Nail Color Pen a try. A quick stop at Walgreens and I was the proud owner of a Black Cherry# 13 Nail Color Pen. I eagerly drove to the office, grabbed a cup of coffee and settled in to my chair to put this pen to the test. Let's just say the product performed remarkably mediocre.


The positives:
1. The nail color does go on quickly.
2. I'm on day three of my quickie manicure, and my nails are mostly sans chips.
3. The polish itself didn't smell nearly as strong as my OPI polish, so it was easier to paint covertly at my desk.
4. The pen isn't messy as a whole, so no worries about wayward nailpolish spots on my desk or on my laptop.
5. I didn't wind up with a lot of color outside my nail bed, so no need for nailpolish remover touch ups.

The negatives:
1. The color is streaky. No one is going to look at my nails and assume that I got a professional manicure. I tried two coats and couldn't get all the streaks out.
2. The click and paint mechanism is wonky. I had to click repeatedly to get the color to flow into the pen, and when it did, it came out unevenly.
3. It's hard to paint with the brush, so you can't actually paint all the way to the cuticles. Considering that I want to elongate my nails with color since I've got small hands, this was a noticeable negative.
4. The brush on this pen is incredibly coarse, so it's impossible to get truly even application.

On the whole, Sally Hansen's Color Quick Pen is a great option for those times when you need to freshen up your nails on the run, but I wouldn't recommend it for anything more lasting than a few days. I'll hang on to my Black Cherry #13 for those "in case of emergency" moments, but keep "I'm Not Really A Waitress" for my at-home manicures.

Redkat Score:


2.5 Kats