By: Erin Brady

Looking to save some money this spring?  Well, there’s a range of beauty treatments out there that are easy to take on yourself, instead of visiting a salon or spa.  While DIY-treatments can sometimes be a success at home, sometimes it can actually be more cost and time efficient, and safer, to visit the professionals.  Follow these tips to determine which beauty treatments require an expert an which can be done at-home:

Waxing
Hair Removal definitely calls for hiring a professional—especially for your more sensitive, hard-to-reach areas.  Hot wax and ripping the hair out by its follicles definitely deserves the knowledgeable eye of an experienced technician to avoid burning or irritating your skin.  Despite the plethora of at-home waxing treatments on the market, most are messy, not as effective and downright painful.  If you do want to save yourself a few trips to your eyebrow waxer, you can go once to get the shape you prefer and perform regular up-keep yourself by plucking stray hairs.

Hair Care
Changing your hairstyle or drastically changing your color deserves a trip to the salon, but you can save major money by cutting down on the number of times you visit your hairstylist each year.  If all you need is color up-keep, box hair color, such as Clairol Nice N’ Easy, L’Oreal Feria, Clairol Perfect 10 and Fekkai Salon Color all work great and process in no time.

Nail Care
Mani/Pedis are definitely one of life’s little pleasures, but this pampering treat is the first thing you can let go when trying to trim your beauty budget.  Why?  Because drugstores have everything you need to get salon-worthy nails!  Sally Hansen’s Nail Polish strips feature intricate designs, fun colors and patterns that look like more expensive Minx nail coverings, but cost only $9!  Looking for regular polish?  Now Essie, the reigning nail salon queen, has all of her fun and classic polishes available at drugstores like CVS.  Get a file, top-coat and polish and you’ll be good to go for weeks.

Tanning
Tanning beds are definitely not worth your money or worth risking your health for, so we suggest trying a self-tanner or gradual tanning lotion.  The tried and true favorite among the beauty community is Jergen’s Natural Glow lotion to create a natural looking hint of color that, when applied more regularly, will yield a more intense color.  Apply this lotion or any self-tanners to clean, exfoliated skin after you shower and wait a few minutes for the lotion to soak in before getting dressed to avoid streaks.