If you love your skin and don’t have an urge to get a nasty sunburn or put yourself at an increased risk for skin cancer, do yourself a big favor and DO NOT PURCHASE Hawaiian Tropic Shimmer Effect Lotion. This gorgeous 40 SPF sunscreen did a piss-poor job in protecting me from sunburn today. I initially applied twenty minutes before swimming, and re-applied every hour (after making sure my skin was dry), yet I’m now dealing with a rather painful sunburn on my shoulders, upper arms, upper back and chest (the burned cleavage is especially painful). Dan and I smeared Ocean Potion Instant Burn Relief (best sunburn relief stuff EVER — even better when you stick it in the fridge beforehand) on my sunburn, but the relief wore off pretty quickly. 
Moral of the story? Pretty sparkly sunscreen = not worth the sunburn! No more Hawaiian Tropics — I’m going back to Coppertone!
Oh God… I use to use that stuff and it is HORRIBLE!
Agreed—it’s horrible!
you made sure to get the sunscreen lotion , not just the sparkle lotion correct? theyve got two, and i made that mistake. i used the lotion thinking it had spf in it. wrong. figured out the mistake and returned it for the one with spf and it worked wonderfully! i also use their new spf without the sparkles and it works beautifully plus keeps my skin moisturized. (and smells delish…yum!)
you want a sunblock, not a sunscreen, IMO. trust me, enough will wash or sweat off that you’ll still get some sun, but not burned…hopefully. Gotta keep reapplying it, like you said. It’s a pain, but not worth your skin getting fried. You’re too young for that!
I’ve been looking at sunscreens because apparently some of the more mainstream ones really aren’t good for you. Nearly worse than the sun!
Here is that one: http://breakingnews.ewg.org/2011sunscreen/about-the-sunscreens/?search=Hawaiian+tropic+Shimmer+Effect+Lotion&brand_id=All&ptype=All&homesearchsubmit2=GO
With the best ranking being 0.
Sorry to hear about your burn. Does not seem fun at all!!
I’ve used Hawaiian Tropics since my baby days since well, I’m from Hawaii n all lol. I use their tanning lotion most of the time with a low SPF when I want to tan and I use Water Babies any other time. I’ve always liked the water babies one better than normal Coppertone for some reason -shrug-
Speaking of tanning, think I’ll go study on the beach tomorrow, buahaha!