My Secret Panning Strategies PART 1: Set Up for Success

From time to time, I get comments on my Instagram posts congratulating me on my progress and asking how I managed to pan something so fast. Today, I thought I'd share my secrets with you. If you believe any of these strategies are considered cheating or you want to know more about my opinions on that matter, I suggest you read this post that is all about that jazz before you continue. When you've done that we can get into my personal panning strategies. Before I start I want to say that this is what works for me, and this is by no means a miracle strategy that works for everyone. And beware; this is going to be a long post even tough I've split it in two.

The first thing I did when I started panning was to go on a no-buy. Without new products coming in all the time it's a lot easier to focus on what I already have and to pan them. This is the single best thing I've done when it comes to my panning journey. Whenever I do need to buy something I make sure I truly need it and make sure I can justify the purchase. Too many products only cause distraction from the ones you're currently trying to pan.

The number of projects I have going on ranges from 1-4. The sweet spot is 2-3. More projects than that just makes it more difficult to actually finish a product if that is your goal. As long as you're on a no-buy it wouldn't matter that much because you're using the same amount of product. You just take it from different containers. However, I get disheartened and loose motivation if I don't see progress so I mainly try to focus on just a few products at a time.

When it comes to my projects I make sure I include a large variety of products. I'm not going to finish five lipsticks in three months and there's no chance I'd be able to finish several eyeshadow palettes within only a few months. That's why my projects usually contain products I can use together in one way or another, which leads me to the next thing I do.

I have a basket in one of my makeup drawers that I call the "every day" basket. It contains the products I try to use every day and can realistically use every day. Right now it contains a primer, a foundation, a brow gel, an eye primer, my two #panthatpalette:s, my contour kit, a mascara and the lipstick I'm focusing on at the moment. This basket enables me to get ready very fast in the morning and work on my project products daily.

Other than my "every day" basket I have a basket I call the "currently panning" basket, which includes all the products currently enrolled in projects, but don't fit into the "every day" basket just yet. That might be because there's a product in the "every  day" basket that serves the same purpose or I might just not want to focus on that project at the moment. Right now the basket contains my baby #panthatpalette, a powder, a setting spray, a variety of lipsticks, a lash glue and a nail polish. Whenever this baskets starts looking this empty, I know I'm ready to start looking for new projects.