1Throughout history, women have enhanced their lips with color.
2Cleopatra led the way over 2,000 years ago.
3She used crushed ants and beetles to redden her lips.
4Today a tube of lipstick does the job nicely,
5no need to mess around with crushed bugs.
6Lipstick comes in a case that also serves as an applicator,
7and that's the beauty of it.
8Just twist the stick and apply color to make lackluster lips look luscious.
9Lipstick ingredients include waxes, pigments, and moisturizers.
10A worker pre-weighs everything following a formula.
11The exact blends are usually a company secret.
12She pours the measured ingredients into a kettle that melts and mixes them together.
13She adds a plant-based gel known as plantolatum.
14It will act as a skin softener, and also enable the lipstick to be smoothly applied.
15Different waxes - carnauba, candelilla, and beeswax - add body to the mixture.
16The waxes will also give the lipstick a certain sheen upon application.
17With the base mixture prepared,
18she now whips up a batch of pigment using different iron oxide colorants.
19She scoops it onto rollers that grind the pigment particles while rolling it into sheet form.
20It takes three passes through the rollers to fully grind the pigment.
21It's ready to be added to the base mixture.
22She lowers the heat in the kettle to avoid scalding the ingredients.
23She adds pigment until the mixture thickens and becomes creamy.
24It's now the right consistency to be shaped into lipstick.
25It's over to the next station, where another worker pours the lipstick liquid into a filling machine.
26This filling system also has a mixer that keeps the consistency creamy.
27She places a mold under the filling machine and activates a lift.
28It serves up the mold to nozzles that pump lipstick liquid into the slots of the mold.
29She continues to fill lipstick molds until the supply in the machine has been depleted.
30She places the molds on a conveyor,
31which takes them through a nearly 5-foot-long cooling tunnel.
32The chilly trip causes the lipstick liquid to solidify.
33The lipsticks are now ready for their swiveling tubular containers.
34She places a rack on top of the mold, and inserts the cases into slots in the rack.
35The slots are aligned with the lipsticks in the mold.
36Then it's over to the turnaround machine.
37Bursts of air gently push the lipstick out of the mold and up into the cases.
38To assist, little pushers apply pressure to the bottoms of the cases.
39The lipsticks have made their transfer without a smudge.
40She sets them down and removes the transfer rack.
41On another conveyor, the lipsticks pass by heat guns.
42The hot air melts the lipsticks just a little to make them shine.
43Continuing on, the lipsticks travel pass rollers that turn the cases to cause the lipsticks to swivel down.
44A tester samples a lipstick from every batch to determine the melting point.
45This is important, because lipsticks should be stable enough not to melt in a purse on a hot day.
46He smears lipstick shavings onto a glass disk and examines their consistency.
47He places the sample on a heating element and swings a magnifying glass overhead for a close-up view
48as the lipstick shavings melt into a puddle.
49Checking a thermometer, he confirms that the melting point is within an acceptable range.
50Another worker then compares the color of the freshly made lipstick to the standard,
51and it's a match.
52So they wrap up production with a plastic cap.
53The cap is clear to showcase the shade of the lipstick.
54It has taken about a day to manufacture this lipstick.
55It's time to freshen up.