I am a big fan of Benefit's make-up range, and only recently had my first experience trying their skin care products. I received a sample set of the Benefit B.Right range, which included a small jar of this It's Potent! eye cream. My products were a freebie as part of a magazine promotion, but you can buy Benefit from most high street department stores that have their own Benefit beauty counters. The full size item is 14.2g and costs RRP £23.50.

Product description: "Your eyes can't keep a secret; the delicate skin around your eyes is the first to show signs of age and stress. It's Potent! Eye Cream fades dark circles and helps smooth fine lines for brighter, younger looking eyes."

The eye cream comes in a glass jar with a plastic screw top lid, and my sample product was a tiny replica of the real thing. I have very long nails and found it a nightmare trying to get my fingertip inside the jar to scoop up the cream, so had to resort to using a brush applicator from a previous eye care product which I was very glad I kept! The contained 3.0mls and this amount lasted me for a reasonable time, lasting at least 10 weeks with applications twice a day.

Directions for use: Apply delicately under the eyes.

The cream itself has a pale creamy white colour and is fairly thick although it does not feel heavy on the skin. The texture is rich and smooth and I found it very easy to spread over the skin. It is important to be careful when applying products to the delicate area of skin around the eyes, as it is much thinner in this place and can be more prone to damaging easily. Luckily, this cream absorbs quickly and requires only a gentle sweep of my fingertip to rub it in gently.

I suffer with terrible dark circles under my eyes and nothing seems to shift them regardless of how well I sleep, so I was hoping that this eye cream would work its magic on me as the description sounded perfectly suited to what I need. This eye cream is easy to apply but seems to have very little in the way of visible benefits. It provides a light level of hydration, but no more than I would get from just using my usual facial moisturiser. It has done absolutely nothing to reduce the few fine lines I have under my eyes. I do occasionally wake up with some puffiness and it does seem to help bring this down a little. However, my main concern is that I do have extremely visible dark circles and I am very conscious of how they look as it really stands out against my pale coloured complexion. I noticed absolutely no improvement in this area. The cream did not lighten, brighten, or reduce my dark circles and the skin looks just the same after application as it did before. Even with continued use there has been no progression and it just did not work for me.

Another bad point that I noticed was sometimes after I had applied this eye cream it made my eyes start to water and caused a painful stinging sensation. This was quite troublesome and worrying, as I do not want to harm my eyes in any way and it was an uncomfortable experience. Although this didn't happen every time I used the eye cream, it happened often enough to become an annoyance, and I imagine it could be more problematic for those with sensitive skin and eyes.

Overall I would say that it was not really worth my while using this eye cream. It did not have a positive effect on reducing my dark circles, and even after continued use there was no cumulative effect in helping this problem to appear improved. I am glad I had a free sample to try as I would have been very disappointed to spend out over £20 for an eye cream that doesn't work for me. I couldn't recommend it, but I will happily continue using Benefit's Boi-ing concealer as that really does help hide my under-eye dark circles!