Good Housekeeping Institute's VIP Products

Jan. 12, 2009 — -- Good Housekeeping reviews thousands of products every year, and in the February issue the magazine honors a select group of VIPs – very innovative products.

Carolyn Forte from the Good Housekeeping Institute shares some of the best products that have been given the super-seal of approval.

Scotch Fur Fighter from 3M
Price: $10; Refills: $5

Win the war against pet hair with the fur fighter, which has a textured pad that grips and removes virtually every hair, even ones deeply embedded in the fabric. Once a sheet is full, just dispose and replace. The Institute found it was safe to use on most upholstery, even silk, but spot-check your furniture first in a less visible area.

Tide Total Care From Procter & Gamble
Price: $13 for 100 ounces

It's frustrating to buy new clothes that quickly fade with repeated washings. Tide Total Care claims to help slow pilling, stretching and fading, and it sounds too good to be true. But Good Housekeeping test showed that after15 washes with Total Care, a navy blue top was still almost a brand-new looking. Compared with a competitor, an identical shirt faded to purple and looked worn.

Custom Creations Foundation From Revlon
Price: $14

Each bottle of this smooth, lightweight SPF 15 makeup contains two hues. Turn the dial to one of the five shade settings, and some of each is dispensed in the right proportion to match your selection. This facial fine-tuner was especially loved by the beachgoers on the Good Housekeeping panel, who liked dialing up a darker color after a day in the sun. Versus Bare Floor Vacuum From Bissell
Price: $80

This slim vacuum's V-shaped head gets into hard-to-reach nooks and crannies, corners, under baseboards and around furniture legs. In the Good Housekeeping tests, it picked up 98 percent of dirt from tight spots regular vacuums tend to miss.

Share SD Card from Eye-Fi
Price: $100

With Eye-Fi's share memory card, each photo you take can be wirelessly transmitted to your PC or Mac and uploaded to an online photo site like kodakgallery.com or snapfish.com. Just change your current SD card with this Wi-Fi enabled one and say goodbye to cables. For $30 more, the Explore card uses geo-tagging to record the location where you snapped the picture. A 2 gigabyte card hold up to 1,000 2 megabyte images.

Price: $22 - $40

In 1988, 27-year-old Sara Blakely of Clearwater, Fla., cut the feet off her pantyhose so she could get the benefits of shaping and an invisible panty line under slacks while wearing sandals. Two years later she introduced a comfortable, body-slimming, toeless garment to the market. Throngs of happy customers later, the line now consists of over 100 figure-enhancing garments from bras and panties to full-body shapers.

"Over the years, we've tested virtually every brand of shapewear, and Spanx always comes out on top," says Kathleen Huddy, textiles expert at the Good Housekeeping Research Institute. "That's because it gives women a great shape without asking them to sacrifice comfort."

Go to www.goodhousekeeping.com to see more VIP products.