Nearly every woman has heard this sage advice at least once in her life: Never leave your drink unattended. Though some might mistake this concern as paranoia, the fear of being drugged is grounded in a sobering reality for tens of thousands of women each year: According to the World Population Review, almost 44 percent of American women will be victims of sexual assault at some point in their lives. Nevada holds the dubious distinction of having the fifth-highest rape rate in the nation, and the Nevada Department of Public Safety says the state’s police saw a 93 percent increase in reported rapes between 2010 and 2019.
“The stats are really intense,” says Joy Hoover, the founder of Esoes Cosmetics, a Las Vegas-based makeup brand dedicated to preventing sexual violence. Hoover says her awareness of sexual violence became acute after her father-in-law killed her mother-in-law in 2013. That, combined with her experience working for a nonprofit that helps sex trafficking victims, convinced her something more needed to be done. “As a mom of two daughters who are six and nine years old,” Hoover says, “it's not okay for me to raise them in the world the way it is.”
Her primary concern was preventing the accidental ingestion of Benzodiazepines, the most common class of drugs slipped into drinks. She and her husband embarked on a year-long journey, resulting in Esoes Cosmetics’ smart Liquid Lipstick line, coming out in March. The lipstick, which comes in four colors bearing names such as It’s Not the Dress Nude and No Means No Red, contains two test strips that wearers that can pull out of the tube and use to see if their drink has been tampered with. Additionally, the lipstick tube features a Bluetooth-enabled button on its base that can be pushed to call 911, send a text message to a trusted contact, or make a loud noise — all customized via the Esoes app. Hoover says, “Most of us carry a cell phone and a lipstick on us, and I just thought: ‘What could a cell phone or a lipstick do? How could it help someone?’”
Elena Espinoza, Interim Director of Advocacy for Signs of Hope, a local organization providing support to those impacted by sexual violence, stresses that while defensive products like the Esoes lipstick can be good first steps to protect victims, they shouldn’t be seen as shifting responsibility for sexual violence away from perpetrators. “We just want people to be aware that that if there's a new product, learn how to use it appropriately,” Espinoza says, “and understand that if it malfunctions or it gets taken away by the perpetrator and used against you, it is never the victim's fault.”
While Hoover emphasizes that her product is not going to solve sexual assault, she considers it to be an empowering tool for victims and a positive development. “We want to make it easy for survivors to know what's going on with them, to have consent and agency over their decisions, and to have help if and when they need it,” she says.
