If you've never been to a major designer sample sale, it's like something straight out of the Discovery Channel wild kingdom shows -- a stampede of starving lions chasing its prey -- where lines of hungry girls typically wrap the corner.

I sent the Purple Lab girls on a mission last week: crash Diane von Furstenberg's New York City sample sale for some street team marketing. Dressed in our Purple Lab tees, dark denim and ballet flats, we were armed with 100 samples of Huge Lips Skinny Hips in No Panty Lines (clear lipgloss) and VIP cards to shop on our site.

As a brand with little out of pocket budget, guerilla marketing and Purple Lab go hand-in-hand. I'm forced to get creative, which is truly a blessing in disguise! Besides, these untraditional methods are what will set us apart!

When we arrived on the scene at 28th and 5th Ave., there was a line weaving around the block. Where other people are groaning at the situation, we were ecstatic! It was our target audience...fashionable women who are in the know!

Plan of attack: divide and conquer! We broke into groups so we could cover more ground. We talked to people, got emails, shared our lip-plumping gloss with Hoodia and everyone was très responsive! (You would be too if our sweet, cute girls approached you!)

Two hours later, we were out of glosses and had to sent Ashley to the headquareters to pick up more. They were going like hot cakes! We asked everyone to become fans on Facebook and offered one random winner two other colors as incentive (Marketing, baby! Marketing!).

A few hours and 60 glosses later, we were ready to head home. Then we spotted her -- Alex McCord from the "Real Housewives of New York City." Ashley made a mad dash for her!

We literally had one gloss left (poetic, isn't it) and Ashley was chatting her up while fishing through her hand-me-down Prada handbag to find it, all the while hoping Alex wouldn't roll her eyes and storm off. We must have looked like crazy fans because the rest of us were staring from the street corner, pointing like gawking stalkers!

"I have something for you!" Ashley said as she found the gloss.

"Oh yeah?" Alex replied in a sweet, welcoming manner.

As Ashley caught her breath, she said, "I am from Purple Lab NYC a fashion-inspired beauty brand started by Karen Robinovitz..." All the while, she was still digging for the product.

As the light turned red and Alex was ready to leave, Ashley got the gloss in her hand as well as a VIP card and we all watched her walk away, reading the copy on the hourglass shaped packaging with a smile.

Life was sweet!

And we had 30 new fans on Facebook the next day!

Mwah!

Karen
Purple Lab Creatrix