Cheap, dry wood pencil splits during sharpening

I have been using Vasanti products loyally since 2005. I love their makeup and skincare. My problem lies with their kajal eye pencil. The wood that is used to make the pencil is cheap, old, dry wood. When you try to sharpen it, the wood splits up along the side of the pencil exposing an inch of the eyeliner product. There is no way to sharpen it again without having to break that piece of wood off and trying again. Sadly I kept running into the same problem over and over, eventually having to throw it out. My mom had the same issue as well. We both stopped buying it, which is a shame because the product was great. It was the poor packaging.