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Rachael Parnell

When Rachael Parnell found out a discounter was launching a recent beauty line that looked similar to items from luxury brand Augustinus Bader, she was "extremely excited".

Rachael rushed to her local store to pick up the store-brand face cream for under £9 for 50ml - a fraction of the £240 cost of the high-end 50ml product.

Its sleek blue container and gold top of each creams look remarkably similar. While she has not used the premium cream, she claims she's satisfied by the product so far.

She has been purchasing skincare dupes from high street stores and supermarkets for a long time, and she's not alone.

More than a fourth of UK shoppers report they've tried a beauty or cosmetic alternative. This rises to nearly half among younger adults, based on a recently published poll.

Alternatives are beauty items that copy bigger name brands and provide cost-effective alternatives to high-end products. These products frequently have similar names and packaging, but sometimes the formulas can vary significantly.

Victoria Woollaston

'High-Priced Is Not Always Better'

Beauty experts say some dupes to luxury labels are good standard and help make beauty routines cheaper.

"In my opinion higher-priced is necessarily better," says consultant dermatologist one expert. "Not all affordable product line is poor - and not every high-end beauty item is the finest."

"Certain [dupes] are really impressive," says Scott McGlynn, who presents a program featuring public figures.

Many of the products inspired by high-end brands "disappear so fast, it's just insane," he remarks.

Scott McGlynn

Medical expert Ross Perry believes alternatives are acceptable to use for "fundamental products" like hydrators and face washes.

"These products will be effective," he says. "These items will perform the essentials to a acceptable level."

Ketaki Bhate, suggests you can cut costs when you're looking for single-ingredient items like HA, niacinamide and a moisturizing ingredient.

"When you're buying a simple product then you're likely going to be alright in using a budget alternative or something which is quite inexpensive because there's not much that can be problematic," she adds.

'Do Not Be Influenced by the Container'

But the professionals also suggest shoppers do their research and say that more expensive items are occasionally worthy of the extra money.

With premium beauty products, you're not only funding the brand and advertising - often the increased cost also stems from the ingredients and their standard, the potency of the key component, the science utilized to produce the product, and trials into the products' effectiveness, the expert says.

Skin therapist she says it's valuable considering how certain alternatives can be priced so inexpensively.

In some cases, she states they might include less effective components that don't have as significant advantages for the skin, or the ingredients might not be as well sourced.

"The big question mark is 'How is it so inexpensive?'" she remarks.

Expert McGlynn says sometimes he's bought beauty products that appear similar to a well-known brand but the product itself has "little similarity to the premium version".

"Don't be convinced by the outer appearance," he warned.

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Regarding more complicated items or those with components that can irritate the skin if they're not created properly, such as retinols or vitamin C, Dr Bhate suggests using more specialised companies.

The expert states these typically have been through comprehensive trials to determine how efficacious they are.

Beauty products must be assessed before they can be sold in the UK, says expert Emma Wedgeworth.

If the label makes claims about the effectiveness of the product, it needs evidence to verify it, "but the seller doesn't always have to perform the trials" and can instead cite studies conducted by different brands, she says.

Read the Ingredients List of the Pack

Is there any ingredients that could signal a product is inferior?

Ingredients on the label of the container are listed by concentration. "The baddies that you want to avoid… is your petroleum-derived oil, your sodium lauryl sulfate, parfum, benzel peroxide" being {high up