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Rachael Parnell

Upon hearing one shopper learned Aldi was selling a new product collection that looked similar to offerings from premium company Augustinus Bader, she was "extremely excited".

Rachael hurried to her local shop to pick up the store-brand face cream for a low price for 50ml - a tiny percentage of the £240 cost of the Augustinus Bader 50ml cream.

The streamlined blue container and gold top of each items look noticeably alike. While Rachael has not used the luxury cream, she says she's impressed by the alternative so far.

She has been purchasing lookalike products from popular shops and grocery stores for a long time, and she's part of a trend.

Over a 25% of UK buyers report they've tried a skincare or makeup alternative. This jumps to 44% among 18-34 year olds, based on a February survey.

Lookalikes are skincare products that imitate established brands and offer cost-effective substitutes to high-end items. These products often have similar labels and design, but occasionally the ingredients can change considerably.

Victoria Woollaston

'Costly Isn't Necessarily Superior'

Beauty professionals say some alternatives to luxury brands are reasonable quality and help make beauty routines less expensive.

"In my opinion more expensive is invariably superior," says consultant dermatologist Sharon Belmo. "Not every affordable beauty label is bad - and not every high-end skincare product is the finest."

"A number of [dupes] are absolutely impressive," says Scott McGlynn, who runs a podcast with famous people.

Many of the products modeled on high-end brands "run out so fast, it's just crazy," he says.

Scott McGlynn

Aesthetic and dermatology doctor Ross Perry thinks dupes are fine to use for "basic skincare" like moisturisers and cleansers.

"These products will be effective," he explains. "These items will perform the fundamentals to a acceptable degree."

Ketaki Bhate, advises you can spend less when you're looking for single-ingredient products like hyaluronic acid, Vitamin B3 and a moisturizing ingredient.

"If you're buying a simple item then you're likely going to be alright in using a lookalike or a product which is fairly inexpensive because there's not much that can go wrong," she explains.

'Don't Be Influenced by the Packaging'

However the specialists also advise buyers investigate and note that costlier products are sometimes worthy of the premium price.

Regarding high-end beauty products, you're not just paying for the label and marketing - at times the higher cost also stems from the ingredients and their grade, the concentration of the key component, the research employed to create the item, and studies into the item's efficacy, Dr Belmo notes.

Facialist she argues it's valuable questioning how certain alternatives can be offered so at a low cost.

In some cases, she believes they could include filler ingredients that do not provide as many benefits for the skin, or the ingredients might not be as well sourced.

"One big question mark is 'How is it so inexpensive?'" she says.

Expert Scott says in some cases he's purchased skincare items that look similar to a big-name label but the actual formula has "little similarity to the original".

"Do not be fooled by the container," he warned.

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Regarding more complicated items or those with components that can aggravate the complexion if they're not created properly, such as retinols or vitamin C, she advises sticking to research-backed labels.

She explains these typically have been subjected to costly trials to determine how efficacious they are.

Beauty products need to be evaluated before they can be sold in the UK, explains skin doctor Emma Wedgeworth.

When the company advertises about the effectiveness of the product, it must have research to back it up, "but the brand doesn't always have to do the testing" and can instead reference testing done by different brands, she says.

Examine the Ingredients List of the Container

Is there any ingredients that could indicate a item is low-quality?

Ingredients on the back of the container are arranged by quantity. "Ingredients to avoid that you need to avoid… is your petroleum-derived oil, your SLS, parfum, benzoyl peroxide" being {high up