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April 12th, 2011 by sarahapps

Tried and Tested: Why Women Stick to Bargain Buy Favourites

By Sarah – Jane Robinson

Glamorous and glossy they are not, but cheap and trustworthy they are – today the top essential five beauty products that woman claimed to rely on the most, were listed. Four in 10 women over 50 (surveyed by The ) claimed that some of their most trusted beauty products cost less than £5.

Vaseline Lip Balm, which topped the all-time list of inexpensive favourites coming in at a mere £1, is a far cry from the shiny goods offered at the top end of the market. It’s therefore a mystery why women fall into the trap of buying over-priced products that do exactly the same job as a £5 purchase. 

Are woman drawn to luxury brands (with super shiny packaging) as a means to upholding an image? Yet, 20 per cent of women say they regret buying these expensive products because they believe the products do not work. Why buy Crème De La Mer’s Moisturising Treatment, at £970 a pot, when we can just pop down to Boots and purchase a tube of E45 Moisturising Cream, for a mere £1.50 that we know to be reliable as it’s highly recommended by doctors?

Pond’s Anti-Aging Cream, at just £4, is used by celeb Kylie Minogue, proving that old favourites continue to be a staple in women’s make-up bags. A favourite of mine always found lurking in the depths of my handbag is the Vaseline Lip Balm. Not only can this miracle product be used for dry lips, but also acts as a moisturiser, eyelash lengthener, a way of taming those unruly eyebrows, cuticle cream and more.

Supermarket chain Aldi not only sells competitively priced food but also delivers well priced beauty products too. Their low-cost premium skin care line ‘Lacura’ includes a range of products all for under £5.99. Their Anti-Aging Multi-Intensive Serum at just £3.49 was awarded the top beauty accolade by Celebs on Sunday readers, beating Boots No7 Protect and Perfect Intensive Serum, which cost approximately five times as much. This clearly shows that low budget and plain packaged beauty products reveal just as good results and offer up to 75% less of the price than many well known beauty brands.

So forget those expensive salary snatching products and save yourself some money and disappointment by sticking to the mass-market, everyday (and sometimes good old fashioned) brands.

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October 29th, 2009 by Sophie Hodgson

If the boot fits

The ultimate wellie

The ultimate wellie

Our finance director has found the gem of all shoe shops, especially if you’re after knee high boots. Like me she has reasonably sized feet (although mine dwarf hers), but for some reason shoe makers seem to think if you have big feet, you’ve got massive calves. The net result is that I end up plodding around the shoe shop in what are meant to be lovely, slimming boots but in fact look like high heeled wellies. Not ideal. And last time I checked wellies – even the fun ones with the frog faces – were not even pushing £20.

Well, said FD has found the answer. A boot shop that has different calf measurements as well as different show sizes. Simple, yet genius. And unlike other outlets that have claimed to do this, they aren’t designed for your granny. And the best bit? We got paid yesterday! Hurrah! Small snag in that I can’t remember the name of the shop and she’s not in today……but I can channel my excitement for one more day whilst mentally destroying my bank balance.