There are some cosmetics brands that simply have luxury written all over them. They make buying skin care products as gifts something of a nightmare as there will always be a line that’s a little bit higher up the price ladder to tempt you. You might have a superb moisturiser or anti-ageing cream in one hand and your credit card in the other and happen to glance sideways and notice that there’s a much sought-after cream from La Prairie that suddenly makes your current choice seem a little stingy, and off you trot to the next counter.

When you get there your head will be turned to other items in their range and you’ll wonder if a fragrance might be a more appropriate gift. And before you know it you’ll be weighing up the benefits of Silver Rain La Prairie in its wonderfully brilliant raindrop shaped bottle. There’s no contest, especially if you find it a tiny bit tactless to get your nearest and dearest an anti-ageing cream for their birthday. The credit card comes out for the final time.

Is there actually any difference between the brands at the opposite ends of the price spectrum? It is tempting to think that there is not, but this would be missing the point somewhat. First of all, some brands lead and others follow. That is to say, the top cosmetics brands have fully staffed laboratories and testing procedures to pay for before a product or ingredient hits the shelves, whereas other companies merely buy the ingredients on licence or ignore them altogether.

Another feature of expensive brands is the sensation of the products as they are applied to the skin. They will spend probably as much time researching the active ingredients as they do on developing ways of making their creams smoother, more easily absorbed into the skin and smelling as luxurious as possible. And since the gift-buying customer is an important component in a product’s sales figures, the products have to look beautiful in the box and on the dressing table. Perfume bottle design seems to get more and more ingenious by the year, to the point where a simple bottle is actually a radical thing nowadays. But these are really important things to consider. Gift buyers will instinctively gravitate towards the prettiest products.

And finally there are the small matters of marketing and profitability to consider. It’s no good spending millions developing superb products if nobody ever hears of them. And there will be no new products to research if the old ones don’t bring in some profit. In this intensely competitive sector, pitching a product at exactly the right audience is a highly specialised task. And let’s not forget that the retailers themselves don’t sell products for fun. Those women in lab coats need to earn a living too.

So just as the cost of a Blu-Ray disc is not simply to cover the cost of a circle of plastic, the price of cosmetics hides a wealth of costs that go in to getting it from a successful lab experiment to the dressing table. So it probably is fair to say that you get what you pay for, as it all feeds into the continuation of an industry that relies on innovation.

Good skin care is not cheap and Sally is an expert who can report on products such as la prairie silver rain which may be expensive but are highly regarded and effective. Her reports are used by skin care publications and stores across the world.

Good skin care is not cheap and Sally is an expert who can report on products such as la prairie silver rain which may be expensive but are highly regarded and effective. Her reports are used by publications and stores like http://www.skincare-online.com/ across the world.

Author Bio: Good skin care is not cheap and Sally is an expert who can report on products such as la prairie silver rain which may be expensive but are highly regarded and effective. Her reports are used by skin care publications and stores across the world.

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