With the sheer weight of new products coming to market, some inevitably get overlooked – it can be months before I chance across them. This happened recently, when a missed late train detoured me to a friend’s flat, where I had to make do with what he had in the bathroom. Within seconds of massaging Superdrug’s Optimum PhytoGlyc Age Day Cream SPF15 into my hungover face, I knew I needed my own. This non-greasy cream provides superior moisturisation, smoothing silkily on to normal, combination or dry skin, and an exceptional base for makeup. For a cream containing sunscreens, it manages that rare feat of staying stable under slapdash foundation application, without peeling, and didn’t sting when it wandered into my eyes. Whatever Superdrug is doing to integrate its SPF, luxury brands need in on it, because I can barely remember a more instantly pleasing, no-fuss cream. I’m sceptical about its long-term “firming” claims, as I am with those for products at five times the price, but for £12.99 I’ll take my chances.

This led me to its big sister Optimum Phytodeluxe Day Cream (£14.99), which is richer in texture, and for drier, more mature skin, but just as lovely a texture. The brightening, plumping effect is instantly noticeable and, again, makeup lies so cosily on top, you can happily skip primer.

One launch I couldn’t fail to notice is Avon’s legitimately game-changing Anew Reversalist Infinite Effects Night Treatment Cream (£25). It’s the first moisturiser based on key research into our skin’s tendency to plateau following long-term use of previously effective products. Having long dismissed women’s claims that a favourite skincare had suddenly stopped working, scientists now concede we had a point. Avon’s solution is to adopt the principles of interval training, where the body is shocked from an idle state by brief bursts of high-intensity exercise.

They’ve done this with a double-ended pump (one side contains a low concentration of retinol) that’s flipped and alternated weekly, so startling the skin into a response. The clinical trial (over a year, rather than the standard 12 weeks, and with a large sample group, too) had amazing results, with visible improvements in facial wrinkles in that half of the testers who were using the cream. It’s an exciting, affordable development that should at least encourage women to swap routines as often as we do a whites wash.