A daily hit of the most stupendously brilliant things to land on the beauty desk. This is survival of the fittest

There’s a trend in beauty for brands to upgrade their best-sellers rather than launch new products and it’s very welcome – we don’t necessarily need more stuff, just for the stuff we love to be better. 

Lancôme only launched their Génifique Youth Activating Concentrate in 2009 and they could easily have sat back and enjoyed its enormous success. So it’s to their credit that they decided to take what was already an award-winning formulation and make it even better, using the huge leaps in genomic technologies (the serious science that underpins the serum) to push its efficacy further.

That means on top of the skin-softening, brightening properties of the original, the new version has specific anti-ageing ingredients too, namely Adenosine, yeast extract and Vitamin CG (which gradually delivers vitamin C to the skin over 24 hours). Plus - and this is particularly nifty - the redesigned dropper is based on the ones used in research labs to deliver exactly the right ‘dose’ of serum and not a drop more so none is wasted – just twist and click. Neat.

Lancôme Advanced Génifique Youth Activating Concentrate, £58, lancome.co.uk