You can find dupes of name-brand and sometimes even high-end products at retail giants, like Walmart, Target, and Dollar Tree. There are the Touchland hand sanitizer dupes at Dollar Tree. Target offers designer fragrance dupes at a fraction of the cost. And Walmart’s controversial Hermes dupes are all the rage.
A Walmart shopper stumbled upon another dupe of a beauty product. And she did so by reading the ingredients list of the two.
“If you use pimple patches, you need to watch this,” TikTok user Dani (@danitilla) says in her TikTok as she stands in Walmart’s beauty section.
She then showcases a container of Hero Cosmetics’ Mighty Patch pimple patches. Dani notes the container holds 27 pimple patches and is priced at $8.98.
She then flips the box over to show that it has one ingredient listed on it: hydrocolloid.
What is a hydrocolloid patch?
According to WebMD, “a hydrocolloid is a polymer, a type of substance that forms a gel when you mix it with water. When you apply a hydrocolloid to a small piece of material, it makes a hydrocolloid patch.”
And it’s pretty effective at “making acne less severe.”
“The moisture from the hydrocolloid gel promotes healing and protects your skin from infection at the same time,” the medical site notes. “The hydrocolloid patch is unique because it soaks up the infected pus.”
To Dani’s surprise, she spotted another pimple patch brand that offers 36 patches for only $2.56 and contains the same ingredient. This brand is Han-hoo Blemish Patch.
The discovery led Dani to advise, “You are quite literally paying for the brand name, so skip the Mighty Patch and get something else.”
Both skincare products also say they can be used at night and absorb oils for eight hours.
Viewers criticized for revealing this
Dani’s video now has 1.8 million views. Some viewers were upset with Dani for outing the secret product they’ve been gatekeeping.
“SIGH. i have been gatekeeping these bad boys. they work wayyyy better than the mighty patches,” one viewer wrote.
“Bruh why is nothing a secret anymore,” a second commented.
“Oh great! Now they’re going to sell them out!” a third remarked.
However, some still prefer Might Patch pimple patches. “I’ve tried both. mighty patch actually seem to work better,” one said.
“It’s the quality of the stick that’s the difference for me. Not the ingredients. Off brand doesn’t seem to stay on properly,” another shared.
Name brand vs. off-brand
Off-brand skin products generally use lower-quality active ingredients and can be less effective, taking longer to see results than their name-brand counterparts, according to Sublime Aesthetic Professionals.
Same factory?
Dani joked in the caption of her video that the two brands’ patches are “probably made in the same factory.”
Third-party companies create and package most name- and off-brand products. And, according to Fashionista, some name-brand products “came from the same place and potentially have the same formula as other private-label produced products on the market.”
Since these products are often similar, consumers can oftentimes use them interchangeably.
However, it’s unclear whether Mighty Patch and Han-hoo Blemish Patch are manufactured in the same place.
The Daily Dot reached out to Dani via TikTok comment and direct message. We also reached out to Hero Cosmetics via press email and to Han-hoo Blemish Patch via contact form.
@danitilla They’re probably made in the same factory 😅 #pimplepatch #skincareproducts ♬ original sound – Dani T
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