Have beauty videos made my daughter a 'Sephora kid'?

When my 11-year-old daughter, Jemima, recently set about decorating her French school book, I wistfully asked what she had enjoyed most about our trip to Paris last summer. I was thinking perhaps the spectacular view from the Eiffel Tower, or the hallowed hallways around the Louvre.

- GEORGINA FULLER

But no: it was our trip to the beauty behemoth, Sephora.

I am sorry to say my girl has recently, against my better intentions, become a 'Sephora kid' - along with the rest of her Gen Alpha (those born between 2010 and 2025) peers.

They save up their pocket money to spend on pastel-coloured skincare products like "creamy jelly cleanser" and "slam dunk hydrating cream", and swap notes about their elaborate, multi-step "regimes". When the beauty chain store opens a branch in our local city of Oxford next month, it's only going to get worse.

A recent study by scientists at Northwestern University found that (admittedly American) children as young as seven are now using more than a dozen products on their skin every day. Girls aged between seven and 18 used on average six different beauty products - at a vast cost to their piggy banks.

Skincare routines are one of the biggest trends on TikTok, which is home to more than 20 million "get ready with me" (GRWM) tutorials, some clocking up millions of views.