The great dupe debate: How the best brands are winning without imitation

The hashtag #dupe has racked up 400,000 posts and millions of views on TikTok. Hunting for dupes has become a sport, with creators earning a livelihood by comparing $15 moisturizers to $90 ones. More than 70% of Gen Z sometimes or always buy cheaper versions of name-brand products.

It didn't happen in a vacuum. Consumers, especially younger ones, started asking uncomfortable questions: Why does this $200 sweater feel like polyester? Why is the scent of this $150 fragrance gone in two hours? Why am I paying for a logo?

The dupe economy rose to fill that gap. If a high price didn’t guarantee quality, at least consumers could get the aesthetic at a fraction of the cost.

But copying has its own problems. Fast fashion timelines. Disposable quality. Potential legal issues. A race to the bottom that trades one form of waste for another.

Increasingly, a new generation of brands is proving there's a third path—one that delivers quality and accessibility, without resorting to imitation.

Copying is a ceiling, not a strategy

Avi Arora has a prediction about dupe culture: it's going to fade.

"I think Gen Z is really conscious of the waste that gets created when there is dupe culture, fast fashion," says Avi, COO of Italic, a brand that partners with luxury manufacturers to create original products at accessible prices. "People are buying more intentionally. They're not just buying things to buy things anymore."

By 2030, Gen Z will have $12.6 trillion in spending power but are choosier than previous generations about spending.

For Avi, the math behind dupe culture is simple and ultimately self-defeating. "It rose as a function of, hey, the quality to price isn't matching up," he explains. "So, okay, screw the quality, but what if we just came all the way down on price?"

The problem? "The only way you can develop products that quickly is to copy what other people are doing."

Italic takes a different approach. The company works with the same manufacturers that produce goods for luxury houses—think cotton towels from factories that supply high-end hotels—but designs original products rather than imitations.

"Usually you’re told you can pick two out of three, right? You can pick between quality, price, and making something unique," Avi says. "I don't necessarily think that's true."

To pick all three, Italic is launching The Palma Collection, a line of home goods inspired by the colors and textures of Palma de Mallorca. It took nearly a year to perfect the towel patterns alone. That kind of timeline is impossible in the dupe economy. 

"My hope is that people are buying more intentionally and they're buying more from the people who are spending their time making really unique products," Avi says, "and less from dupes or fast fashion."

Italic built its model on rejecting dupes from the start. But not every brand takes that path. Some find their way to originality through a different door.

Accessibility can be a starting point, not the whole identity

Sergio Tache didn't set out to build a “dupe” brand. He set out to solve a problem.

"It just didn't make sense for us that to go out on a date and smell nice, you had to fork out $150 plus," says Sergio, founder of Dossier, a fragrance company that produces high-quality perfumes in France and sells them for a fraction of luxury prices.

Dossier launched with its Impressions collection—fragrances inspired by luxury scents. It was a strategic entry point, a way to build trust with consumers priced out of prestige perfume. But Tache always had his eye on something bigger.

"We continued with our Originals collection, which are our own creations," he says. "And that's really now a big focus for us—growing those originals."

The shift worked. When Dossier opened a pop-up in New York's Nolita neighborhood last year, customers waited two hours to get inside. And once they did, something interesting happened.

"On one side you have the Impressions, on the other side you have the Originals," Sergio recalls. That other side got tons of foot traffic. "Once they got to try them and interact with them, there was a big enthusiasm for them."

For Sergio, affordability was never the destination—it was the vehicle. "Dossier is not value for value's sake," he explains. "The value is a means to an end, and the end is perfume discovery."

Dossier has now opened its first permanent boutiques in New York City, positioning itself not as a dupe destination but as, in Sergio’s words, "a perfume house for the next generation."

Dossier's evolution from inspired-by fragrances to original creations shows how accessibility can be a launchpad, not a limitation. But it's not the only path. Other brands start with originals and let consumer comparisons find them.

Let the product speak, and the comparisons will follow

Every few weeks, another TikTok goes viral comparing Bubble Skincare to something that costs five times as much. The company doesn't make those videos. Their customers do.

Bubble creates dermatologist-developed skincare products priced under $20, backed by a community of over 120,000 members who help shape everything from product concepts to final formulations. The formulations are entirely Bubble’s own—original products backed by rigorous clinical testing. But when your $16 moisturizer performs as well as something that retails for $80, comparisons are inevitable. More than 75% of makeup users believe affordable makeup and skincare works just as well as premium.

Marianne Robinson, Bubble's Senior Director of Community & Influencer, sees it as validation.

"Comparison culture reflects a more empowered consumer," Marianne says. "At the end of the day, people are questioning whether higher prices truly deliver better results. Affordability isn't seen as a compromise anymore."

Unlike brands that chase trends or rush products to market, Bubble's development process can take up to three years. "We don't chase trends when it comes to products," Marianne explains. "We develop our products for real needs."

That discipline has earned something rare: a brand that welcomes side-by-side comparisons. "We're comfortable in those comparisons because transparency, consistency, and performance are all places that we thrive," Marianne says.

Her read on the Gen Z consumer? They've stopped equating price with quality. "They're quick to switch brands if they feel like something aligns with them better, maybe more honest, and aligns with their values," she says. "Trust, transparency, and efficacy matter more to them than prestige or even legacy."

What lasting brands know

What connects Italic, Dossier, and Bubble isn't only affordability—it's a shared commitment to originality.

Italic designs original products in luxury factories. Dossier evolved from inspired-by fragrances to its own creations. Bubble builds quality products and lets consumers draw their own conclusions. The dupe label, when it comes, arrives from the outside—from consumers and culture—not from the brands themselves. The brands building lasting businesses aren't playing the dupe game.

The takeaway for merchants is straightforward: you don't have to copy to compete with luxury. Invest in quality. Be transparent about your value proposition. And let consumers make the comparison themselves.