Worth more than £17 billion and forecast to grow by 16% in the UK by 2016, it is little wonder many people are jumping on the beauty industry bandwagon.

Its success is driving a technological race to offer the latest treatment with the newest gadgets – and a struggle for salons to prove they are qualified to operate the equipment.

“We can diagnose problems and we use medical terms,” said Dr Alice Hudson-Peacock, co-owner of Canterbury Skin & Laser Clinic.

“To a less-qualified person something could be just a brown pigment. We diagnose things so we use the most suitable machine to treat a condition.”

Laser specialist Dr Hudson-Peacock and her consultant dermatologist husband Mark charge hundreds of pounds for treatments like botox, repairing skin damage and hair and tattoo removal.

They back it up with huge investment in technology to carry out the work. Spending sums like £45,000 on an anti-aging machine called the Exilis Elite is not uncommon.

They splashed out £48,000 on a hair removal machine two years ago and £40,000 on a tattoo removal machine. Four years ago, they coughed up £100,000 on a multi-treatment Palomar apparatus.

Their latest piece of kit, an anti-aging machine called the Oxyjet, was trivial by comparison, setting them back £10,000 in November.

“I go to conferences all the time and we are kept up to date with technology,” said Dr Hudson-Peacock, who launched the company at Chaucer Hospital in Canterbury in 1997, before moving to Castle Street 11 years ago as the business expanded.

“We don’t just get the first machine which comes on the market. Often machines are launched at conferences and we wait for reports to come back on technology. We want evidence based support before we buy.”

She added: “You look for the latest machine providing a service we think there is a demand for. Sometimes people think you can buy one multi-platform which will do everything. Some are like that but you won’t do everything well.

“We want to provide the best machine for each purpose. We have a specific machine for most things.”

Success, however, is not as simple as buying the latest piece of kit.

Beauty industry consultant Helen Willsher, who runs business advice service Beauty Experts Academy, said many of the horror stories about treatments going wrong are down to staff not being adequately trained to use medically advanced equipment.

“People that don’t have enough of the anatomy and physiology training are causing severe damage to customers,” she said.

“The training has to be top notch when you’re dealing with these pieces of equipment because they are very scientific. It is not always going to be good enough if you don’t have that background knowledge and just pay your money and do basic training.”

Mrs Willsher, who lives in Gravesend and has 31 years experience in the industry, said the key to success for new salons is getting their business in order, rather than splashing out on a costly new product.

She said: “What counts is what you offer to your clients rather than whether you are using the latest piece of equipment.

“A lot of them are chasing down rabit holes to try this and that, rather than looking at the basic problem, which is they need to get their business organised properly.

“It is not the latest treatment which is going to make that much difference. If their business isn’t solid in the first place it doesn’t matter which shiny object they go out and purchase.”