Remember the first time you heard that shampoo brand you use doesn’t matter?
I do. Vividly.
Girl X, Beauty Tool As a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed cosmetology student, I was always quick to share my newly acquired indoctrination knowledge about the importance of a focused hair care regime. Of course, that meant coordinating (read: expensive) products by the same salon-only (read: heavily commissioned) brand.
My mother and my family in general tend to humor my “zomg-new-info-alert” hyperactivity. They’re used to it. But that time… Not so much. I was halfway into some hair-related spiel when my Mom broke in with a phrase I’d never forget:
“Shampoo doesn’t really matter.”
Say what? Now in almost any other instance, I would have rolled my post-teen eyes in that forgivably arrogant way, adding the obligatory “Whatever” for effect. But for some reason, what she said that day would hang onto my then-young, impressionable brain cells forever.
Conditioner Junkie, Here It’s true– which means that the idea that shampoo doesn’t make or break your hair (pun semi-intended) was a truth I wanted to hear. It seemed logical, especially for someone like me who has continually battled a fine, tangle-prone mass of triple-textured strands no matter what shampoo I’ve used. How many times had I battled the tangle monster on top of my head, only to realize that a good conditioner with plenty of slip could make the process a bajillion times easier?
Still, the all-powerful marketing powers that be would fight for the same precious brain cells that yearned to believe that Suave was every bit as good as Sebastian. And like a good little hairdresser, I bought in. But with science in my corner purporting that one sudsy concoction was as good as another, I’ve often since felt a tingle of redemption. (If you’ve been to cosmetology school, or around a cosmetologist, you know the kind of battle for souls I’m talking about. If not, you will someday. And when you do, please don’t admit to using Pantene.)
So– does it matter? The verdict is still out, as hair snobs and science duke it out in an eternal battle of marketing world vs., well, reality.
Those who say shampoo brand matters cite the surfactants, detergents, sulfates, and a bunch of other villainous chemical gobbledygook that is apparently very bad news for your hair.
Those who say it doesn’t matter cite the fact that soap is soap.
Whenever you consider something like this, though, you have to be objective. I mean, how many hair scientists, or trichologists, are hung up on how their hair looks?
My gut says not very many.
Not to say that they don’t care, I mean, we all have bad hair days, and I’m sure that the experts in white coats stress over their tresses just as much as the next person, if not slightly more. But I’d also surmise that, after twenty years in college or whatever it takes to become a specialist in, um, trichotomy, all the number crunching and late nights over a microscope kind of weeds out any super-vain, mane-tossing trichologists pretty quickly.
In any case, am I the only one strangely fascinated by the fact that, at the time of this writing, the Trichological Society‘s president is 100 percent bald?
