Eco Hair and Beauty are running a year long project looking at sustainability in hairdressing. We are putting current hair-care practices under the spotlight to see how we can have fabulous hair, save on bills and become more eco-friendly. This month it was: conditioner.
Most of our information on hair products comes from manufacturers, so we decided to do our own independent survey on conditioner. We asked those who usually used conditioner to do without it for a wash or two and report on results.
The first interesting finding was the amount of people who already said they did not use conditioner at all, either as it made no difference, they didn’t have time or it didn’t agree with their hair type. Therefore, the results from the survey are from individuals who use conditioner, either by choice or out of habit.
The second interesting finding was the huge variety of responses – it appears that the effects of not using conditioner vary a lot depending upon hair type. There was an almost equal split of those who said their hair looked worse, those who reported no difference and those who said their hair looked better after not using conditioner. Not using conditioner made hair less greasy and lank for many and there was no change for most in bounciness or in shininess, but the flip side is that for many it made hair slightly dryer, and sometimes more tangled, depending on hair type. Most reported that they needed to wash their hair less often and nearly a third of all respondents reported that they were likely to use less conditioner in the future as a result of experiment going without. If you’d like to contribute to our research and try going without conditioner, please give feedback on how it went for you on our online survey https://www.isurvey.soton.ac.uk/13095
As a result of this research, we think it is worth encouraging clients to experiment with the effects of not using conditioner, especially for those with lank hair, as a third of them are likely to see an improvement. Another great option is leave-in conditioner. This is great for fine hair that tangles easily and is flyaway but gets weighed down by regular conditioner. It is also great for clients with normal hair who can use it to improve manageability and smoothness. Leave-in conditioner can provide extra body to fine hair. Many professional ranges also reduce colour fade, include heat protection and can strengthen and repair the hair. The more general benefits of not using conditioner or switching to a leave-in conditioner are saving time, energy, water and money.
Why not try our Carbon Footprint Calculator and see how much energy you could save just by changing your haircare routine a little!
Click here for the Carbon Footprint Calculator
