Do You Really Need to Shampoo Twice? Episode 435

0:00Paula Begoun: Hi, I'm Valerie and you're listening to The Beauty Brains.

0:13Paula Begoun: Welcome to The Beauty Brains, a show where real cosmetic chemists answer your beauty product questions and give you an insider's look at the cosmetic industry. This is episode 435. I'm your host, Valerie George, and with me today is Perry Romanowski. Good day, Perry. Good day. Oh, you're back from Australia. Welcome back. On today's show, we're going to cover lots of questions, including how do you protect hair from chlorine? What makes a good detangler? How do curl creams work? Do you really need to shampoo your hair twice? What are our thoughts on in beauty products? But first are chit chat.

0:47Paula Begoun: Yes, I did just get back from Australia. I had a lovely trip. I brought the whole family with me, Mr. Cosmetic Chemist, Baby C, and we fell in love. We went to Sydney, we went to Perth, which is a long way away from Sydney. And yeah, it was just an excellent time. So the difference between Sydney and Perth is like the difference between New York and California, right? Correct. It was almost a five hour flight there. Australia is kind of like the US in width, I think. Exactly. I found that out. Only booking the flights, I was a little surprised. Yeah. But I think on the West Coast, there isn't much more than just Perth, I guess, right?

1:31Paula Begoun: Perth is, from a statistical fact, the most isolated city in the world, where a city is defined as having over 1 million inhabitants and the other city having 100 ,000 inhabitants. So it's the furthest away from any city with over 100 ,000 inhabitants in the world. Wow. It is kind of far. So how long does it take to get Australia? Well, from Dallas, it was almost three hours to Los Angeles. We had a layover. Then it was a 15-hour flight to Sydney where we decompressed for a couple days because I had baby see the whole flights. And after a couple of days in Sydney, getting used to the time change, we flew another almost five hours to Perth.

2:23Wow. Amazing. Now you were at the IFSCC Congress where cosmetic science from all over the world get together and they give talks and do posters and things. How was that?

2:34Paula Begoun: It was really great. A big theme was photo protection and all things related to photo protection, like pigmentation and stuff that comes with it. But another really big theme was the skin barrier, which I was surprised at only, not because I don't think there's not science to the skin barrier or absolutely think there is, but we're still doing research on the skin barrier on a biological marker level. And I thought that's really interesting that we still haven't figured it all out. Yeah. Yeah, you would think that we would have figured a lot of it out. But I mean, I guess, you know, I was thinking like when I was in college and I was studying biology and the topic of skin came up, you didn't really study it more beyond like, oh, there's this epidermis, there's dermis and there's follicles.

3:23And that's about all you really did about it. And so I guess when you're in college, you don't really focus on skin very much. although I suppose dermatologists do it more but their focus is more on diseases I took my classes

3:38Paula Begoun: were more especially in grad school were more geared towards biomedical sciences so I actually had a really in-depth look at skin and a lot of I had to take a cell biology course that literally was just about like the processes that are happening inside the cell but that's not routine exposure to someone in the cosmetics industry. Really, you just do kind of surface level skin structure and physiology. My view was a little different because of the grad school program I was in. Yeah, I actually, I was a biology major for much of my college career. So I did take a cell biology course and, you know, love the Golgi apparatus, the endoplasmic reticulum.

4:23Who doesn't love those? Although my favorite organelle was always the ribosome.

4:29Paula Begoun: Really? Why? I mean, they make the proteins. They are the workers there. Yeah. I really like the Golgi apparatus. It's the post office of the cell. And I like it because it's organizing things, packing things up, and then getting them where they're supposed to be. I just really appreciate that service. I also like post offices. I love the spell of paper, which has nothing to do with the Golgi apparatus. But I just thought if I worked at an organelle, I would be in the Golgi apparatus. See, I would totally be a ribosome. Well, if you are in the industry and you're interested in going to an IFSCC, I highly recommend saving up for 2028.

5:13Paula Begoun: The U.S. Society of Cosmetic Chemists is going to host that Congress in Las Vegas in 2028. and I'll be chairing that conference, helping plan it. Perry is also involved in the planning, so we're super excited to host it here in the U.S. Yeah, looking forward to that one. Well, you know, speaking of the U.S., I was actually at a conference in South Carolina called Naturally Kiawa. I think people say naturally Kiawa. Yeah, some people say Kiawa. Why do I say Kiawa? Maybe it's pronounced that way. I don't know. I haven't been to that conference. You know, people pronounce it differently. But, you know, I love going to the south, and, you know, Charleston is an excellent city.

6:01I took a little swing by there, but it was a fabulous time. So the theme was really, like, taking old stuff and making them seem new. Like, one company talked about butyloliate, which that's been around forever. Old school. Yeah. But then they're showing how it is outperforming silicones, silicones and so how it's like kind of a natural replacement for silicones well the theme of that

6:23Paula Begoun: conference is like all things natural but what frustrates me is when someone says oh this outscores silicones or outscores acrylate chemistry and it's like in what way because there's not a natural thing that replaces those so in what metrics because if it did perform as well we wouldn't need those other materials right right it's like because those things are cheaper i think at some level than silicones right like the old classic stuff it depends on what it is i think especially if it's plant-based and the plant market fluctuates based on availability because i think crops are like coconut and palm they actually are listed on the not the stock market but you know, on the commodities market, you can kind of see the value of the oil.

7:14Yeah, that is a good point. Another thing that was interesting out of there was there were a few talks on boosting sunscreens or sunblockers. So rather than talking about, you know, UV filters themselves, the talk was all about, you know, adding a polymer to it, which is going to boost the UV filters, which I thought was pretty interesting.

7:38Paula Begoun: yeah you know at the hate to go back to ifscc but a lot of not necessarily booster talks but things along those veins as well but what's also really interesting is there was a lot on the spf testing methodology where not all the filters you know should be evaluated in the same way and other things can kind of influence stuff yeah so very interesting but isn't it crazy we still don't even have SPF figured out? Well, I gotta say, one thing that surprised me coming out of college and getting into the cosmetic industry was how loosey-goosey all of our testing really is. I mean, even something like testing how thick something is with the viscometer, I'm like, wait, you put this little spindle in there and you spin it a certain amount and how much it drags and then you look and like, this all seems a little dicey to me.

8:32You know, that's why I say Cosmetic science is, it's kind of science, but a lot of it is just getting something that works and you're like, it works, let's go with it.

8:42Paula Begoun: Well, let's head over to Beauty News and see what kind of science is there.

8:52Valerie, one of the first things I saw was an article from the Business of Fashion called The Politics of Duping. And they were saying that this duping culture is getting out of control and bordering on copying everybody. So in this article, they examined how affordable beauty dupes have become an established part of the industry, with consumers increasingly question whether luxury products justify their prices. Brands like McCow Beauty are embracing imitation openly, even partnering with Skindinavia to sell the original Urban Decay All Nighter Setting Spray Formula under the name All Dare at a lower price.

9:38Meanwhile, premium brands are pushing backs with Charlotte Tilbury's legendary, for a reason, a campaign emphasizing the authenticity and reputation of its originals. This growing dupe market raises questions about originality, ownership, and the boundaries between matching product performance and copying protected branding or packaging. I mean, I guess the article's central argument is that premium brands can't count on prestige alone to defend their prices as affordable alternatives are more acceptable. So this duping culture, I mean, Valerie, is this something new and crazy in the industry?

10:15Paula Begoun: Not only has duping been going on in this industry since the beginning of the industry, but it literally is the central premise of what I'll call R &D. I can't tell you how many times I've been handed a benchmark product and say, duplicate it or make this better or let's tweak this because I think it's good. But, you know, I want to riff off this a little bit. And every brand does it. Every brand is inspired by another product. Very rarely are brands coming up with unique ideas on their own. So I just think duping is inherent. Like people want something and a brand is going to make it their own, even if they're not exactly duplicating it.

11:06Yeah. I mean, if you look at the technology in our industry, it hasn't changed very much in a lot of years. You know, there's skin lotions, there's shampoos, you know, there's cleansers. But this tech, you know, this chemistry has been around for a long time. And so we are at an industry at a point where you can't really differentiate yourself very well with how your product feels and interacts and works. so you can only differentiate yourself with a story or a branding or a fragrance maybe, packaging, and there's only so many of those out there, and we've been duping forever. In fact, the brand I work with, VO5, we had what we call the fast follower strategy, which is you look at what's an expensive brand that is selling well, and let's make a 99-cent version of that, And that's a strategy that VO5 did.

12:03Suave did that strategy. White Rain, all of that.

12:06Paula Begoun: Every company is doing this. It's not new. And I know there's a huge kerfuffle online about the Fenty Beauty packaging and how all these other companies ripped the packaging off. The reality is we're all walking the same ingredient shows. We're all walking the same packaging shows. And it's in the interest of the ingredient supplier or the packaging manufacturer to sell their item that they spent a lot of money on to as many companies as possible. They gain nothing from exclusivity financially. And so a lot of people assume one of those iMAS companies, you know, probably Fenty was first to market and these other companies ripped them off.

12:48Paula Begoun: But the reality is those other companies could have been in contact with this packaging company first. And they just took a little bit longer with their launch or whatever. We're all walking the same shows. And honestly, no one invents anything. We're all just using blends of the same stuff and buying from the same people. The only way with packaging, if you want your own packaging, you do that. But you've got to create your own molds, create your own designs, and then you get exclusivity to that. but if you're got a packaging supplier well they don't want to just sell to one company and so when one and then when one brand sees one thing is taking off then another brand's like yeah let's go to that and that's that's the duke culture in fact if you go to like walgreens they're used to they have pantene which is their big seller and then right below that they had i don't know equate or something which come on or i don't know is that uh walmart or walgreens or something but they would take the same, the packaging would look almost the same.

13:48And, you know, it's really not that difficult to copy the performance of a cosmetic product. It's just not that hard if you've got good cosmetic chemists. And this isn't surprising to me at all. And it's been going on forever.

14:04Paula Begoun: And by the way, why do people just care about cosmetics? It's been happening in the automotive industry, the fashion industry, the accessories industry. It's the soda industry. I mean, it's really just, it's what people do. So anyway. Yeah. What'd you see? I saw Head & Shoulders launched a scalp care collection. Oh, scalp care. I thought it was interesting because we talk about Procter & Gamble and some of the technologies that they work on. They own Head & Shoulders. And I thought, oh, well, let me peek you in and see maybe what they're using and you know from a technology standpoint not interesting they're using ingredients like niacinamide in their scalp soothe salicylic acid and scalp purify bioceramides and scalp restore but what i thought was interesting is the look and feel of the product it is in a color palette that was popular in the mid-1990s a teal a blue a purple the packaging um in certain instances looks clear or maybe it has a metallic finish i just thought it looked clear like a really nice young refresh and i'm a head and shoulders fan not because i have dandruff or flaky skin or anything i actually like the way it feels on hair as a traditional two-in-one and i always think their scent scents are fun and good so i'd be interested to try these and see what they do.

15:34Well, their formula chassis is pretty much the same as Pantene and Herbal Essences. Actually, I say Herbal Essences, which is funny because this looks to me like Herbal Essences. A little bit, yeah. You know what I mean?

15:49Paula Begoun: It would be interesting to do a head-to-head challenge, and maybe because the Scalper Store is in opaque packaging, maybe that's their pearlescent chassis, and the scalp soothed and purify are rightly in clear packaging and clear chassis. Yeah, I think you can't really make a clear zinc purithione formula, right? No, it's not possible. I think you can make a clear salicylic acid one, but yeah, the zinc one is going to reflect light, so it's always going to be opaque. And especially if they do have any meaningful ceramide content in there. Ceramides are really long, fatty, compact lipids. I think that would be a little hard and you have to kind of suspend them and get them dissolved.

16:33Paula Begoun: So it almost has to be a little bit of a little pseudo emulsion to keep it in. Yeah, I mean, those are just going to wash out, right? Well, it depends on what they're using. I'm not sure. I haven't seen the inky list, but it's available at Walmart. So I might go pick it up. Sure, sure. And see what they have in it. But surprisingly, Perry, you actually don't need a lot of ceramide content to have any meaningful impact on hair. In fact, you can get away with very low levels. And they can stick to hair a little bit depending on the ceramide. It actually kind of has a negative feel, in my opinion, if you use too many.

17:15Paula Begoun: But maybe it's good for the scalp because these are really scalp care products. Well, I have to say, you know what? One of the impressive things about P &G, who is not a sponsor of the show, by the way, but they are always somebody, if you're in the industry and you're looking for who's got the best technology, it's almost always P &G. Anyway, what I find really impressive about them is what they did with their Old Spice product. I mean, Old Spice was a dead old brand, and somehow they refreshed that brand and made it come back. I think a lot of that's marketing, though. The product's still neon-colored, stinky, in my opinion, and leaves rashes on your underarms.

17:56Yes, yes. No, it absolutely is a marketing phenomenon there. There's nothing new or special about their new relaunch products. And, you know, that red rash under your armpits happens to me when I use Old Spice, which is why I don't use it. But this feels the same way because, to me, head and shoulders is, you know, they have that white bottle. kind of like old-fashioned.

18:20Paula Begoun: They just throw apples on the front if they had an apple scent. Right, right. And so this looks like now more they're, instead of going the let's look more like Pantene route, they're going the let's look more like Herbal Essences route. So we'll see what happens. In fun 90s colors that Gen Z's attracted to. I think it's a great move. I'm going to pick them up. I can't wait to try them. Yeah, we'll have to try that. And also speaking of trying out pair if you remember a couple episodes ago we had a question about some japanese sunscreens and i said i don't think i'd like one of them because it i don't like the disappearing invisible veil type feel on skin but i actually bought the other one it came and i'm going to try it out all right well we'll report back next time all right let's head over to some beauty questions

19:12our first question comes to us from sarnia hi beauty brains i love your show i have a few questions about caring for chemically treated hair while swimming in chlorinated pools i'd lighten my hair at a salon bleaching and want to spend or commit to getting into the pool more often for pool workouts this year one of my hesitations is how damaging or gross my hair starts looking. Years ago when my daughter was part of a swim team I did a bit of googling and found that using the product shampoo 2 clarifying by Paul Mitchell was helpful for her non-colored non-bleached hair and for me I've been pre-wetting my hair in the shower and putting conditioner in it before putting on my swim cap.

19:59Whether or not this works I'm not sure. What's the chemical or physical reaction that's happening to my hair when I just leave it dry and not in a swim cap before going into the pool. What suggestions do you have for trying to keep my hair well cared for while still getting swim workouts into my routine multiple times a week? Thank you so much. Oh, a Paul Mitchell product. Is this one that you worked on?

20:24Paula Begoun: No, this product is from the 80s. I think it was launched in 1982 or three. Wow, that was a while ago. Yeah, unless I did it as a baby. But no, chlorine is really interesting because a lot of the chlorine on hair research actually has occurred in the 80s. And I feel like it's not something we're necessarily really worried about today, unless you're a swimmer or a prolific hot tub user. I feel like we haven't really updated the work. Yeah, that's true. Actually, I worked on the VO5 hot oil brand, and we did a chlorine protection project where we wanted to say, oh, if you treated with VO5 hot oil before getting into the pool, you could protect your hair.

21:11And one of the things that we had to do was create an artificial pool in a 55-gallon drum. So we had to figure out the chlorine percentage, and then you'd soak the tresses in there, and you had to simulate swimming. But like I said about earlier about cosmetic science, this is like, I don't know, loosey-goosey science, if you ask me.

21:30Paula Begoun: Yeah, why'd you have to do 55 gallons? Well, it's so we could have our own 55-gallon pool, right? So I don't know. I think it was so we could have more tresses in there and it would be more reflective of how a pool is. Because what would happen is if you use, say, a smaller beaker, a smaller volume of water would be harder to show differences. Yeah, well, especially because in pool water, chlorine's only around three parts per million, which is a very tiny amount. And that would also be very difficult to weigh out with any precision or accuracy in small amounts. All right, that's fine enough. But what about this tear and chlorine and damaging?

22:11What's going on here?

22:12Paula Begoun: Well, what's interesting about chlorine is that most people think it's responsible for that phenomenon in hair where your hair turns green after swimming. And that's not actually chlorine. It's the copper used in the preservative systems of the pool or hot tub water. But what chlorine does is it's an invisible damager. And what happens is chlorine, when it's a loose ion, it's because pure chlorine is a gas. you have different problems if that's present in your pool water, a most likely death. But if you have a little chlorine ion floating around, what it does is interacts with the hair fiber. It can attack the disulfide bonds in the cuticle, which is the outermost layer of your hair, and it makes it rough.

22:58Paula Begoun: It can also cause change in strength inside the hair fiber the more you're soaking in the pool water. If your pool is outside, UV light makes this damage a whole lot worse. And UV with oxidation just in general is really bad. But the most important thing to know is that a lot of the studies done to show the effect of chlorine in hair are done in above average conditions. So Perry, you mentioned you guys tried to mimic pool water and look and see if there was anything that could happen to the hair. A lot of the studies that have been done on chlorine species in hair are done at extremely acidic pH, which means the reaction is fastest based on the chlorine ion or extreme pHs, which show there's a negligible effect.

23:51Paula Begoun: And they also use in some of the experiments, like several times the amount of chlorine that you would find in a pool. So over 10 ppm. And so you have to think, is there a real urgent impact of chlorine on hair in pool water? Probably not. Only because the conditions aren't as extreme. However, if you're a frequent pool user and the pool is outside, probably over time, you're going to have some effect. And usually pools that are neutral pH, again, they have around 3 ppm chlorine ion present. And the effect is so gradual, but you're going to see cuticle issues. So you're going to feel very rough on the hair.

24:41Paula Begoun: Hair might feel like straw. Chlorine exposed hair actually is a little bit more flexible, research has found. Not as stiff, but the stiff feeling comes from the exterior. And so my recommendation would be, if you're a frequent swimmer, to do some preventative treatment versus post-care treatment. Because once that cuticle is damaged, it's pretty hard to get back. Now, we just talked about pools. Do people have to worry about chlorine in their house water? There are limits to chlorine present in tap water. And usually... And a lot lower than pools. Yeah, and most municipalities aren't actually using chlorine.

25:24They're using chloramine rather than free chlorine.

25:27Paula Begoun: So it wouldn't have the same effect on hair. So I don't think you have to worry about it in tap water. But Perry, what can we do about pre-treatment? Because I think that's the best route. Yeah, I think this strategy that she's doing with pre-wetting and using a conditioner in her hair and a cap, that sounds pretty good to me. I mean, if you wanted to go an extra step, you could use something like a hairdressing, which has petrolatum in it, and that's going to repel water even more. But I think, you know, using like a leave-in conditioner and putting a cap over your hair to reduce water impact, that's probably the most you can do.

26:07And that's going to reduce the chances of the initial damage the most. I will also say another thing that's just damaging if you swim a lot is just you're getting your hair wet. it's swelling and so every time it swells no matter the chemical makeup of the pool

26:22Paula Begoun: that's going to damage your hair too would you recommend i mean a leave-in conditioner is a great choice you definitely want to have something with a little oil in it coating the hair um to minimize the reaction of water so choosing something that's a little oilier is a great choice because oil and water don't like to interact would you think a vo5 type oil product is better and i put oil and air quotes there over a leave-in conditioner there is no oil in vo5 hot oil but uh let's see over i mean it depends on the leave-in conditioner so if your leave-in conditioner is just filled with humectants and some you know cationic surfactants that's probably not terribly helpful you you really would want a product that is going to leave a a silicone coating on the hair fibers because the silicone is going to resist water better than, certainly better than any humectants and cationic surfactants.

27:27Yeah, I would say if you have a leave-on that has some silicone in it, that's probably going to protect it better than if you just have a standard leave-on with standard surfactants.

27:39Paula Begoun: Or you could put some drops of oil into a leave-on conditioner. Now, I noticed she didn't say she's using a leave-on conditioner. She's using just a conditioner. I don't recommend using a conditioner designed for rinse-off on your hair or scalp just because it's not regulated for safety in the same way that a leave-on conditioner is. So definitely use a leave-on and like Perry said, get some oil or silicones in there. So maybe a, you know, if you like Paul Mitchell, Paul Mitchell Super Skinny Serum, or even just like any oil would do. Yeah. Our next question comes to us from Heather, a patron.

28:17Paula Begoun: This is a question continued from the previous show, right? Yeah, yeah. You remember Heather? She had like a million questions, but we covered three of them last time. We've got a few more this time. A few? How many more? Here you go, Heather. Just three more. Oh, great. All right. But they're all sort of hair related, so they're all kind of related. All right. Detanglers. I saw or heard something recently and I cannot remember where to go back to for reference. I searched your episodes for keywords, detangle, and nothing came up, so I figured I'd ask y 'all. What I remember hearing was that some conditioning agents remain on the hair after rinsing that are particularly good at keeping the hair lubricated after the hair is dried to reduce tangling.

28:56Paula Begoun: What would these ingredients be and would it make sense to look for them on a label? Yeah, we've talked about detanglers here and there. at some level the detangler is a hair conditioner all hair conditioners are going to detangle to some extent but some are going to work better than others to me the best detanglers are going to be silicone based for sure detanglers usually contain a combination of quads so these positively charged conditioning agents usually a cetrimonium chloride which works really where a well when the hair is wet. And there may be some when the hair is dried, but they're not going to provide lubrication necessarily.

29:37Paula Begoun: So you may put like a liquid dispersion of a silicone in a detangler to help also coat the hair fiber and keep it from retangling once the hair is dry. Right. The other thing that those things will do, they're good at being anti-static because they're ions, they can sort of reduce hair static. And hair static is another thing that makes hair harder to comb. So if you could reduce that in addition to the lubrication, that's going to make hair easier to detangle. I think amodimethicone is the gold star for all of this. And I like it because it comes in little dispersions that go into a detangling spray, which is a liquid.

30:20Paula Begoun: It's sprayable. It doesn't matter if it's aerosolized. So I think this is also one of the most common silicones to put into TEMLINK spray for those reasons. For sure. Look for amodimethicone, yeah. All right. She's got another question about curl creams. How do they improve definition? I know products that hold, products that hold, like gels and mousses, have polymers that form a film around the hair as it dries. Many curl creams don't seem to have that film form. So the definition is improved initially and then throughout the day, two days, the hair expands and fluffs. I really want to make sure I'm giving my clients the right context for how and why to use different product categories.

31:04My understanding currently is that curl creams rely on conditioning agents, which increase the surface tension of the water on the hair, helping it to clump. But sometimes they do leave a castor gel or crunchy. And if you put them on damp or dry hair, they can still form a clump, albeit stringy and sticky one. And in that case, how would a curl cream differ from a leave-in conditioner? Please help just mystify this product category. Curl cream, leave-in conditioner. First of all, I'm going to say there that's, it could just be a marketing and a semantics wording thing. because any curl cream could also be called a leave-in conditioner.

31:44It's just, you know, typically, though, a curl cream is going to have like a cedal alcohol, whereas a leave-in conditioner is typically just going to want it to just be liquid and not have those fatty alcohols. But what's your thoughts on that?

31:58Paula Begoun: I don't think that's necessarily the case. I think it is a fine line, though. I think a lot of curl creams are leave-in conditioners, But I have found that all curl creams do contain some kind of polymer or something that behaves in a polymer-like way. The consumer might just not recognize it as a polymer. So, for example, like polyquaternium-68 or polyquaternium-37. These are positively charged materials and they're quads, but they also have some film-forming capability. and I think yeah I very very rarely see curl creams that don't have some inherent styling property but the base is absolutely a leave-in conditioner except they thickened it right like even more because it's supposed to be more nutritive feeling whereas leave-in conditioners are pretty thin as you mentioned I remember when I was working on a curl cream we were just we tried to take our our rinse off conditioner and just modify it so it could be left on the hair and you know work in this kind of same way curl creams also you don't you don't put it on overall on your whole head right you just spot treatments curl creams well i don't know i think it depends on the the user but yeah um i definitely think you probably use less because you're layering it with other other things usually in a curly girl routine it's you know not the only thing you're putting on your hair yeah well no that that is true too so i guess so i guess the bottom line on this is that there's probably a film former in there that you don't really recognize as a film performer.

33:43It's different than the ones you're going to find in gels and mousses, but they're in there.

33:47Paula Begoun: Yeah. And that's exactly why you sometimes see a cast or it gets crunchy, but otherwise the conditioning agents are the same. Technology is not changing that much. All right. Our last question from Heather for now, hydrating and moisturizing shampoos. Most of my clients exclusively use a shampoo marketed this way, have buildup that I can feel when I wash their hair. What's the deal with that? Also, I've been hearing so many curl specialists say lately that your first shampoo is your cleansing round and then you do a second round with your hydrating shampoo. I feel like A, if you need to do two shampoos every time, you probably just need a stronger shampoo and do one round.

34:28Paula Begoun: And B, shouldn't the conditioner be doing the hydrating? All right, now I'm done. Thank you, Heather. I like that last question. Like it shows some skepticism i'm like yeah well i love that it shows critical thinking right right right but yeah the conditioner is supposed to be doing the hydrating the shampoo throwing the word hydrating and shampoo is just i don't know it's it's hydrating is sort of the opposite of what shampoos are shampoos are trying to take stuff away not leave stuff behind well let's start with her first question. So when she sees that her clients are exclusively and only using shampoos marketed as hydrating and moisturizing, she feels a little buildup on their hair.

35:11Paula Begoun: And the deal with that is, as Perry mentioned, shampoos are supposed to be removing things, but a consumer doesn't necessarily like that stripped feel of their hair. And so conditioners, or excuse me, shampoos are marketed as hydrating and moisturizing so that the consumer is like, wow, this shampoo is not going to strip my hair. But that means it uses depositing conditioning agents in the shampoo. It's the only way you're going to feel hydrated or moisturized is probably by putting a quad on the hair. And it's kind of the basis of a two-in-one shampoo. So anytime there's a hydrating or moisturizing shampoo, you're depositing something.

35:54Paula Begoun: And this is maybe why you feel buildup because they're only depositing and then following it with a depositing conditioner. Yeah, typically it's a polymer JR or polyquat 10 is the ingredient that you'll see. I hate that one. So antiquated. But and that one has does have a tendency to build up over time, which is why others have been invented and used. But, you know, Polyquat 7, look for something like that. Or even Guar Hydroxy Propyl Trimonium Chloride, depending on the cationicity and molecular weight, will afford that same thing. But their job is to stick to the hair. So you will get some inherent buildup.

36:33The other interesting thing is that a lot of times a 2-in-1 shampoo is not marketed as a 2-in-1 shampoo. You know, forever, Pantene was using 2-in-1 technology, but they just called themselves a moisturizing shampoo. and there's actually silicone in there. And so it's... As well as polyquatin. As well as the polyquatin. So, yeah, it's not surprising that you can feel something because those kinds of ones are leaving stuff behind. And if you're... Now, as far as using a conditioner afterwards, I think you get a better conditioning effect from a regular shampoo and then a conditioner versus a two-in-one.

37:17Paula Begoun: Of course, because with a two-in-one, you're like trying to be a shampoo. You're trying to be a conditioner. They're kind of competing. And I just don't think you get the lubrication that you need from a shampoo. So that's the deal with it. And I don't think hydrating and moisturizing shampoos are bad. But I think every once in a while, you have to not use something that's going to leave things behind. And so I always love a clarifying shampoo that doesn't really have anything in it other than a fundamental detangling effect. So you can actually get your fingers through your hair. But this kind of leads into your question about how you've heard people say your first shampoo is your cleansing round.

37:59Paula Begoun: And then you do a second round with a hydrating shampoo. I don't think you need to do that. I just think every once in a while you have to put your hydrating shampoo down and use a cleansing shampoo that doesn't deposit anything. Your VO5, your suave. Your shampoo one or shampoo two by Paul Mitchell. Neutrogena. Is Neutrogena the one that clarifying one they had? Oh, I don't remember. Maybe. A long time ago they had. Remember they had the little bottle? and yeah oh is that are you talking about the t-cell shampoo for dandruff no no that it's different but it kind of looked at but neutrogena always had that they were like the go-to clarifying shampoo oh interesting their positioning was this is like your once a week shampoo so after you do all that you're here use this one and it's super clear well i think that there's something behind it especially because nowadays every brand seems to be leaning towards these sulfate-free chassis which just inherently don't rinse well and they kind of leave a lot of residue behind and so I'm a big believer in dropping the depositing shampoos however I also believe in shampooing twice but I don't feel like you need to do that every time and ones you're cleansing and the others you're hydrating I don't believe in that if your hair is soiled you'll know that your first shampoo didn't really could benefit from a second round is if you didn't get a lot of foam because oil and debris suppress foam formation.

39:32Paula Begoun: And so if I get in there and I'm really, you know, trying to work up a lather with my whatever shampoo it is, it doesn't matter. I say, oh, wow, my hair was pretty soiled. And you probably already know that going into the shower. I'll do a second shampoo and I probably just use the same shampoo and you'll get a really good lather worked up and that's how you know okay i'm in a good space i got everything off my scalp so you don't even need to mix and match you just would do two shampoos and again you'll know if you didn't get any foam shampoo in the clean hair you get more foam and by the way this is for u.s because in the u.s we love foam i know that in other geographies maybe foam's not as desired and so they're low foam shampoos anyway yeah well you know in the u.s we all of our shampoos were based on sodium lauryl sulfate the secondary sulfate was the sodium lauryl sulfate but in europe it was switched in fact most of them didn't even use sodium lauryl sulfate they used sodium lauryl sulfate which is a little less harsh but a lot harder to make foam better so and in the eu they love uh the different alkyl glucosides oh yeah desal glucoside cocoa glucoside and what While technically they're good cleansers, I feel like they leave a lot behind.

40:47Paula Begoun: Just like a weird residue. Yeah. Not a fan. And I don't love their foaming. I don't love their foaming. No. All right. Our next question comes to us from Helen. Helen says, what are your thoughts on InBeauty products? Thanks for everything, Helen. InBeauty. Are you familiar with InBeauty? I feel like I've seen them around, maybe on Sephora.com. I don't like that they have a lowercase i and an italicized n, but that's how I remember them. It's like, ugh. I'm looking at their website. It's, you know, it looks like a... I wonder, like, what is their... What's their thing that makes them stand out?

41:32I mean, I guess the lowercase and the italian.

41:37Paula Begoun: From a product assortment, nothing. I'm wondering if, remember we judged the Allure Best in Beauty a couple, well, we've done it a few years, but I think you did skin one year. I'm wondering if this was a product you tested, their elastic skin. Because you don't get all products. You only get like a small collection of products that are being judged. Right. And we judge a lot of products. So this could have been one of them. It doesn't occur to me. But, you know, I'm looking at their elastic skin product, for example. So, you know, I look at this bottle and it just screams to me, hey, is this the ordinary?

42:12I mean, it looks the same. It's got the black and white. It's got the clinical look. Yeah, the pricing is different.

42:24Paula Begoun: Well, when I look at the products, I don't see anything special. But I'll tell you a couple things I do appreciate. I appreciate that they have an abundance of clinical studies. So some of them are consumer perception. Some of them are a professional grader. I like that because, you know, while they're only going to present their best information, a lot of brands don't even do clinical studies. So I think this is at least a nice point that they've done some investing in it. Now, some of the results look a little dramatic after one week, after four weeks. Like, really? Her turkey neck's totally gone?

43:08Paula Begoun: I don't know. You know what? When I see before and after pictures, I'm super skeptical, which is funny. I'll see in a scientific presentation, people do that too. I'm like, come on. The lighting isn't even the same. It's so hard to do. It's so easy to make it look like there's a difference by just like a subtle lighting angle different it's just really hard to do this and these you look at these before and after pictures they have and the lighting is different in the before and after and if the lighting's different that's you have to question what's the real change that you're seeing exactly and you can usually tell like if the skin tone is different like in all the afters everyone looks a lot tanner right yeah the other interesting thing they did that i i didn't like i'm just going to mention this is they throw percentages in front of ingredients like six percent copper and biohacking peptides there is no way there's six percent active peptide in this product like peptides are generally active level used 0.2 or 0.1 percent or lower right right and if this had any meaningful amount of copper in it the product would be blue copper peptide is a neon blue peptide six percent wild yum extract.

44:22Paula Begoun: This is probably just the extract being added in and it's in glycerin or caprylicapic triglyceride. So it's the overall added. Right. So the trick here is that when they say 6 % copper peptides are biohacking. Now, I don't know that this is what they're doing, but the fact that there's not blue, this is probably what they're doing. What they do is when they buy a raw material, their copper peptide raw material, what they buy is a solution of that ingredient in a larger solvent as you said often that's either propylene glycol or glycerin and so they're putting six percent of that in there but the copper peptide piece of that is what maybe one percent would be a one percent solution that'd probably even be high well it's usually at this it's probably a point one percent solution it's the least expensive one you can buy right and so then when you're saying six percent of a point one solution, well, that's not a lot in there.

45:20Paula Begoun: Exactly. Now, is this a nice product? I don't know. Like I said, they've done some clinical testing. The price is a little pricey. I don't think it's really unreasonable based on other products on the market that have similar ingredients that are being highlighted. $52 for one ounce. But will you see the dramatic prevention of aging signs and reversing of aging signs only using the product will tell well i would say if you spend all that money you don't want to feel like a sucker so you probably will see it yeah i mean that's it really the amount you spend on something can impact the way you think it works and a lot of beauty products is just about how do you feel about how it works and how do you feel about it and you know if you spend a lot of money you certainly are going to feel like it's working better yeah so that's just this product you know they have a lot of other products they do have that cover the whole face and they even have a little spf and glow and i'm i'm sure it's all fine and i mean they got their award winners and And they're perfectly fine products.

46:39And if you're okay with the pricing, I just don't see anything here that I would say, wow, these are amazing.

46:45Paula Begoun: Yeah, like I'm not going to go buy them. They're just not for me. You know, it's just my personal preference. Sure. But you know what is amazing? That music. Thanks for listening. If you get a chance, head over to Apple Podcasts or Spotify and leave us a review. that will help other people find the show and ensure we have a full docket of beauty questions to answer. And if you have a question, just record it on your smartphone and email it to thebeautybrains at gmail.com or you can write us in the form that's in the show notes or call us 1-872-216-1856. Next week, we're going to have a voicemail.

47:20Somebody called us.

47:21Paula Begoun: Wow. Yeah. Hey, the Beauty Brains are also on Patreon. If you appreciate what we do and the fact that we don't have commercials, well it's not free to do this we do have to pay for like websites and hosting and stuff but you can support that by heading over to patreon and go to patreon.com slash the beauty brains and subscribe at any level you also get the shows earlier you get your questions a higher priority to answer and you get a transcript of the shows also don't forget to follow us on various social media accounts on instagram we're at the beauty brains 2018 on expert the beauty brains on blue skyward the beauty brains we have a facebook page a tiktok and we're doing pretty good on youtube yeah yeah we're actually publishing stuff there so check that out well thanks again for listening everyone and remember be brainy about your beauty thanks everyone

48:16kittens