Why Does Your Hair Look Better at the Beach? Plus Co-Washing - episode 434

0:00Marianne O'Connor: Hi, I'm Valerie and you're listening to The Beauty Brains.

0:12Marianne O'Connor: 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 434. I'm your host, Valerie George, and with me today is Perry Romanowski. Hi, Perry.

0:27Rebecca Kokoska: Hey Valerie, another palindromic number episode. I was going to say that.

0:32Marianne O'Connor: I should have not given you the opportunity. On today's show, we're going to cover lots of questions, including are mineral sunscreens from Japan effective? What do we think of Brook Shields hair care line? What's the deal with Hair Story New Wash? How does it work? Does a person's hair really behave better at the beach? Should you try out Vita Reset supplements for skin? And how should swimmers take care of their hair? But first, inane chit chat.

1:00Rebecca Kokoska: Valerie, you got a big trip to Australia coming.

1:03Marianne O'Connor: That's right. Next week, I depart for IFSCC, which is the International Federation of Society of Cosmetic Chemists, their annual congress held in Perth, Australia. So I know we have a lot of Australian Beauty Brains fans. I will be there.

1:18Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, so if you can get to the other side of the continent, because I think most people live in like Sydney or Melbourne. So that side and Perth is on the other side.

1:29Marianne O'Connor: That's right. I have quite a bit of travel and BBC is coming with me. Oh, and Mr. Cosmetic Chemist. But we have to go to L.A. We fly direct out of L.A. to Sydney. And then we fly, I think it's like another five hours to Perth. The Australia is as wide as the United States. So it's like flying from L.A. to Boston.

1:49Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, it's a big place. I was looking at flights from Chicago to get there. It's like 30 hour traveling.

1:57Marianne O'Connor: So, well, yeah, it's going to be a long day. And guess who gets to sit with baby C? You or?

2:06Rebecca Kokoska: Yep, me. Now, I'm curious, baby C, do you have to get an extra seat for baby C? or you just hold him on your lap?

2:16Marianne O'Connor: He's still under two, so he flies on lap for free. And I will be interested to know if we get questioned how old he is. He'll have his passport with him. But a lot of people think baby C is already two because he's a very big baby.

2:31Rebecca Kokoska: Ah. So babies essentially are just carry-on luggage then?

2:37Marianne O'Connor: Exactly. I'm going to pop them up top and close the door.

2:41Rebecca Kokoska: Well, that's fine.

2:41Marianne O'Connor: No, just kidding.

2:42Rebecca Kokoska: Well, I'm actually going to Toronto. I'm speaking at a conference there next week. So that'll be fun.

2:51Marianne O'Connor: What are you speaking on?

2:52Rebecca Kokoska: Oh, the impact of AI on cosmetic formulating. So just, you know, all the advances there. And well, you know, the pluses and minuses are there. And we'll see how it affects things.

3:05Marianne O'Connor: Are you going to do anything else while you're there? I mean, that's another country. Toronto's close.

3:10Rebecca Kokoska: It is close. I've been to Canada, but I always do like to see Niagara Falls. So maybe I'll take a little side trip to Niagara Falls.

3:19Marianne O'Connor: I love Niagara Falls. I'm from the north and we used to go there all the time. It was just a couple hour drive. I love it.

3:26Rebecca Kokoska: It's a very cool, natural thing to see.

3:34Rebecca Kokoska: Valerie, the LA Times, your old newspaper of record, had an article about does beef tallow work in skin care? And then there was a whole article examining the growing trend of using beef or bison tallow as a natural facial moisturizer. According to them, you know, tallow contains fatty acids that can form this heavy water loss reducing layer on the skin. But in the article, they said experts explained that the composition is not identical to human sebum and that trace vitamins are not comparable to properly formulated skincare actives. And then the author did this whole bit where she tried these tallow bombs for a couple of weeks and produced some sort of, according to her, a noticeable glow.

4:22Rebecca Kokoska: But, you know, the test, a couple of week test is not going to tell you whether a skincare is going to give you anti-aging. Or anything.

4:30Marianne O'Connor: N equals one.

4:31Rebecca Kokoska: Right. But overall, the article concluded that tallow can moisturize, but the stronger claims about preventing wrinkles and treating acne are not supported by good evidence, which, you know. It was very surprising to me that tallow made a comeback. It was around in the industry when I started, but back in the late 1990s, when there was mad cow disease that was all over the news, the industry pretty much moved away from animal ingredients and also you know animal cruelty and cruelty freeze started to pick up then too and so the industry kind of moved away I'm a little

5:08Marianne O'Connor: surprised that it's coming back well what goes around comes around everything's cyclical so from that perspective I'm not surprised but you know it's just coming around again it'll go away people will forget about it. You know, I have tried some tallow creams. I like a heavy, older feeling, occlusive cream. And to me, that's just what it is. They feel a little bit older. Yeah. And the trend today, or at least what consumers are shopping for, is really the opposite. And a lot of that's driven by K-Beauty. These light textures, meltable creams that just kind of disappear into your skin. They feel velvety, silky, cocoony, and beef tallow is just an older feeling type cream when you're using it.

5:54Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, I mean, it doesn't really work better than I'd say a good old petrolatum or mineral oil or, you know, a well-formulated cream, but it's a fine enough ingredient. It's been used in the industry forever. In fact, they used to use it to make soap pretty regularly and it's one of those also upcycled ingredients because you know when you're making hamburgers and steak there's a little bit left over right and that gets turned into tallow and it gets turned into other products.

6:28Marianne O'Connor: A lot of conditioning agents and detergents meaning surfactants still come from tallow chemistry now because of the vegan requirements Not many are used in personal care anymore. They're probably used in other industries.

6:44Rebecca Kokoska: Right. Yeah, so it's good to see that we're not wasting. I mean, it would be good if, I guess, we got away from eating animals. You know, philosophically, I am a vegetarian. I just don't live that way. But it would be nice if the world went that way. It would be easier to live that way.

7:01Marianne O'Connor: What a conundrum.

7:02Rebecca Kokoska: It is. So I agree with you. It's a decent agreement. It's not some miracle treatment. And, you know, if you find it unseemly to use animal-derived products, then you don't want to use it. But some people don't mind it, and it's a good enough ingredient. But not that anything else couldn't replace it, but there you go.

7:24Marianne O'Connor: Now, you know what can be replaced? PFAS. New York Times Wirecutter also had an article, What You Need to Know About PFAS in Your Beauty Products. Oh, yeah. Do you know what PFAS are?

7:37Rebecca Kokoska: They call it the forever chemicals, right?

7:42Rebecca Kokoska: Polyfluoro, perfluoroalkyl substances or something like that.

7:46Marianne O'Connor: Perfluoroalkyl substances? Yeah. I think that's what it stands for. PFAS.

7:50Rebecca Kokoska: They call it forever chemicals because they don't break down in the environment very readily. I mean, eventually they do break down, but it takes a long time for them to break down. And forever, maybe it's like the lifetime of a human, so they call it forever, but it's not really forever.

8:08Marianne O'Connor: Well, the article did a nice job of explaining what they are. And they're used in personal care, sometimes as sub-ingredients. You might not even know they're there. Sometimes PFAS have been used to stabilize peptides. But they're often intentionally added to cosmetics to improve smoothness, shine, texture, water resistance, and long wear. And even those self-foaming masks that are very popular in K-beauty where they start to bubble on your face, like little pop rocks, those even, that actually is a PFAS material. Oh, really? That's added. And so products you would find these in are those fun face masks, but also mascara, foundation, eyeshadow, lipstick.

8:51Marianne O'Connor: And because of the negative perception, the use definitely is declining. But the concern of PFAS is that they can accumulate not just in the environment, but in people. And they have been associated with health problems. But the challenge is scientists still lack adequate exposure and toxicity information for many of the PFAS. So no bueno. Now, makeup is not considered a major source of overall PFAS exposure compared to food that's been contaminated with it or even drinking water. So if your cosmetic does have a PFAS, don't panic. Don't throw everything away. I think you should still be fine to use it.

9:34Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, no, I think this is certainly a legitimate pollution concern. But as far as it being unsafe for consumers to use, that's not a lot of good evidence there. Whenever I hear it's associated with, I mean, that just means we have weak evidence. I mean, usually when they associate stuff like that, they take rats and they fill them with 10 ,000 times as much exposure that a human would ever get through a route that humans wouldn't get. And then they find some problems. I think that's exaggerated. And there's just not a lot of good evidence that these are harmful to humans, especially in the levels that you get exposed to in cosmetics.

10:19Rebecca Kokoska: But there is certainly an environmental issue, but we've got lots of environmental issues. I don't know. They are certainly effective for making things waterproof. And your mascaras are not going to work as well if they have to replace them with PFAS or ingredients that don't work as well as these.

10:41Marianne O'Connor: Or maybe other materials that just have the same challenge. Now, I think PFAS and cosmetics will be a short-lived problem because they are being restricted on a state-by-state level and on an international level. And they'll go away. So, one, not many people are using them. Two, the people that are, they're not going to be using them much longer. But the thing to note is just because you see the word FLUR, F-L-U-O-R, on your ingredient list for your product doesn't mean you have a PFAS. That's a common misconception. The definition of a PFAS is a molecule that has a fully fluorinated carbon atom.

11:22Marianne O'Connor: Just the presence of fluorine on its own doesn't make it a PFAS. So look for things like perfluoro or polyfluoro. That will tell you potentially that material is a PFAS, but just don't assume.

11:36Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, I will say in my formulating work, we didn't really use, I was doing hair care, So we didn't really use PFAS in anything. We did have one leave-in conditioner called, we had this ingredient called base C, which I think was some sort of fluorinated surfactant. But I don't even think, since it wasn't a polymer, so I don't think that would even qualify as a PFAS.

12:06Marianne O'Connor: I've only encountered it on two occasions. One, it was a part of a peptide that we were using and it was used to stabilize the peptide. So actually wasn't even part of the inky. We had to find it by looking at the composition and impurities for the raw material. So it was when we did a regulatory deep dive and the supplier had to come out with a PFAS free version. The second instance was we actually created a bubbling mask for the scalp. and when yeah when I started to see some of this regulation coming down the pipeline like chatter was starting to kick up we just uh slipped the formula into the shredder oh there you go that is it did not launch needless to say that's one way to cancel a product yeah but it's funny uh I was getting a facial and the esthetician put that put a bubbling mask on me this is a few months ago yeah and i said well this product won't be around for a while she said what do you mean i said well these it contains a p fast it's a little forboding

13:13Rebecca Kokoska: yeah that's so that it's a volatile one right is that how it makes the bubbles it has a

13:19Marianne O'Connor: surfactant it evaporates off it tries to burst through other surfactants and in that process

13:24Rebecca Kokoska: creates a flowing effect yeah so it's sort of like uh what uh vinegar and uh what's that vinegar and baking soda.

13:33Marianne O'Connor: Yeah, an old volcano trick. A little bit of that. Right. Well, Perry, we also have some listener feedback.

13:47Rebecca Kokoska: That's right. I saw this one came on Spotify. I think somebody did that. But anyway, they said, good morning. I just stumbled on your lovely podcast and I'm such a fan already. I was hoping to listen from the beginning, but I'm not able to find a way to access the podcast audio for episodes before episode 128. Is there a part of the website that maybe I've overlooked? Thanks in advance, Jacqueline. I was going to say, oh, you could just go to our website. I have all the old ones there. But I looked, and indeed, it only goes back to episode 128. Wow.

14:24Marianne O'Connor: Why would you want to go earlier? I'm not on them.

14:26Rebecca Kokoska: I know. Valerie began at 166, I believe.

14:32Marianne O'Connor: 165, 166, something like that.

14:34Rebecca Kokoska: That's right. That's right. Well, now I'm...

14:36Marianne O'Connor: Yeah, so Jacqueline, you don't want to go earlier. It's just Randy and Perry complaining. That's right.

14:43Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah, the good old days. We weren't really complaining. We were... Mostly it was Randy making fun of me. But...

14:51Marianne O'Connor: Well, maybe Jacqueline is a nut for lists, and she simply just has to check the list off. I totally get it.

14:57Rebecca Kokoska: Well, I am also curious, like, what was that first episode like? Because we started this show originally in maybe 2012, maybe even earlier than that. But we were way early adopters. But I'll have to go look. I'll tell you what, I will go look. And if I can find them, I will make them available to all the patrons.

15:22Marianne O'Connor: Wow, very cool. all right well let's head over to some beauty questions

15:33our first question comes to us from feta feta says ciao i've discovered your podcast recently

15:40Rebecca Kokoska: and i've already shared it with some of my girls it's a great science-based content oh thanks i'm italian living in hong kong and i'm very into checking inci of products from skincare to home cleaning as in Italy we are very into quality of products and health concerns. Since I'm living in Hong Kong and given that I've been wearing SPS 50 since I was 15, I'm 35 now, and despite I'm still shopping Italian skincare most of the time, I found some niche brands of mineral sunscreens in Japan that seem to work amazing in extreme weather and under organic makeup. I would like to have your perspective on the effectiveness of them given that there are not so many western reviews out there based on translation of my direct experience.

16:25Rebecca Kokoska: They are great in terms of everyday performance under makeup. Okay, and we have the Ruhaku Geru Peach Veil SPF 50, and then we have the Soform SPF 50 UV Protection Milk. Thanks, and have a great weekend, Fede. Have you used Japanese sunscreens?

16:47Marianne O'Connor: I have not, but it's a category I'm curious about. I've used lots of Japanese hair care and I like it. It's very different from Western hair care, but you know, I'm not a fan of Korean sunscreens. So I'm partially, I'm probably like the only person on planet earth that's not a fan of them. My personal SPF preference is I want to feel a thick waxy coating. I don't want to feel silkiness, softness. If the word veil is present in the name, the product is probably not for me. I want to know it's on my face, so I don't touch my, I have a bad habit of touching my face. So for me, usually the Korean ones are not good.

17:29And I'm curious

17:31Marianne O'Connor: about Japanese sunscreens, but you know, I'm a little hesitant. So no, I have not tried any of these.

17:37Rebecca Kokoska: I don't think this Rahuku one is going to be to your liking because it's described the texture is lightweight, non-greasy, silicone-free milk. I think what we're getting to though is that as far as performance goes and products as the consumer can go you can only go with what's on the bottle like it says spf 50 now we found that there have been a lot of independent testing showing that sometimes if it says spf 50 maybe you don't get spf 50 when you use it because the testing does not always reflect what happens in real life or even what happens between different testing labs. It's just, it's just a hard, SPF is a hard thing to test, you know?

18:20Rebecca Kokoska: So the, I think the only thing consumers can go with is like, this company has put out this SPF 50 and they, they said they've run tests and it is SPF 50. So you can either believe them or not.

18:32Marianne O'Connor: Well, the Japanese method for testing sunscreens is a little bit different than how it's done in the US and the EU. So they use the PA plus system. And I actually really like this system because it not only tells you the level of UVB protection, it tells you how good the UVA protection is. That's what the plus sign means. The more pluses, the more UVA protection that you have. And having worked with Japan before in the cosmetics world, I'm really inclined to trust the data that they're getting for their numbers. And the fact that this is 50 plus and a PA plus, plus, plus, plus, I think that this would be very good.

19:16Marianne O'Connor: I also see this product has a lot of pollution particulate testing, which I think is really interesting. You know, I've said it before on the show. If people were as worried about pollution particulate as they are worried about some of these other things, like, you know, the car industry would be really differently regulated. But pollution is terrible for your brain. It's terrible for your skin, terrible for your hair. And so I like that they have that specific data, not related to SPF, but it's just in there. But in terms of the actual ingredient list, you're right. I probably wouldn't like it.

19:55Marianne O'Connor: Right.

19:56Rebecca Kokoska: But other people who like something not to be feeling on their skin, you know, they might like it. So that's the problem with recommending products as far as your interaction with them, because people are different and what you like will be different. So I'd say these probably are good products. I'd have more faith in them, a little more faith in them coming out of Japan. They seem, the culture is more structured and rigid in the way it does testing and such. And so I'd have a little more faith that, you know, in the United States, sometimes you can kind of get fly-by-night operations. You know, we have sort of freedom where anybody can launch anything if they have enough money and some gumption.

20:41Rebecca Kokoska: But sometimes things slip through the cracks and are not done as fastidious as you would expect.

20:49Marianne O'Connor: Now, I'm kind of changing my mind on whether I would like this or not. So the full ingredient list actually is a zinc oxide dispersion I'm familiar with, which is coco caprolate caprate zinc oxide. And then there's another material that's part of this blend. And it's kind of, I don't know how to describe it, but it is a little topical type feeling. And the fact that it is 50 plus, they would have to have a considerable quantity of this in there. So I retract that. I think I would be okay with it. Now, it probably indeed is very light. I do think this probably does leave a bit of a white cast on the skin based on some of the online photos that I've seen.

21:31Marianne O'Connor: So it definitely would be sitting up there. But again, like you said, Perry, without actually trying it, you know, the inky list doesn't tell the story of the texture necessarily. We can only guess.

21:47Rebecca Kokoska: You can't really tell from the ekey list about whether you're going to like a product or not.

21:54Marianne O'Connor: Exactly. Well, I mean, I like some of the materials that they have in there. Squalane is super light. I actually really love the feeling of squalane on the skin. It just has a very specific skin feel when it's rubbed in that feels kind of nice and refatting. Of course, they have, you'll call them marketing ingredients. I'll say, you know, maybe they have some efficacy, but if there's any reasonable level of dipotassium glycerosate, which is a licorice root extract that actually has activity within the skin, centella asiatica, you know, who knows if it actually works. But again, I'm inclined to think, you know, that if it's saying it works, you know, it probably definitely does.

22:39Marianne O'Connor: But given the naming, I probably would guess this is a much lighter product than the Gruhaku Get2 UV Veil.

22:46Rebecca Kokoska: And watery. So, all right. So, yeah, thoughts on that? I mean, they're worth trying. You know, if you get dried out, you get burned. Well, don't use it. is that like a literal burning or figurative burning indeed well i actually might pick these

23:07Marianne O'Connor: up you can get them on jbeautynatural.com oh and yeah i mean the filters are allowed in the u.s so there's no reason they can't ship the real formula here but i might give it a try i did see daniella from switzerland on jbeautynatural.com commented i like the product only the talc inside it's not so good.

23:30Rebecca Kokoska: You know what? Talc is fine to use, but I can understand why people are afraid of it. All right.

23:36Marianne O'Connor: Our next question comes to us from Jane. Hello, Beauty Brains. I would love to get your opinion of Brooke Shields' hair care line commence. It's targeted to those of us with mature hair. I've been using the shampoo, conditioner, root serum, and leave-in conditioner for a few weeks. I like the subtle scent, but haven't noticed any definite changes. What do

23:55Rebecca Kokoska: you think? Thanks for your help, Jane.

23:57Marianne O'Connor: We actually have covered it in episode 386 and mentioned it in 387, and that was back in January of 2025.

24:05Rebecca Kokoska: Wow, it's been around a while, huh? So it's, you know, that's always a good thing when a brand is still around a couple years later, because a lot of times a celebrity will launch something, it'll last for a year, maybe a year and a half. They'll sell out their first production runs and then it disappears so yeah that is still around it says

24:25Marianne O'Connor: something i remember when it launched there were a lot of images of the hair that i i think were not good it didn't show hair in its best light and so when looking at the images it was like is that how the hair looks because it looks fried damaged dull dry frizzy and they have updated the imagery so that you actually get more of a look at the hair. Yeah. I think, which is really nice. And the hair looks a lot better. So I think that was a good update.

24:52Rebecca Kokoska: They have a lot more images of Brooke shields. So like, yeah,

24:57Marianne O'Connor: well, when the images are Brooke, it's like of Brooke kind of far away. Whereas the other images are like close up of the model's hair, but when it's Brooke, it's full on Brooke.

25:06Rebecca Kokoska: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think she's trying to really attach herself to this. So as far as the products go, I mean, they look fine in my opinion these are you know let me let me step back a second so i only formulate

25:21Marianne O'Connor: hair care hair color scalp care products for a living when i lecture it's only on that i've done a lot of research at the salon brand that i previously worked out on these items and so i'd like to think i can recognize a good formula when i see one or at least one that would deliver the attributes being advertised. Sure. And, you know, these formulas look fine enough. Is it what I would have done for this brand? No.

25:52Rebecca Kokoska: Well, I will say I'm just looking at the full ingredient list of the shampoo. At first, they call out, you know, all of their market ingredients, foaming oak, quinoa peptides, lactose, you know, all of the marketing ingredients. But when I look at a formula, I say, what's really the ingredients doing anything? And this is based on cocamidopropyl betaine and desoglucoside and hydroxyalkane sodium salt.

26:21Marianne O'Connor: Yeah, they have an interesting inky for sulfonic acids and C14-16 alkane hydroxyl. I think they mean sodium C14-16 olefin sulfonate.

26:33Rebecca Kokoska: Right. So they don't exactly have the right ingredient list on there, which, you know, Brooke might want to get her people on to fix that. But and I see and then it's like everything but the kitchen sink in here. There's all these extra ingredients, which are to me aren't really doing anything. But, you know.

26:52Marianne O'Connor: Now, the challenge with mature hair is the scientific community, when you purely look at the literature from a literature perspective, you can find a relatively equal amount of literature that supports that gray hair does change as you age. Right. So it's stiffer, less elastic, tougher cuticle, meaning it's tougher to get color in. Sure. But there's also literature that says it's the exact same as pigmented hair, naturally pigmented hair. So I think from a scientific perspective, I already know it's the same. Yeah.

27:33Rebecca Kokoska: My challenge, Perry, is... No, I did some work with looking at gray hair products and tresses and such. And, you know, on a blinded basis, people could not tell differences. Even, you know, despite what the literature says. things. Yeah.

27:47Marianne O'Connor: But the challenge is anecdotally, when you look at your own head, you're not looking at your own head. Not only do the gray hair stand out, but they're different. They literally stick out. They don't comb down the same. They're, you know, stick straight in areas that I have curly hair. So I understand what the literature says. And I've looked at, you know, gray hairs. Granted, they were standardized as well. It just behaves differently. And so that's the tough part. And when I look at what's in commence, the reason I mentioned, you know, I'm, you know, not trying to be nasty when I'm looking at these formulas, I do think that gray hair has different needs and it starts within the scalp.

28:36Marianne O'Connor: And I have a whole presentation on scalp and how scalp ages and I don't think brands are really following that and I don't think that this brand is acknowledging from a scalp perspective that that's where it starts and then two you have to use things that really soften the hair and I don't see that those things are being used here it's kind of like generic conditioning materials.

29:00Rebecca Kokoska: Polyquat 10 yeah but I'm sure the products are

29:03Marianne O'Connor: fine and i'm sure they're fine but as this person noted like i'm not really seeing a difference

29:10Rebecca Kokoska: they're also not super expensive i mean as premium brands go right 24 bucks for a bottle of shampoo there's salon brands cost a lot more than that so it's affordable for fine enough products if you want to go a step up over drugstore brands if anyone from commence is listening i'd love to

29:31Marianne O'Connor: tell you about aging scalp and how you could improve your life there you go next question

29:36Rebecca Kokoska: is heather from patreon heather had a bunch of questions she's new to patreon and she gave us like six i'd say we take a few of them and we'll spread them out to the next one so hi val and perry i am a curly hair specialist and a former science teacher and my nerdiness knows no bounce so i really thank you endlessly for what you do also i finally joined patreon because of y 'all so that's cool. I have infinite questions, so I'll bullet them for you to answer separately. Okay, her first question. I've been getting a gazillion ads for Hair Story New Wash and see a bunch of stylists I really respect saying they swear by it.

30:11Rebecca Kokoska: It is a co-wash with the concept of like cleans like, so embulsifying an oil cream base should cleanse the scalp and hair. In my salon, I experienced the clients with buildup on their hair experience increased frizz due to the buildup repelling water and the hair getting weighed down. I also have very oily and very fine hair wavy friend who swears by daily co-washing with a weekly clarifying shampoo. She says her hair waves better with this method. I'm wondering if this product is really worth its weight. Is it any different than those other co-washes on the market and why do some hair types seem to really prefer this?

30:49Rebecca Kokoska: Is it cleansing enough for the scalp as long as a clarifying shampoo is used in the rotation? All right, that first question. Have you seen this Hair Story New Wash stuff?

31:01Marianne O'Connor: I'm familiar with Hair Story.

31:03Rebecca Kokoska: Oh, well, that's good. I mean, I've seen it. I'm looking at their main bestseller, the New Wash Original. It says it replaces shampoo and conditioner in one step, detergent-free, cleanses without stripping. Okay, and it's based on what? Glycerin, ceterol alcohol, sterol metal, propyl dimethyl. So this is just a conditioner.

31:25Marianne O'Connor: Exactly. So it's a traditional cleansing conditioner. The brand was launched maybe a handful of years after when by Chaz Dean launched his cleansing conditioner. And it's all based on the same technology. It's essentially a conditioning base. It uses sterometropropyl dimethylamine, which is the conditioning agent used in two-in-one shampoos from the 90s. And it's very lightweight. It has really great wet feel. Um, it's best suited for wet feel. So when you're applying it to wet hair and you're rinsing it, hair feels really great. It's also really good at wet combing. So when the hair is wet, it combs really well.

32:07Marianne O'Connor: It's not so heavy in conditioning that you're going to think, oh, wow, I'm just using a conditioner on my hair. It really is one of the most lightweight conditioning agents you can use in a conditioning system. I love it. But it definitely has a time and place, and I think it is most suitable for people with fine hair. If you have really coarse hair, really thick hair, as a conditioner, it's not going to do a whole lot for you. And so in that instance, it may be best suited as a co-wash. Now, the concept of like cleans like is a basic chemistry principle of like dissolves like. So two things of similar chemistry are compatible with each other and can dissolve with each other.

32:57Rebecca Kokoska: It's kind of a polarity thing, like oils kind of blend with oils and water kind of blends with the water, but they don't sort of blend together because polar and nonpolar don't blend. But the problem with that is that while light dissolves like water stuff dissolves in water, oil stuff does not necessarily always dissolve in other oil stuff. So it's not exactly correct there.

33:20Marianne O'Connor: And because you're just not putting out oil in your sebum, you're producing waxes, you can get solidified buildup on your scalp, you have dead skin cells. While it effectively might be lightly cleansing your scalp, it's not really cleaning your scalp. And they tend to rinse poorly from hair. The goal is for them to stay behind. It's a conditioning product. so eventually you actually will potentially get some buildup from this product because you're not really cleaning it's why your friend probably has a really great experience when they use a very

33:58Rebecca Kokoska: cleansing shampoo every week yeah so i tried the co-washing experiment myself when i was working on these products and you know if you like the way your hair feels when you do this it's sure you You could go a long time just using conditioner, but it leaves your hair sort of weighed down. And I don't know, there's a certain field. I think most people wouldn't like it.

34:20Marianne O'Connor: Yeah, it definitely, you have to be used to it and you have to be able to tolerate it. Now, is it any different from other co-washes on the market? Of course, it's not 100 % identical, but it's based on the same technology and that's styro-medopropyl dimethylamine. And so from that perspective, it's exactly no different. So could you use it in your rotation and cleanse the scalp as long as you use a clarifying shampoo? I would say you have to use a clarifying shampoo every other wash or every third wash. I would recommend it because it's probably just not getting the debris from the scalp.

34:59Rebecca Kokoska: You know, when I was actually working on a project on this, we found that people were using VO5 conditioner as their co-wash. because that one was just based on cetrimonium chloride. Super lightweight. Yeah, but it's also a cationic surfactant. And if you put enough of it in there, it'll actually kind of clean your hair a little bit.

35:23Marianne O'Connor: Exactly. And cetrimonium chloride actually might be a better fit if you have really fine hair because it is very light and it's a combing cationic. So it's really great to get detangling through the hair. It's why you see it used in detanglers, but it's not necessarily a feel that you would feel. So if you're looking to cleanse and not really feel and have hair be weighed down, it could be a good fit.

35:52Rebecca Kokoska: It rinses out better. All right, let's go to the next question. So many curlies feel like their hair looks and behaves much better at the beach. Why is this? I live in eastern Oregon, and it is pretty dry climate here. So how can I help my clients achieve the beachy hair of their dreams in this totally different climate? I have heard that people talk about beachy hair and it being better. Is that the humidity in the air and the saltiness? I don't know. Or is it just that you're on vacation at the beach and you're feeling good?

36:25Marianne O'Connor: Well, ocean water is a little bit different. It has a pH around 8 and it has an extremely high salt content. and what happens is you go in the water and of course the air is humid so your hair is behaving differently anyway but you go in the water your hair gets coated in this salt and it almost like crystallizes on the outside of the hair fiber and changes the swelling properties of the hair and so people think like wow my hair is really soft or my hair has really good body and volume but really it's the salts from the ocean water on the hair changing the properties of it. So it is a real thing.

37:08Rebecca Kokoska: Right. I guess the salt could also sort of crystallize on the fibers and sort of separate the fibers itself too. Exactly.

37:17Marianne O'Connor: And so I think there is something special to the ocean. Now, to help your clients get beachy hair of their dreams, I hate to say it, but I would look for magnesium sulfate. So that's like Epsom salts. There's a lot of surf sprays based on this technology, and I think it works really good for that purpose. Now, many of them also have style-type things to them.

37:40Rebecca Kokoska: Sure.

37:40Marianne O'Connor: But there are some really great ones that even if your client wanted to themselves, they could make their own magnesium sulfate spritz for their hair. and then couple it maybe with a lightweight styling oil or oil over it.

37:55Rebecca Kokoska: And while you're applying that, play like a beachy video so they can watch it. She actually had one more question here that will cover humectants. If humidity is the bane of many curlies, why do many styling products, and especially gels, have so much humectant in them? It seems like it would be counterintuitive, but it's not. why is the glycerin in those uh styling products you know i've always wondered why curly hair

38:27Marianne O'Connor: products um have so much it's generally glycerin in them because glycerin um leaves a lot of drag on the hair and it really gives a lot of negative hair feel but i know that there's a conception that because it's a humectant and curly hair tends to feel dry, that it's really good for hair. And I don't necessarily think this is the case. Now you do want a little bit of water in your hair because water is a plasticizer. It helps make it a little bit flexible, but having too much water in hair can actually make it more rigid, which seems counterintuitive. It's like this really fine point within hair.

39:14And then you have the aspect of humidity.

39:17Marianne O'Connor: Depending on where you live, if you live in a really dry climate versus a really humid climate, your hair is going to respond to all of those humectants a little bit differently. And so it can actually have an adverse effect. And then you have to couple it with other things that counteract what glycerin is doing to the hair. But generally, in my experience, glycerin is a negative for hair.

39:44Rebecca Kokoska: Well, I also think that as frizz goes, it's not really the humidity that is causing the frizz. What it is, is the hair absorbing water and it's in a sort of an uneven way and it's damaged more on one side than the other. And so we used to do this sponge experiment or demonstration where we had one sponge type on one side and one sponge type on the other side and one was able to absorb water at different rates and so when you put water on them the same amount of water on them the sponge would curl up to one side and that was because of the different and and that sort of demonstrates how damage is on hair and so I think one of the things that happens when you put a humectant on a damaged curl hair like that is you sort of even out the way that the water will absorb onto that specific fiber.

40:39Rebecca Kokoska: And that could help with the frizziness or something like that.

40:44Marianne O'Connor: A porosity equalizer of sorts. But I think it has to be, you have to live in the right environment, in my opinion, and it has to be the right amount. I don't like the blanket statement like oh it's you know good for curly hair i think it depends on the quantity

41:00Rebecca Kokoska: and and where you live well thanks for that heather uh and yes we'll cover the rest of your questions in the future show she had a few more well we have time for one more question perry

41:13Marianne O'Connor: it comes to us from carol please tell me if this is worth it if you can respond quickly i appreciate it i love your show and trust you would say all the best carol all right vita reset you know and

41:25Rebecca Kokoska: i first looked up vita reset it went to something about your video games or something i don't know i think it was a various but i found the website vita reset.net they claim to rebuild younger looking skin from the inside out firm hydrated and visibly glowing oh and guess what it's got collagen, hyaluronic acid, biotin, uh, boy, uh, Valerie, uh, I'm, I'm not a huge fan of supplements.

41:56Marianne O'Connor: I think I mentioned last time, anytime you go to a website, offer ends in 59 minutes, 13 seconds, and you scroll down and it's 17 ,000 customers and counting, and it's scrolling all these five-star reviews you know money guaranteed real life changing results and you can you know get a crazy supply for you know x amount of money six bottles and it just feels like it's a hard sell right used car sales many we say in the united states and you know lots of questions right on the front page clinically safe 100 satisfaction guaranteed 60 days money back guarantee. Like that just tells me the product is probably not one to invest your money in.

42:46Marianne O'Connor: It feels like a get rich quick scheme for the company. And I'm not saying the products don't work. I'm saying it's unlikely they work in the way that they say they do. But what I am saying is just use a little bit of caution because it feels like a sales gimmick.

43:03Rebecca Kokoska: In their defense, I think this is the kind of thing that works online. Not that the product works, but the marketing of the product in this way is what works because you know like you said there's

43:14Marianne O'Connor: 17 000 plus users but and carol's asking us if she should buy it so clearly it works right

43:21Rebecca Kokoska: right well but clearly her skepticism is raised a bit and for a good reason but if we if the the reality is there's scant evidence that what you eat has a big impact on your skin and on your hair and i know the collagen supplement people have pressed really hard and they paid a bunch of influencers and even some science influencers to say oh this is this is working for you but there's no good evidence for that and new york times just published an article i thought of you Perry, and actually I'll give to you the article, that we are taking way too many supplements,

44:04Marianne O'Connor: and there may be adverse health effects from taking all these supplements. So I don't think there's anything in this bottle that you wouldn't get from having a well-rounded diet.

44:14Rebecca Kokoska: Right. And the other thing is, like, in the United States, this industry is wholly unregulated, in my opinion. There was a thing called, what was it? No, it wasn't the D'Shea Act. It was, Yeah, you know, it was the Deshaies Act passed in the 1990s, which essentially said, FDA, you cannot look at manufacturers of supplements, and they're going to tell you that it's safe, and unless people are dying, you can't do anything. So it really tied...

44:44Marianne O'Connor: And the industry lobbied to have that act passed. Oh, yeah, yeah.

44:47Rebecca Kokoska: And so did Mel Gibson, yeah.

44:49Marianne O'Connor: No, he was not involved in the Deshaies Act.

44:52Rebecca Kokoska: Oh, yeah, yeah. There was a very famous commercial where Mel Gibson, the police come into his house and then they go into his cabinet and is like, you're not taking my vitamins away from me? Oh, yeah, this is a huge thing.

45:06Marianne O'Connor: Oh my gosh. He did play a crucial role in publicizing the Dietary Supplement Health Education Act of 1994, also known as Deshaies. Yeah. Because he did a commercial, tongue-in-cheek, wow, a heavily armed SWAT team burst into Gibson's mansion under cover of night. Yeah. They corner Gibson in his kitchen while he's wearing a bathrobe. They handcuff him for possessing a bottle of vitamin C. gibson defends himself by raising his hand saying it's only vitamins oh yeah so i should have done

45:41Rebecca Kokoska: that in an australian male accent but i didn't have it that had a huge impact on the passage of that legislation and ever since then you know these men anybody in the united states can pretty much come up with anything call it a vitamin supplement and get it on the market without any proof that testing was done properly. And a lot of times there's been various newspaper articles and things where people have tested what's really in there and it's not what's claimed on the bottle.

46:10Marianne O'Connor: So there's also the opportunity for a lot of contaminants and supplements if a facility is producing them and they're not doing the necessary HPLC, GC, MS to ascertain that there's not heavy metals or other toxic compounds. And also very few companies are doing toxicology assessments on supplements. Yeah.

46:33Rebecca Kokoska: And, you know, and as long as they're not killing anybody, they can just keep doing it, at least in the United States. So that's my thoughts on this. First of all, there's no evidence that eating something is going to be good for your skin and hair. That's, you know, that seems logical.

46:51Marianne O'Connor: Except having a biotin deficiency, which is very rare because you get most of your biotin from food.

46:55Rebecca Kokoska: Yes, yes. No, I mean, it seems logical. Oh, you are what you eat. But if that was true, you know, I would be like salmon and I'm not.

47:03Marianne O'Connor: No, you'd be Diet Coke.

47:06Rebecca Kokoska: Well, it's Diet Dr. Pepper today. But yeah, like your body digests stuff and then uses the stuff it uses and then gets rid of the stuff it doesn't. It doesn't know what was in there. So you are what you eat but on a molecular level. And then, you know, supplements are not regulated, and I think overall they're not exactly safe.

47:29Marianne O'Connor: So, Carol, I'd probably skip buying it.

47:31Rebecca Kokoska: Well, speaking of safe...

47:33Marianne O'Connor: 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.

47:44Rebecca Kokoska: And if you have a question, just record it on your smartphone and email it to thebeautybrains at gmail.com. or you can just use the form in the show notes of this episode or call us at 1-872-216-1856. You know, it's been a few episodes since we've had somebody's voice on here. So, hey, if you want to hear it, but we'll take emails. But, you know, we always like to hear other voices. Also, the Beauty Brains are on Patreon. If you appreciate that there's no commercials here and we don't do advertising, but we need some support in this and you want to support the show, go to patreon.com slash thebeautybrains and subscribe at any level.

48:20Rebecca Kokoska: And if you do that, you get your questions in a higher priority to answer, and you get a transcript of the show.

48:26Marianne O'Connor: Don't forget to follow us on our various social media accounts. On Instagram, we're at thebeautybrains2018. On X, we're at thebeautybrains. On Blue Sky, we're at thebeautybrains. We have a Facebook page, a TikTok, and a YouTube.

48:37Rebecca Kokoska: There's content on both YouTube and TikTok now. Check that out. It's all new.

48:41Marianne O'Connor: Woo-hoo! Well, thanks again for listening, everyone. And remember, be brainy about your beauty.

48:46Rebecca Kokoska: Thanks everyone