Does This Salon Vs. Drugstore Shampoo Experiment Prove Anything?

Sabrina Rojas Weiss
A woman's hair is washed in a salon-type basin.
Are expensive brands really better than drugstore? (Photo: Getty Images)

The decision to purchase salon hair-care products over drugstore brands often comes down to our relationship with our hairstylist or how much cash we’ve got in the bank. Even if you’ve read that cheaper shampoos have damaging chemicals, it’s hard not to wonder whether you’d be a fool for paying four or five times more for high-end brands. This uncertainty explains the rapidly rising view count of a video a British stylist posted to Facebook this week. Could it be scientific proof that one is better than the other?

In the video, salon owner Rachel Trach squirts Unite 7Seconds shampoo into a wine glass filled with water and Tresemmé 24 Hour Body shampoo into another. She stirs both glasses. We watch with bated breath as the Unite glass turns milky and the Tresemmé remains clear. Next, Trach swishes a hair extension around a bit in the Unite glass, and drops it in.

Then comes the moment we’ve all been waiting for, when Trach swishes another lock of hair into the Tresemmé glass. The water instantly turns purple.

Eureka! She’s got it!

Well, she does have a good video, which has been viewed over 7 million times as of this writing. The post has almost 54,000 shares and 8,000 comments on Facebook.

“This is just one example why it’s so important to educate our guests on how horrible drugstore brands are for your hair & skin!” one user wrote.

“And you wonder why you are always having to re-dye your hair,” another said while tagging a friend.

Not everyone is convinced. “I am not sure if Tresemme has that texture though it seems a little sketchy,” said one.

This isn’t exactly a controlled scientific experiment. We know nothing of the hairpieces she’s using. Were they both dyed the same way? Were they real hair? One commenter seemed to think the Tresemme one looked suspiciously like Trach had just dipped it in dye.

She’s also not comparing apples to apples: Unite specifically states on its website that 7Seconds shampoo will “protect your hair from UV rays, thermal damage and color fading.” The description for Tresemmé 24 Hour Body shampoo makes no mention of color protection. That’s a different shampoo altogether.

“For colored hair, we recommend using a different product from the range which is designed for color-treated hair and keeps hair color vibrant for up to eight weeks,” a spokesperson for Unilever (which owns Tresemmé) told the Sun after viewing the video.

There is a reason many drugstore shampoos can damage hair more than their pricier counterparts. To create lather, they contain ingredients such as sulfates — the same ingredient used to clean everything from floors to cars — which can wash away hair’s protective moisture. Sulfate-free products use gentler (and sometimes more expensive) ingredients to get the job done.

If Trach wants to do some more extensive experimenting to convince us, we’ll be watching.

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