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I wanted to talk today about conditioners.
Conditioners as a whole. And and as you can see, I have no conditioners in front of me, so this isn't one of these. I'm trying to sell you something things. Although, I do have a bottle of leave in, but that's for a different different type of conversation. But let's talk about conditioners.
Seriously misunderstood creatures. Bottles and tubes and jars of conditioner. Now look, first thing, all conditioners are good.
Never met a bottle of conditioner I didn't like. The real trick with conditioner is getting the right one on the right head and using it correctly. So we have a couple of different issues with this. Number one, what does the client want?
Some some clients, they, you know, if their hair is shiny or weighed down, they think it's greasy, and they blame their conditioner. Some people want it to feel weighed down and and feel a little shiny. So we have to have a little conversation first about that. Second is getting the right one on the right head.
Now, whether you have a heavy moisture conditioner or a good protein conditioner or one that's both, how do we give it to the client? So we know and if you've watched our videos and you've been part of our education, we know that curly hair needs more moisture and straight hair needs more protein. So you have to know which conditioner is which. We want to get the moisture conditioners on the curly hair and people who get frizzy and we want to give the protein conditioners for the people who need strength or body or repair to their hair.
So that's first off. If you give the moisture to the straight hair girl, she's not going to like it And that's when they buy something from you and they say, you weighed my hair down. I didn't like it at all of these things. We have to, you know, close the gap of error that we can make by suggesting conditioners to people.
So let's make sure we get moisture ones to the curly hair and frizzy hair. Let's get the protein ones to the straight and fragile hair. Now that we've done that, we've got them the right category.
We got to teach them how to use it properly.
You rinse your conditioner out until it's slightly filmy.
Slightly filmy.
If you rinse a conditioner out squeaky clean, you've got no benefit from that product. You might have got a little detangling, you know, in the process of that, but you get no real benefit from the conditioner if you rinse it squeaky clean. And this is a huge problem for clients.
You know, surveyed clients, most of them rinse their conditioner out squeaky clean. So they're buying expensive products from us, and they don't feel or see any difference in their hair, and they stop buying. We all know that our retail sales are terrible in salons across the country. So if we can just tweak this, let's just tweak this and do it a little bit better.
Get the right one on the right head and they use it correctly, and you're gonna see big time results and big time repurchases of those products. And they're gonna trust you more. They they they feel you have more credibility in in what you recommend and how you recommend it.
So that's first off. Let's get the right one on the right head. They're all good. And then at that point, let's see if it works for her.
So I got her in the moisture category. She's got curly hair. It's getting frizzy. I get her in the moisture category.
And maybe she tries one of the moisture ones and she doesn't like it. Maybe it's the consistency. Maybe it was a little too heavy. It was too much moisture for her.
Maybe we move to another one, a different type of moisture. One might be an oil. One might be just a light moisture.
Now start moving her around in the category she's supposed to be in and using it correctly. And she's gonna find one that you carry in your salon that she likes better than another.
But we're trying to just limit it down, get the right one on the right head. And it's the same with the protein clients, exactly the same thing. Have her try one, then have her try another. And keep going and you do process of elimination till she finds the one that she likes the best. Now here's a there's a caveat to this that I think we have mass misconception, not just stylist but consumers too. You know, feel good conditioners don't necessarily fix and fixed conditioners don't necessarily feel good.
So we have to combine our knowledge, our education of products and hair, and talk to her about what she likes and dislikes, the way her hair to feel. I like it squeaky clean. I don't want that slightly filmy.
Well, if that's the case, that's what these guys are for. I mean, everybody should have a leave in every day and use it head to toe every day anyway, but that's perfect situation for somebody who doesn't want that heavy conditioner. Conversation is crucial to your client, asking them specifically what they want, how they want their hair to feel. Some like it to feel squeaky clean and rough.
They feel like they have more body to it. Others want that silky soft smoothing feeling air. So you can't just say, hey, I love this product. And it's why I get super annoyed when, you know, there's a brand out and everybody's screaming the brand, oh, blah blah blah.
And all these people are buying it because it's not for everyone. One size doesn't fit all in our industry. And we have to have an education about hair and about products and have good consultation skills. And when those three things come together, you're gonna have success in it.
She's gonna like her hair. It looks and feels exactly the way she wants it to, and you're making money. And you're doing the recommendation, building the credibility of your clients that they go, yes, she knows what she's doing. And that's a huge part of what we do, that credibility that you need to have.
The other side of the conditioner story is what we do behind the chair. Now, because conditioners are acidic, and typically lower than our hair and skin, our hair and skin being four point five to five point five. Conditioners run just on the low end of that and for some conditioners even lower than our pH. This is a good thing. We know anything acidic or lower than us closes our cuticle, creates more shine in the hair, and and helps the hair and protects the hair. But by lowering lowering the pH, that also seals in your color. The more we can keep our cuticle down and in in that acid state, the better wear and tear we're gonna have on our hair color.
Which is why when people are rinsing it off squeaky clean, they're really not getting that benefit and they're going to have faster fading. And we need to combine all of this information.
All this information we have to combine and just recommend something to someone based on their hair type and whether they have color or not. And and we're gonna have massive amounts of success with it. And the fact that conditioners are acidic, we can use conditioners as a tool to make our chemicals more gentle.
Our chemicals damage hair not because of the ingredient. It's not the ammonia. It's not the bleach. It's the pH of the ammonia.
It's the pH of the bleach. The amount of alkalinity, the higher the number the more alkalinity and that's what damages our hair. Why bleach damages our hair? Is because the p h and the amount of alkalinity at that p h on our hair.
So if you wanna make a bowl of bleach more gentle, just add some conditioner to it. Any conditioner.
Because it's acidic and it's gonna lower the pH of that bleach a little bit, and it's gonna be more gentle.
Now if you, really want to learn this, you can go into our freaks and geeks class or our legally blonde class, which we get into pH in way more detail in there and understand that anything you want to make more gentle. If somebody's feeling irritated with hair color, you're just doing a root touch up and it's irritating your hair, if you add some conditioner and lower the pH of that color a little bit, in a lot of cases, it can make that sensation go away. Because remember, everybody's skin is between four point five and five point five. And if your skin on your scalp is lower than someone else's, that color is gonna feel stronger on her than it does on her.
So by adding some conditioner and lowering the pH, we can get rid of that maybe slightly burned, slightly sting feeling that she's having. It won't in all cases, but it will in a lot of them. And it's a quick easy fix, you know, by putting conditioner on the hair prior to doing, like, a lightener service, anything with lightener or bleach.
I always tend to and you can watch it in the in our application video.
I always have a bowl of conditioner, and I always put it on, the hair from the line of demarcation down. From the the line of demarcation to previously lightened hair. That previously lightened hair, I paint conditioner on there first, then I go in on the virgin hair and do the lightener. That way, if it overlaps or it gets pulled down, I got a conditioning barrier and and protection on the hair because I put conditioner on it. You know, we tend to buy a lot of products instead of stopping.
If we get good education and good information, we can think our way through most of this. And you can do this with any conditioner. They're all good. They all work the same. They're all made the same.
Are some better than others? Absolutely. But if you put the wrong one on the wrong head and she uses it correctly, it doesn't matter how good that conditioner is. It failed for her. And unfortunately, it failed for you recommending it to her because you've lost credibility selling her an expensive product that didn't work. So conditioners are are great. You can take any conditioner, you know, put it in a water bottle, put a little bit in a water bottle, add water, shake it up, and you've just made a leave in.
Leave in conditioners are hugely helpful for us and should be one of the most popular selling products in your salon.
No matter what hair you type, whether it's the curling and it needs moisture, if it's straight it needs protein, you should be getting out of the shower and spraying a nice light leave in every day. Because remember, you're rinsing that conditioner out with water which is a higher pH. And you can get out of the shower and spray your head to toe and re re acidify your skin and your hair. Take this to the beach.
We're coming into summer months. A good leave in like the like the Soma leave in, it's got some UV protectant in it. So you take it to the beach. You throw it in your cooler.
You can rehydrate your skin and rehydrate your hair. You know, after you get out of the salt water, spray it in, rehydrate it. These are things that we have available to us all the time, and these are conversations we should be having with our clients instead of pushing the latest brand or the latest gimmick.
They will love you for it, but you can certainly make your own leave in conditioner right at your station if you tend to use one at your station. Just a little conditioner water, shake it up, spray it on, you've just made your own leave in. Because that's really all this is, is just conditioner that's super super duper watered down.
But they have great properties to them for shine, for static, for UV protection, for split ends. They have all those things in them.
So the whole vast world of conditioners that we have available to us, whether it's a leave in or a mask. The real difference is how thick it is, how concentrated thick it is, how long you leave it on, and more importantly, if the hair is clean on the inside and outside before you do them. Because if we're trying to repair the hair, if there's gunk stuck to the outside and the inside of the hair is polluted, you know, doing a deep conditioning treatment is really not worth it.
People trying to do glazes, they're trying to shine and condition hair with a chemical, which is an oxymoron.
It might feel and look good for for a few minutes, but two three weeks that when when all that all fades and washes off, you're just left with hair that you've done chemical treatments on. They'll get a better result, longer lasting results, better feel of their hair day to day, week to week. If they just did this every day instead of a chemical that will wash out in, you know, seven to ten shampoos.
So we can really use our conditioners professionally, in with our chemicals, in with your perms, your bleach, your color. You can add conditioner to those and make them more gentle on somebody you think might have fragile hair or sensitive skin.
Being able to talk to people about them and getting the right one on the right head. Ninety percent of our problems with with our clients or ninety percent of their problems that they complain about can be fixed if they had the right conditioner and they used it correctly.
So make sure you go into into our library, watch Legally Blonde. It really touches on how any conditioner you have in your own salon can save you money from buying gimmicks, and you can really start customizing your work, being able to make something a a lightener more gentle than buying three different ones because one says it's more gentle. You can do that yourself, and that's what education does is about teaching you how to do it, that you have the creativity, you have the knowledge, you understand what you're doing and why you're doing it.