Avalon Organics shampoo’s great, but its conditioner, I thought, could be thicker. And since I ran out of both yesterday, I picked up JASON Natural Sea Kelp shampoo and conditioner at Co-opportunity. Paraben free, biodegradable, and leaping bunny logo-ed! Also, on sale.
I knew JASON’s a company that’s signed on to the Compact for Safe Cosmetics, so I hopped in the shower before checking its safety ranking on Skin Deep (here’s why you should check). And I was pretty happy with the stuff, mainly because it has a coconut-y smell that makes me feel like I’m between sips of a pina colada while I’m washing my hair….
But today I got curious and plugged the products into Skin Deep — to find my shampoo and conditioner aren’t listed yet. Undaunted, I typed in individual ingredients to find out if any were questionable —
Turns out, one is: oxybenzone, has a high-risk ranking of 7. Two others, retinyl palmitate and citric acid (only in the shampoo), have medium-risk scores of 3; all other ingredients have low-risk rankings.
I have no idea how that averages out to an overall product ranking — I would guess a 4 or 5?
So medium risk isn’t bad and I’ll enjoy my pina colada scented showers for now — but why settle for medium when there are low risk products on the market? After all, I liked Avalon Organics’ conditioner okay even if I didn’t love it — and that’s ranked a low-risk 2.
Of course there’s always a risk when trying new products — they might not work, or you might not like them. So — got a conditioner you wanna recommend? Check out its score on Skin Deep, and lemme know how it stacks up.
Update, 3/2/08: I got a new shampoo — EO — and LOVE the stuff, which is greener AND works better than JASON’s products.
I don’t even use conditioner any more. I either rinse my hair with apple cider vinegar or add a wee bit of olive oil with my shampoo (sometimes with an egg.)
Comment by Jasmin — July 9, 2007 @ 11:02 am
It’s amazing how bad the “good” stuff is!
I swtiched to:
Korres Sunflower Extract & Vitamin F Shampoo, rating = 0
Korres Silk Milk Conditioner, rating = 1
I love them both. They are $17/bottle, so yes not inexpensive.
Comment by Callie — July 9, 2007 @ 5:26 pm
ack! My hair is full of moderate hazards!
Comment by Zach Behrens — July 10, 2007 @ 1:41 am
Conditioner’s one of those things I’ve been using for so long I haven’t ever questioned the necessity of it — One idea I have is actually just going without and seeing what happens….
The vinegar, olive oil, and egg idea sounds interesting, if a bit cumbersome –
Callie — I’ll check to see if Korres is available at my Co-op — Thanks for the tip :)
Comment by Siel — July 10, 2007 @ 8:56 am
Not cumbersome at all—you just put whatever into a cup and take it with you into the shower. You can even add a few drops of essential oil for scenting your locks :)
Comment by Jasmin — July 10, 2007 @ 9:55 am