Shopping for Ingredients
What to look for — and what to look out for — on the back of your bottles
WRITTEN BY GINA MARIE RODRIGUEZ
Rather than looking at the back of a bottle and expecting a product to perform a certain way, we should assess the results we get with a product and then worry about what’s in it.
But trial-and-error can be an expensive method of choosing a shampoo, especially when it comes to high-quality products. And curly girls know what can happen if you dedicate weeks of washes to the wrong system: Suddenly, your mane’s on a path to frizz and breakage that could take months to undo (once you eventually find the right products, of course).
So it’s understandable that you want to at least start looking in the right direction.
Many stylists focus on natural, botanical ingredients. Products containing these ingredients are often simpler, environmentally friendly, and water-soluble.
But if you have damaged hair, botanical ingredients might be too simple to protect it against the elements. This is where the synthetic and non-water-soluble products will fare better.
For example, silicone isn’t botanical and it’s rarely water-soluble. But it can coat and protect your hair better than a botanical will, and you need to choose what works best for your own hair’s needs. Silicone is also a lightweight replacement for oils (which are botanical, but not water-soluble, which means they can be heavy and create buildup).
Still, cosmetics are made to perform. Period. That’s their role. If you’re looking to seal in moisture — or seal out a dry, arid climate — then you may want to consider a product with silicones or oils and be prepared to deal with the buildup that will likely ensue.
So let’s say you’re willing to look beyond all-natural or botanical ingredients, if need be. What do you need to know to get the highest quality products?
The thing is, when ingredients are chemically engineered, it gets harder and harder to understand how they perform and what they’ll do to your hair. No product lists the complete origin of their raw materials, and suppliers are constantly changing. That’s why, once again, it comes down to trying products and seeing what they do for you, specifically, instead of trying to predict it based on the label.
For the most part, it’s easier to stick to simpler and more natural products for your primary needs (to give your hair a stable foundation, at least); then, if you really need to, you can add a final layer with a sealing ingredient such as a silicone or an oil or plasticizer to affect the day-to-day style and performance.
Using these sealing ingredients occasionally won’t permanently derail your healthy hair. There are ways to restore the hydration they’ve stripped or remove the buildup they’ve caused once they’ve done their job.
But that’s a call you have to make for yourself, and there is no right or wrong answer. You’ll have to decide if using a “generally not recommended” ingredient on your hair is right for you. Some people choose to stick with botanical products and embrace the slight uncertainty of how their hair will respond in certain situations, while others prioritize predictability and control.
Additionally, we all know that a lot of what we see on labels is part of a marketing agenda. For example, you might see “all natural” ingredients promoted all over a bottle, but those might not even be active ingredients that influence product performance. Companies can include less than 1% of a fancy ingredient in their formula, then celebrate its benefits in giant print on the front of the bottle. That’s not illegal, and it’s not false, but it’s also not going to help your hair.
Since you can’t assess the results on your own hair while you’re standing in the store aisle (or browsing online), what do you actually need to look for before you head to checkout?
First five
The first five ingredients on a label will tell you most of what’s inside. Water should be the first ingredient and sodium chloride (table salt) should not be listed anywhere near the top of the list. That’s because it’s very easy to make a product and then dilute it with water so much that it’s no longer as effective. Companies can get away with this because the label will still name a lot of high-quality ingredients in the first five slots, so that it looks like the overall product is high-performance. However, if they dilute it too much, the product then becomes too watery, so one trick is to add sodium chloride as a thickener. Seeing it high on a list of ingredients (for example, the sixth slot) could signal the product is excessively watered down. Therefore, it’s no longer high-quality and effective; basically, you’re buying fancy salt water. (Plus, of course, you want to avoid the potential drying effect of the salt.)
Water solubility
Look for products that are water-soluble. Warning: this might not be as easy as it sounds.
In product formulation, there are three categories of solubility: water-soluble (dissolved by water); alcohol-soluble (dissolved by alcohol); and oil-soluble (dissolved by oil). Oils, butters, and silicones are not water-soluble. Most alcohols are water-soluble; however, some ingredients that can dissolve in alcohol cannot dissolve in water (and are therefore not water-soluble).
Confused? The easiest solution is to remember that oil and water do not mix. However, through the magic of ingredient combination and formulation, some oil-soluble and alcohol-soluble ingredients can, in fact, be made to work in conjunction with each other and function as water-soluble. How that is done ... is more than we can get into here. Just remember to scan those first five ingredients and try to avoid oils, butters, and silicones. In fact, use them sparingly if you choose to use them at all.
Emulsifiers
If you’ve ever made homemade Italian dressing or vinaigrette, you’ve seen the oil, water, vinegar, and herbs separate in the bottle. Maybe you’ve used a premade seasoning packet that bound the ingredients together — those binders are known as emulsifiers. Like those store-bought Italian dressings, hair care product ingredients need to be held together and emulsified. Cetearyl alcohol, cetyl alcohol, polysorbate-20, and glyceryl stearate are all examples of emulsifiers. Behentrimonium methosulfate is also a very popular emulsifying wax, but don’t let the classification of “wax” fool you; because emulsifying waxes link oil and water together, they are, for the most part, water-soluble.
Emollients
Emollients are ingredients that trap moisture and create a barrier for moisture loss. For conditioners, the presence of emollients are important for softening and conditioning. But they should appear a little farther down the list of ingredients. Oils and butters like jojoba oil, shea butter, olive oil, and coconut oil are emollients. (Silicones, such as dimethicone and amodimethicone, are categorized as emollients, too.)
If you’re looking for protection from outside moisture, oils, butters, and silicones are excellent at repelling water. And therein lies the problem: When they are relied upon heavily and allowed to form an impenetrable barrier to water, hair takes on product-induced, artificial low-porosity.
Humectants
Humectants are an important part of hydrating and moisturizing curl care. They literally attract water and delay evaporation. Glycerin is a common humectant that attracts and binds itself to water very easily. But it can also let go of that water if something comes along and steals it away. Urea, xanthan gum, sorbitol, hyaluronic acid, polysorbate, hydrolyzed proteins, and amino acids, among other things, all act as humectants. Plant-based humectant gels such as aloe vera gel, flaxseed gel, and even okra gel are examples of strong, film-forming “fixative” humectants — not only do they attract and hold water, they are water-soluble and water-reactivated. They add a layer of hold once they are dry.
Proteins
You’ll often hear the great protein vs. moisture debate and may feel pressured to add more protein or more moisture — or avoid them. Decades ago, whole protein strands were widely used in deep protein treatments for damaged hair to help temporarily repair the damaged site, like a scaffolding. If overused, those large, full proteins could stiffen the hair strand so much that it would feel brittle and rough to the touch and could even become so rigid that the hair could break.
You can still find large “whole” protein treatments on the market, but you’ll more often hear of curly girls DIYing their own protein treatments. Adding protein will “beef up” your curls to some extent, but the results are temporary, and DIYing protein treatments can go wrong more often than they go right. That’s why they are no longer used in salons except in extreme situations. (If you see the word protein without the words “hydrolyzed” or “amino acids,” it’s safe to assume you are dealing with a full/large protein that will definitely overprotenize your hair if overused.)
While there are benefits to adding proteins to your routine, most hair care products already have them. However, most of the proteins you see listed in the ingredients are actually there acting as humectants — rather, they are acting as moisturizers. What you will see listed are often hydrolyzed proteins (hydrolyzed wheat protein, hydrolyzed rice protein, hydrolyzed quinoa protein, etc.) and amino acids (the building blocks of proteins that have been chemically extracted from hydrolyzed proteins). Amino acids can be identified as ending in “-ine”; glycine, alanine, tyrosine, and serine are a few. Once proteins are hydrolyzed or amino acids are chemically extracted, they no longer have the same scaffolding effect and don’t retain their original structure. Instead, they behave like humectants and hold onto hydration.
Polyquats
Polyquats (like polyquaternium-10, or PQ-68, among others), are good for adhering to the hair and offering some kind of conditioning effect. They are copolymers and crosspolymers that are positively charged to attract to the hair. Some are easy to remove from the strands and some are more difficult — all in all not good or bad, just tricky. Polyquats can be really helpful in detangling, obtaining slip, or protecting your hair from humidity and UV rays. But because there are so many to keep track of, and many quickly build up on the hair, curl stylists generally recommend you keep polyquats to a minimum.
Extracts
Extracts are also tricky ingredients because it’s nearly impossible to tell if the extract in question is there purely for marketing purposes, or if it is more potent (like marshmallow root extract, which thickens and adds slip for detangling purposes).
Film formers, plasticizers, and polymers
One thing is for sure: To hold a style for any length of time, you will need a film former. All plant-based gels like aloe, flax, and even okra will leave behind a film that is water-soluble and easy to reactivate by simply misting with water. However, that same water reactivity can pose a problem if there will be water vapor present in the air, and it can lead to sticky and tacky strands.
If a humidity-protective, film-forming layer is not included in the product or used as an added layer, the water vapor in the air can rewet the humectants in the hair and the product will become sticky once again.
To prevent this, a plasticized polymer or cross-linking ingredient modification is helpful. These are recognizable as -phthalate (dimethyl phthalate), -acetate (polyvinyl acetate), -crosspolymer, or -copolymer (PVP/VA copolymer), etc. These kinds of ingredients are somewhat water-soluble to varying degrees (and some are not water-soluble at all), but that is what helps to protect them against rewetting and water reactivity. Remember, when you begin layering products to improve humidity resistance, at some point you will need stronger cleansers to remove them.
As you can see, product formulation is not an easy task. That’s why, to keep it simple, many curly girls and curl stylists have decided to stick to botanical, natural-based products with shorter, more simple to understand ingredients lists. But as we mentioned before, their “hold” factor and humidity protection is lower. That makes the health of the hair the primary focus because the healthier the hair, the better it will fare in all situations.
Bottom line: The most important aspect is how the product performs for you. Cosmetic chemistry is an amazing science and advancing every day. Sometimes a product “just works” — and without a cosmetic chemistry degree, it’s hard to know exactly why. If you’re lucky enough to find something successful for your hair in your climate, then use it.
There is no rhyme or reason to the polyquats’ number system. There are more than 40 and they are assigned
numbers in order of their registration, not in order of molecular weight or effectiveness.
What do Curl stylist panelists look for on product labels?
CAMILLE JANAE: I think one of my favorite ingredients is behentrimonium methosulfate. I like it in conditioners because it gives slip, which aids in detangling, but is water-soluble so it does not build up on the hair over time. I try to avoid various forms of silicone, typically listed as dimethicone. This ingredient allows a product to have slip and often shine as well, but it typically is not water-soluble. Over time, it can create a layer on the hair that prevents water from entering. I live in a fairly dry climate, so I haven’t found that my product choices are as heavily affected by the climate. However, if I know clients will be traveling to a more humid environment, I advise them to avoid styling products heavy in humectants, such as glycerin. Or they can use a product on top of it with fewer or no humectant ingredients to minimize the potential of becoming frizzy quickly as a result of the humectants pulling moisture from the atmosphere into their hair.
CARLEEN SANCHEZ: I guess I’m not that crazy of an ingredient person. I do the typical Curly Girl Method ones, avoiding sulfates and silicones. What I really look at is the quality of the guest’s hair health, as that tells me the bigger part of the story. Then I go through their product haul with a highlighter pen looking for ingredients that are easily recognizable as not CG-friendly. And avoiding fragrance or oils if they are high up on the list.
HEATHER BARCLAY: Because curls are drier and so much more delicate by nature, it becomes more about what not to use. Dehydration is always a huge problem in a curly girl world. So I avoid anything with the word “sodium,” “sulfate,” “lauryl,” or “lauroyl” on a shampoo label. This translates to me as harsh detergent. While this might be delightful to scrub my bathtub, it definitely is going to do negative things to the environment of the scalp/hair of curlies. Sulfates are derived from petroleum, a known irritant to the eyes, skin, mouth, and lungs. Over time, the scalp will take a beating. This is why so many scalp issues exist today. People focus solely on the fabric of the hair and ignore the scalp. If we nourish the environment the hair grows from, the hair becomes more lovely by collateral. Instead, we beat it up and ignore it. I typically seek a nonlathering cleanser that hydrates while it cleans. (Not to be confused with co-washing, which can clog pores and leave buildup resulting in hair loss.) I’m a firm believer in including a scalp ritual in a regimen.
WENDY FLORENCIO: This is my list. It’s not exhaustive, but it’s what I’m looking for in quality formulations. I’m in South Carolina, so these ingredients are based on a hot, humid environment:
• Aloe vera: an amazing humectant that locks in moisture, helps in curl formation and clumping, keeps the hair hydrated, has wonderful slip, relieves itchy scalp and dandruff, and is excellent at removing oils from your hair.
• Marshmallow root: has the most amazing slip, adds incredible shine, softens the hair, and helps relieve scalp irritations with its anti-inflammatory properties.
• Glycerin (for my local, humid weather): a wonderful humectant, it helps in curl definition by pulling moisture from the air into the hair.
• Cetearyl alcohol: a natural emollient, it smooths the hair, helping tame frizz and hold moisture inside the hair, adds slip for detangling, and softens the hair.
GINA MARIE RODRIGUEZ: My rule of thumb is to pay attention to the price point. If the product is in the $15 or less price range, I know the ingredients were likely diluted or compromised. Not all products that are high-dollar are “better quality,” but it is something to consider and a huge red flag for me. Generally speaking, I prioritize manufacturers who source organic ingredients because it tells me that the company’s values are close to my own, but it doesn’t mean that organic ingredients are necessarily better.
I avoid sodium laurel and sodium laureth sulfate in shampoos and I avoid oil and butter in the first five ingredients. I also generally avoid silicones — especially in the first five. I look for aloe vera or flaxseed in my hydrating gels and behentrimonium methosulfate and cetyl alcohol in conditioners. Glycerin is fine in a leave-in product (under another product without glycerin) or in a refreshing spray in moderate climates, but I don’t like it exposed to very arid or very humid conditions.
I don’t buy into hair “ingredient sensitivity.” I’ve had people tell me their hair is “sensitive” to aloe vera and will cause it to “flash dry/flash freeze,” yet, I have four different aloe vera-based gels in my salon and they all work slightly differently; one of them is bound to work just fine for their hair, proving that it isn’t the ingredients that matter most, but the formulation of those ingredients.
MICHELLE STIVER: Ingredients that I try to avoid are sulfates, silicones, parabens, methylchloroisothiazolinone and methylisothiazolinone (often called the Itchy M’s), polyquats, artificial fragrance, and heavy butters and oils. I have a sensitive scalp, so products with fewer ingredients tend to work better for keeping my scalp healthy and happy. I look for organic, cruelty-free, etc. I watch out for glycerin, as I don’t want it to be too high on the ingredient list if it’s damp or very dry outside. I take that into consideration primarily with my top coat or final product in my routine.
ATOYA BASS: I used to look at ingredients 10 years ago, but I don’t really do it much now. I’m not a fan of oils and butters. Depends on how far down in the ingredient list it is ... and the hair I’m doing. But I’m way more interested in performance than ingredients.
YASMINE YOUNG: I look for water, the universal solvent! It dissolves more substances than any other liquid and should be the foundational ingredient for any cleanser, conditioner, or styling product you’d want to use on your hair. Additionally, marshmallow root provides slip and definition, and it’s a natural emollient!
KRISTA LEAVITT: Mostly I look for aloe and flaxseed for my main things. I prefer organic or natural and unscented products, limiting the amount of chemical load on my body.
