Hair is a very personal thing. Its more of a minefield buying hair care products than skincare products. Why? Because hair comes in different textures, forms, lengths, conditions and people do various things to it to change the structure and look of it. As someone who has afro Caribbean hair, I’ve always grown up to think I can’t grab any shampoo and conditioner on the shelf to use. And that’s not wrong! Thankfully the market now is much more accommodating to this type of hair with much more products available to buy than 5, 10, 15 years ago. I recently tried Superdrug’s Coconut Oil Clarifying Shampoo. But did I like it?
Who is this shampoo for?
Superdrug’s Coconut Oil Clarifying Shampoo comes from a range of products designed for tight textured, coily and curly hair types. So that can include my hair type, right up to someone with bouncy, loose curls. There isn’t much more information to say what this shampoo will do to the hair, except it shouldn’t strip the hair but effectively cleanse it. With the word ‘clarifying’ in its name I would assume it should focus on making sure the scalp and hair is clean and remove any residue or build up or products possibly used on it.
Cost
This costs £5.00 for 400ml, but regularly is on some form of offer. I bought this when it was 3 for 2, which is the promotion it tends to be on most of the time. For anyone that buys products from black hair care ranges, you will know that they’re a lot more expensive than £5.00. Rrp of shampoos for my type of hair, when not on any discount or promotion, can be around £9.00 plus mark.
Packaging
This shampoo comes in a standard, flip top plastic bottle. It looks like it’s a part of an own brand of Superdrug, and doesn’t look massively eye catching, but on a practical level does the job. What IS important is on the label it shows a basic illustration of what your hair pattern should look like to use this, which is very helpful.
Fragrance
This has a sort of coconut, tropical smell to it but it’s not a natural one. Quite synthetic, not awful, but for me not massively enjoyable. It’s fine, not great and thankfully not too strong.
Look & consistency
Liquid but not too loose. This looks cloudy in appearance e.g not transparent, with a shine. Easy to pour and use as it’s not too thick. Very much like most shampoos when it comes to consistency.
In use
With most shampoos they don’t really start taking to my hair until wash number 2. Wash one, it doesn’t foam up too much, my hair resists being wet and lathered! By wash two, the foam is coming through the hair and I can get on with washing it. I wash my hair at least a good 3 to 4 times. Excessive? Not really. With the amount of hair I have, it’s thickness and the fact my type of hair doesn’t get washed every day, I need to be thorough!
The fragrance I didn’t love and I didn’t hate it. It was ok. But I’ve personally smelt better.
I found my hair felt clean while washing it, but got tangled up quite easily. And I didn’t get that nice, clean feel to it. Clean? Yes. But something about my hair didn’t have that lovely feel to it. Hair and scalp were clean, but after finishing what felt like a hundred washes, it just lacked softness. And I really felt I needed to throw on conditioner to make it feel moisturised.
Would I buy this again?
No. And the reason for this is it wasn’t moisturising or nourishing enough for my hair. It did the basic job. But for someone who has hair in twists for a good number of weeks, I need every wash to feel moisturising and this didn’t. I wanted to give this a go to see what it was like and I did. But I’m going back to Black Castor Shampoo as this gave my hair everything it needed.
