Ridiculous red

In a hurry, I picked up a shampoo that I would not usually buy: John Frieda's Radiant Red. It apparently "locks in rich red tones and illuminates daring highlights". A little bath time reading lead me to realise that this is the most unconvincing product I've seen since intelligent foundation.

Basically, the shampoo does not add or deposit colour, rather it claims to "remove dulling residue while prolonging the intensity of your stunning red colour." Please explain to me how the residue that dulls red hair differs from the residue that dulls any other colour of hair? Do its sister products "Brilliant Brunette" and "Sheer Blonde" not remove residue?

When they say "Developed exclusively for redheads", do they mean that they added a different food colouring to the same basic ingredients that they also use to make the shampoos formulated for non-redheads? Seeing that my shampoo is a shocking day-glow red certainly reassures me that I've bought the right product.

But John and all his pals are one step ahead of me. Just to reassure me that they really are doing all that can for my fiery tones, they've added extracts of pomegranate and plum - these fruits which are typically red in appearance must be really helpful in a shampoo that doesn't deposit colour.

Whilst I don't pretend to be an expert on beauty or chemistry, I simply can't see a way that this could be anything more than a marketing gimmick. I doubt there are any differences between the functionality of the shampoos targeted at redheads, and those targetted at blondes and brunettes.

Feel free to prove me wrong and I'll personally write Mr Frieda a heartfelt apology.

3 Comments

How bizarre. Perhaps us Oxfordians are obsessed with social class.

Posted by Sha on Tuesday 5th December, 2006 at 00:35

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