Experts reveal the impact of using fewer products during the isolation period

Hair Care

One of the key pieces of advice to alleviate the spread of COVID-19 is to ensure you are washing your hands more frequently, but there are little rules around not washing your hair whilst in isolation. Thousands of people have been taking to social media declaring that they are giving their hair a rest of frequent washing.

Being in isolation could have one or two benefits on our hair health then, with new research showing that we are likely to use up to two thirds less hair products during isolation, which experts claim will benefit the environment, our health and our bank balances.

The data

On average, people wash their hair 2 to 3 times a week. Hair experts reportedly claim that we need around 15-20ml of shampoo to wash hair effectively – that’s the same as 3 full teaspoons. Most bottles of shampoo are on average 300ml bottle, meaning one bottle should last you around 5 or 6 weeks. If we are replacing this shampoo every six weeks, that works out as around 9 bottles of shampoo a year.

A good quality shampoo of this size will cost around £5 on average – which works out as at least £45 a year spent on shampoo alone. In isolation, if we are cutting down to washing our hair just once a week, a bottle should last 20 weeks, cutting our yearly spend down to just £15 on 3 bottles of shampoo, saving us £30 a year.

Longer hair will mean conditioner gets used faster – using 20ml of conditioner to soften those long locks, which is around 4 full teaspoons, and will last just 5 weeks in total. This means you’ll need around 10 bottles in a year, costing over £50 for conditioner!

Cutting down to conditioning your hair once a week means that a 300ml standard size of conditioner will last around 15 weeks, or just under four months. This means just three and a half bottles should do you for the year, setting you back around £17.50 – a £32.50 saving within the year.

Dr Rekha Tailor of www.healthandaesthetics.co.uk specialises in skincare and comments on the importance of cutting down on the health of our scalp,

“Hair is made of dead skin cells which form keratin, but it doesn’t need as much washing as the rest of our skin. Just as everyone’s hair is slightly different in type, colour and texture, everyone’s hair needs washing at slightly different frequencies. Washing hair too often for any hair can be drying though, especially for people with grey or coloured hair as this tends to be drier.

“By washing hair less frequency you can help to prevent the skin on your scalp drying out and retain moisture. Shampoo is designed to clean the scalp and remove excess oil but if it’s overused it can damage both. It strips the oils the scalp produces and can leave both dry and the skin on the head itchy and flaky.”

Tony Jones, General Manager at Harvey Water Softeners pointed out that hard water in your home combined with use of products may be contributing skin conditions,

“Those who live in areas with particularly hard water may find that this is even more severe, with research showing that washing in hard water damages our protective barrier of our skin, and can lead to skin conditions such as dryness and eczema – which in turn may cause scalp problems such as dandruff if we are washing frequently.”

Residents of the UK worried about their own water supply can check the hard water levels in their area here.

Join over 200,000 of our happy customers

youtube thumbnail

Winchester, Hampshire

youtube thumbnail

Eastbury, Berkshire

youtube thumbnail

Camberley, Surrey

youtube thumbnail

Southampton, Hampshire