While going to salons is a welcome idea for days when you are feeling lazy or for general pampering… It may not be the best idea for your natural hair or your hair in general.

This of course excludes actual licensed cosmetologist… Specifically a trichologist, and if you go to one salonist the entirety of your hair journey to a hairdresser who has enough time for you, and knows what they are doing. Please consider all those factors before we break this down.

I spent the better part of last year and this year on the salon chair because I was busy and traveled quite a bit in my first half of the year…and as such hair was the last thing on my mind. So I came up with a few reasons why…based on my experience, the salon may not be the best place for your hair. Just compare this with your salon experience.

1. They unnecessarily overdetangle your hair.

Remember thinking… “aki si they have combed my hair alot” as you sat in your salon chair… You were probably right. Before washing your hair… (if they prepoo)… After rinsing the conditioner off…. After the deep conditioning process /treatment… Before they blow dry your hair… Those, are already three times more than necessary. Keep in mind kinky hair doesn’t have detangle memory… It coils right up back to original position.

2. Wash your hair as one big lump.

After detangling your hair… They go right back and wash your whole head of hair and sometimes they scratch your scalp with their nails to give you a thorough wash.. Which gets your hair as tangled as it was if not more tangled than before.

3. Barely have time to go through your hair… Perhaps in a hurry.

I have to highlight this even though I understand it 100%…for some reason the hairdressers in salons that I have visited always seem to be in a hurry to get done with you. On one occasion, in a high end salon that naturals visit here in Nairobi, after what seemed like an eternity of detangling my hair in sections as I had requested, a hairdresser told me that I was being accorded treatment that was meant for children. I can only imagine what adult treatment looks like. While taking shorter time is always a plus… Sometimes it costs you quality service like in my case, I happen to be very tender headed… So any rough handling of my scalp amounts to a headache.

4. Quality control

I have in the past rubbed hairdressers the wrong way by asking them to lower the heat on the devices they used on my styling. They all in general complained that my hair would take too long to straighten. While this doesn’t go for all salons, it’s really hard on general to be in control of some of the styling tools that they use on your hair in terms of temperature or quality or even the hairdressers training (especially this… Because most aren’t familiar with kinkier textures.)

I could talk about costs, but I feel like I don’t have sufficient knowledge to challenge price points in relation to the big business picture.

Bearing the above points in mind though, I also want to state that, salons are not necessarily a negative space especially considering that you can get professional hairdressers who have great advice in there. However, having knowledge on good hair practices and understanding your hair can and will always come in handy when dealing with salon situations. Remember you can only guarantee what you know.

In Friday’s post… I share with you ways you can make your salon experience more pleasant…

Until then, let me know how your salon experience has been in the comment dialog box below.

Love and love,

Nyake.