Brazilian Keratin Treatment/Relaxer
At Le Collage Salon, we strive to provide our clients with the highest quality service and to use products that are safe and effective. There are new products and services that are being used and offered in salons under the name of Brazilian hair treatments/relaxers or Keratin treatments/relaxers. These services have become very popular and claim to leave the hair soft, shiny, non-frizzy and much more manageable. We have chosen not to provide these services to our clients.
Le Collage has been providing services to our clients for over 30 years. We take pride in the services we offer and the safety and reliability of the products we use. We do extensive research on all of the products we use in the salon. We have researched the Brazilian/Keratin treatments and have found that they contain formaldehyde or encapsulated aldehyde. Many of these products claim to be formaldehyde or chemical free. Keratin alone will NOT relax or straighten hair. A chemical is required to change the structure of hair. The Brazilian/Keratin straighteners are applied to the hair and heated with a flat iron, vaporizing the formaldehyde or other chemical and releasing it into the air. According to the PBA (Professional Beauty Association), both stylists and clients can be exposed to levels of formaldehyde greater than 0.75 ppm (the OSHA limit is 0.75 ppm over an 8 hr. exposure period) by inhaling these vapors. Formaldehyde is a suspected carcinogen and exposure to these chemicals can be highly irritating, potentially causing severe allergic reactions of the skin, eyes and respiratory tract. In our opinion, the only safe way to do these services would be for the stylist and all clients and staff in the environment to wear canister gas masks, which is not feasible.
Le Collage Salon will not provide these services to our clients. In our opinion , the health risks are too great. In today's world, where being "green" has become a focus, we cannot justify performing this process, regardless of the profitability it would provide us. There are other options that we can suggest and we would be more than happy to consult with you regarding them.
|
