‘I’m a Hair-Care Brand Founder, and This Common Routine Mistake Could Be Contributing to Hair Loss’

We’ve reached the golden age of hair growth products. In the past few years, a category that once only offered clinical (and pretty not-cute and nasty-smelling) solutions that were hidden away because we were embarrassed to show them off in our showers has expanded beyond our wildest dreams to include luxurious formulas that actually work. And the health of our hair is better for it. One of the brands leading the charge is Virtue Labs, which launched in 2015 and uses a revolutionary ingredient—a bio-engineered form of keratin that was originally discovered for its wound-healing abilities—to stave off hair loss.

In the latest episode of Well+Good’s beauty podcast, Routine Rundown, the brand’s founder and CEO, Melisse Shaban, came on to talk all things hair loss, and explain just how much (and why) the industry has changed.

Listen to the conversation here: 

She shared a whole lot of interesting tidbits, but one of the biggest takeaways is that scalp health is critical to hair health—which means that in addition to using the right products (like Virtue Labs’ Flourish Density Booster) to stave off shedding, you also need to properly keep up with your routine. And that, says Shaban, all starts with the way you wash your hair.

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“We went through this trend where we were all doing the ‘unwash’ thing and using dry shampoo, and people were washing their hair once a week or once every two weeks,” says Shaban. “But you have a lot of oils in your scalp, so that’s like not washing your face and then putting a moisturizer on. We put a lot of gunky products in our hair—all those pastes and sprays—and that grit is sitting on the scalp.”

Time and time again, experts have told us that all of that buildup creates a less-than-ideal environment for hair growth—and can ultimately contribute to thinning. “I know a lot of people who are losing their hair don’t want to wash it a lot because they think it weighs it down, but it’s actually healthy for the scalp,” says Shaban, who recommends washing regularly to get rid of all that gunk and stave off shedding. “Then, you can use conditioner from the midshaft down—just don’t use it on the root, because you don’t really need it there and that does tend to weigh the hair down.”

Thankfully, with the help of anti-thinning shampoos and conditioners—like the ones in the Virtue Labs Flourish Collection—these regular washes can serve double duty in cleansing your hair and boosting its density. “The alpha keratin is actually stimulating hair growth,” says Shaban.

Shop the products below, and listen to our full conversation on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your Podcasts.