Apparently, Everyone's Going Back to Drugstore Shampoo in 2025
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Courtesy of Kara Nesvig
A few months ago, I found myself in the shampoo aisle at Target. This is not an area of the store I typically frequent, given that I’m a beauty writer and get to stock my shower with all kinds of fancy products for free. But my wavy, highlighted hair wasn’t feeling or looking right. It was limp and flat. It felt gummy and sticky, not soft and touchable. So, on a whim, I tossed an old favorite into my cart: Herbal Essences Smoothing Shampoo. You know, the one with the rose on the bottle that you probably used back in the ‘90s. After luxuriating in its deliciously familiar floral scent and rich bubbles, I was shocked that my hair air dried into voluminous, shiny waves. Was my secret to happier hair seriously in a $5 bottle of shampoo this entire time?
Turns out I’m not alone in this experience. Though it’s become de rigueur for beauty enthusiasts to use salon and luxury shampoo formulas exclusively, it seems the tides are turning—and all roads lead to our local big-box stores. For a while now, TikTok users have been rediscovering the staple drugstore shampoos they long ago traded for higher-end and “clean” formulas. And like me, they’re loving the results, which are compelling: Their hair seems long, luscious, shiny, and bouncy—shampoo commercial-ready. The brands I’ve seen most on TikTok are Pantene and Dove, though L’Oréal Paris has made a few cameos, too. It’s enough anecdotal evidence to make you want to toss your fancy formulas to the side in favor of a neon-green bottle of Garnier Fructis.
Even Alix Earle, the reigning queen of Gen Z TikTok, has gotten on board. “How come when I come home and use my expired Pantene shampoo and conditioner, my hair feels softer than it’s ever felt?” she asked in a recent video featuring old photos of herself from high school when she had hip-length blonde hair that she attributes to her faithful use of Pantene. “Is it a myth that it’s bad for you or what?” Other TikTokers have shared similar before-and-after videos explaining why they’re back on the drugstore shampoo train.
tiktok drugstore shampoo herbal essences
Why did so many of us stop shopping for hair care at the drugstore in the first place? Most prominently, sulfates—a type of surfactant, the thing that creates a bubbly lather—and silicones—a type of polymer that creates a shiny, smooth film on hair—have gotten a bad rap due mostly to the clean beauty movement, which really took off in the early 2010s and peaked nearly a decade later. The clean movement’s initial raison d’être was to help people distance themselves from ingredients that could be harmful to their health, but myths that silicone and sulfates can cause cancer and other health risks have long been debunked, per previous Allure reporting.
There are other reasons people have avoided these ingredients; when used too frequently, silicones can lead to build-up on the scalp, resulting in heavy, limp hair. Sulfates can be drying and strip hair color; they can also be irritating for certain scalp types.
In response to the clean movement’s rise, many hair care brands, especially mid-range and luxury brands, removed silicones and certain sulfates—particularly sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) and sodium laureth sulfate (SLES)—from their formulas throughout the 2010s and haven’t looked back. (Some brands replaced sulfates with more “natural” cleansers derived from ingredients like coconut oil, for example.) A wave of drugstore brands eventually followed suit; for example, Pantene’s sulfate-free Gold Series line and my own beloved Herbal Essences, which proudly proclaims to be silicone-free.
Which leads us to the big question: Is there really a difference between drugstore shampoo and mid-range to luxury shampoo formulas? The short answer to that is yeah, but they still do the same thing.
According to AJ Addae, a cosmetic chemist and the CEO of Sula Labs, shampoo is a rather simple product to formulate at any price point because it only has one job, which is to cleanse. High-end and other sulfate-free shampoos commonly rely on those coconut oil derivatives for their cleansing agents—Addae points to cocoamidopropyl betaine and sodium cocoyl isethionate specifically. But luxury shampoos also tend to utilize “sensory elements like foam boosters, fragrance, or delivery of active ingredients” that can drive up the price point.
Meanwhile, “lower-priced shampoos tend to either skip on fancy actives or utilize surfactants like sulfates, which are both a surfactant and a foam booster, to save on costs,” Addae says. At any price point, the surfactants are all doing the same job at the end of the day: “binding to both oil and water and rinsing dirt down the drain.”
Cosmetic chemist Perry Romanowski says some of the “instant results” TikTokers are experiencing from their shampoo can be chalked up to good old research and development, including lots of testing. “[Drugstore shampoo companies] are trying to make a product that is appealing to the greatest number of consumers,” he says. “This requires them to continually test their products with consumer groups." In short, big-box brands are optimizing their formulas for the utmost performance based on what their product testers consider to be the best instant result. It makes sense, then, that these brands would be prioritizing shampoo formulas that provide a deeper clean that eliminates buildup—the cause of plenty of people's day-to-day hair woes.
So if your hair hasn’t been looking its best recently, does that mean it’s time to throw out your fancy stuff and switch to a cheaper shampoo? Well, that depends. You may just be using the wrong shampoo for your hair’s specific needs; my hair likely wound up feeling gummy and flat because I was using too many hydrating shampoos, which weren’t giving me the deep-cleansing benefits of a sudsier shampoo—hence why I experienced such a “Wow!” moment with the Herbal Essences. (And not the kind from those ‘90s commercials.) If your hair is feeling heavy and gummy like mine was, chances are you just need to use a clarifying shampoo or scalp scrub once in a while to prevent buildup.
As for me, I haven’t fully ditched all my expensive shampoo—now I alternate with a bond-building formula from Redken when I’m planning to heat style, and I’ll probably always prefer a high-end conditioner, especially Crown Affair’s Ritual Conditioner. But my sweet pink Herbal Essences has earned a permanent spot in my shower, just like it did circa 1999.
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Originally Appeared on Allure
