Another look at a top selling Amazon.com beauty product…
Moroccan Oil Hair Treatment has been in the top 100 Amazon.com beauty products for almost two years! (It’s currently ranked as the 17th best seller.) It’s obvious that people really love this product; let’s look at the label to see exactly what it is they like so much. (Hint: it doesn’t actually have anything to do with Morocco.)
Moroccan Oil Hair Treatment ingredients
Cyclopentasiloxane, Dimethicone, Cyclomethicone
These three silicones are what make this product work (as opposed to the small amount of argan oil that it contains.) The “cyclo” ‘cones are volatile which means they evaporate. They are used as a carrier for dimethicone which is what is really smoothing and conditioning your hair. The cyclo’s distribute easily through your hair, depositing a thin coating of dimethicone. Then *poof* they disappear. There are many other hair treatments that use similar ingredients so you can find cheaper products that do the same thing as Moroccan Oil.
Butylphenyl Methyl Propional
This is a little sneaky: this ingredient is really the primary fragrance in the product. By listing this ingredient by its chemical name and by listing a “fragrance supplement” lower in the ingredients (see below) I guess it makes this product look like its fragrance free. I’m not really sure why they would list it this way.
Argania Spinoza Kernel Oil (Aragan Oil)
This is the “magic” ingredient that this product is famous for (and named after) but it’s used at very low levels.
Linseed (Linum Usitatissimum) Extract
I’m not sure why they added this additional extract. It won’t add any benefit at low levels.
Fragrance Supplement
Again with the sneakiness.
D & C Yellow 11, D & C Red 17
These dyes are added to give the product a golden color so it looks more like “real” Argan oil. (The silicones which make up the bulk of the product have no color.)
Coumarin, Benzyl Benzoate, Alpha-Isomethyl Ionone
These chemicals are listed because they are known allergens that are contained in the fragrance.
If you’d like to buy Moroccan Oil Hair Treatment 
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So what are the other hair treatments that use similar ingredients but are cheaper? Inquiring minds want to know!
Here’s one example: NEXXUS Frizz Defy Leave-In Oil Shine Treatment
There’s a knock-off version you can get at Sally Beauty for a lot cheaper. Personally, I can’t use any hair treatment product that have the -cones in it. It would rub off to my face and voila, I would have zits around the cheeks and hair line.
@Dao: There’s hope for you! The silicones in these kinds of products shouldn’t cause you any zit problems. Cyclomethicone evaporates and dimethicone has a very low comedogenicity rating. That means it won’t cause acne. There may have been other ingredients in the specific products you tried caused you to break out.
I recently tried the Got2b Oil-licious and the first four ingredients are the same so I suppose it would work the same way.
Cyclopentasiloxane, dimethiconol, dimethicone, Argania Spinosa kernel oil, Sclerocarya bierra seed oil, Vitis vinifera (grape) seed oil, Helianthus annuus (sungflower seed oil), beta-carotene, ethylhexil, methoxycinnamate, Fragrance.
Oh, neat! My hubby got this for me for Christmas (per my request) because I wanted to try it, and while I loved it I couldn’t justify spending $30 (New Zealand) for the smallest bottle and $60 for the bigger one with the pump. So I looked into some organic argan oil and was able to purchase a MUCH bigger bottle for only $20. The only problem (which isn’t actually a problem) is that it’s 100% argan oil and doesn’t smell pretty like the “Moroccan Oil” brand stuff. Argan oil has a funny smell but it still works just as well (if not better) than the Moroccan Oil. Thanks for an interesting post!
Damn. I went silicone-free with my shampoo and go figure, I’ve been putting this stuff in my hair (the moroccan oil treatment) for months now and it’s just putting silicone back into my hair! I don’t use a lot at once though so maybe it’s okay and definitely not every day…. but I have been trying to go all natural so maybe I should just buy some coconut oil and some argan oil by themselves and apply to my hair a couple of times a week instead of using this. I do enjoy the “soft” effect the “moroccan” oil treatment gives my hair and it does smell quite nice, but is it really safe to use in my hair? @___@;
Wouldn’t 100% pure argan oil work the best? It is available through different brands.
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