Is Biolustre a bogus buy?

Sarah C’s saga: I emailed you earlier about a product called Biolustre, I would like to know what it really does. I found a list of the ingredients and directions for use (from the Long Hair Community forums).

The Left Brain’s side of the story:

In case everyone’s not familiar with Biolustre, it’s belongs to the Jhirmack division of the Playtex company. (Yes, they make more than just bras and panties.) Here’s the info that Sarah found:

Ingredients: Water, Tert-buryl Acrylate, Methacrylic Acid, Ethylacrylate Copolymer, Hydrolozed Wheat Protein, Aminomethyl Propanol, Dimethicone Copolyol, Propylene Glycol, Diazolidanyl Urea, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, Fragrance, Hydroxyethyl Cellulose Sodium Acetate

Directions: Apply liberally to clean dry hair from root to end. Dry with blow dryer until product feels hard on hair. (DO NOT COMB THROUGH). Wash out completely. Style as normal. Enjoy truly healthy, youthful hair.

To be honest, this product is a mystery to me. The first several ingredients are basically hair spray resins. If you put this product on your hair and dry it, I’d expect it to feel very much like a heavy hair spray. But if you wash your hair (like washing a hair spray out) there isn’t much left behind. So it appears to be more of a styling product than it does a conditioner. Weird.

Their claims don’t really make sense to me either. You can read them for yourself on the Biolustre website, but I’ll summarize a few here for your edification and entertainment.

1. Bioluster is the only proven hair repair product…which repairs damaged hair and does it instantly.

It works instantly: yet you have to put it on and then blow dry your hair completely dry. THEN you have to wash it out completely. Then you still have to dry and style your hair! I don’t know about you, but their version of “instantly” would take me about 20 extra minutes!

2. It will actually lay down additional layers of keratin and make the hair thicker.

If the ingredient list is correct, there is no keratin in the formula. There’s wheat protein, but no keratin. So I’d love to know how it lays down more keratin when there IS NONE in the product.

3. Bioluster strengthens hair and increases the tensile strength up to 300%. This allow a no breakage guarantee if used before a Japanese straightening treatment.

Besides the obvious redundancy in this claim, I’m baffled by the “no breakage guarantee.” If I buy a bottle of Biolustre and use it at home and then go to a salon for a Japanese straightening treatment they guarantee I won’t have any breakage? And if I do, what happens? Do they refund the $500 I spent on the Japanese treatment? Or do they just send me a coupon for another bottle of Biolustre? The whole thing doesn’t seem very well thought out to me.

Well, you get the idea. I’m not impressed by this product. There are other options for straightening hair. Have any of our loyal Beauty Brainiacs tried it?