The rumors of unsafe levels of formaldehyde have been around for a couple years. Believe me, I have done my homework. I wouldn't want to endanger my clients, myself, or my family. I have read many complaints about the product, but their description of what was happening in their salons was not adding up because I wasn't experiencing anything like that in my salon. So I dug deep and looked up the testing results for myself.
There is a group trying to recruit stylist to get involved in a lawsuit against Brazilian Blowout. They have sent me letters asking me to be listing in the suit as well. But the complaints were saying that the fumes were overwhelming in the salon and people were having to leave because they couldn't breathe and stylists noses were bleeding, etc. That has not been my experience. Nor have any of my clients ever complained of experiencing problems like that.
In my research I have found some interesting facts. Originally, a salon in Oregon filed a complaint and OSHA came out to their salon and tested the product there. It was found to have very high levels of formaldehyde. This information went out in the press and Brazilian Blowout sued OSHA stating that they did not follow proper procedure by only testing products in that salon. They were concerned that the salon could have been putting themselves in a position to sue Brazilian Blowout. Brazilian Blowout won the suit and OSHA had to redo the test using samples from many salons. There is formaldehyde released from the Brazilian Blowout, and according to OSHA's findings some of the samples out of the 105 they tested were harmful. The majority tested well below OSHA's safety standards. It is equivalent to the amount of formaldehyde exposure we get from living in a new home. I have read OSHA's report in its entirety and there were a couple phrases that stood out to me.
The 8-hour average exposures ranged from a low of 0.006 parts per million
(ppm) to 0.33 ppm. These compare to a permissible exposure limit of 0.75 ppm. Although it
was not exceeded for any of these stylists, it should be noted that multiple treatments would
increase the daily average significantly.
Again, using Oregon OSHA’s results for reference, it appears unlikely that the mandatory shortterm levels were exceeded.
I have posted some findings on my web site. Brazilian Blowout's website also has press releases about the topic.
Here are some links you may be interested in.
http://www.fox19.com/story/13492093/brazilian-blowout-is-it-safe (see the scientist's remarks at the end of this article)
http://www.salon360.org/brazilian_blowout/breaking_news
http://www.brazilianblowout.com/fda
Brazilian Blowout IS in trouble with OSHA because they printed "Formaldehyde Free" on their product and did not list formaldehyde on their material safety data sheet. They should have warned stylist that there was formaldehyde in their product.
There is a new product called the Brazilian Blowout Zero which has no formaldehyde at all. I haven't tried it as of yet, but I hope to soon.
