For my family when it comes to hair car products in our sometimes a beauty product becomes part of my family story without me eve, realizing it. One of those products is Alberto VO5 Strawberries & Cream Conditioner and there Shampoo.
And before I get too far into this review, let me confess something: I picked up the wrong bottle. I thought I had the shampoo. I didn’t. I have the Alberto VO5 Strawberries & Cream Conditioner.
Which means I have to go back to the store and buy the shampoo because, apparently, everyone in my house has decided that shampoo is something that mysteriously disappears while conditioner sits there wondering what happened.
I don’t know what people are doing with all my shampoo! But that’s okay because it gives me an excuse to make another trip to the store and get the matching Strawberries & Cream shampoo.
And I’m going to need it. Because this isn’t just any conditioner to me. I’ve used VO5 products since I was a little girl. I remember the old VO5 shampoo from years ago. In my memory, that shampoo was a gold color.
VO5 was just one of those brands that seemed like it had always been around. Then Suzanne got older. And Suzanne had hair. A LOT of hair. Thick hair that was hard to get a brush through at times and man on man it would tangle.
Her hair was long for years, and it tangled terribly. If you’ve ever tried to brush through a little girl’s long, tangled hair, you already know that getting ready for the day can turn into a full-scale negotiation.
But there was something else about Suzanne that mattered when it came to this particular shampoo. Pink was Suzanne’s favorite color. Everybody knew it. So when I found Strawberries & Cream and it was that pretty pink color, I knew exactly what I was going to do.
If pink shampoo would convince Suzanne to wash her hair, then I was perfectly happy to buy the pink shampoo and conditioner. Whatever works, right? Sometimes parenting isn’t about winning an argument. Sometimes it’s about finding the right color bottle. And if that bottle happens to smell like strawberries and cream, even better.
Suzanne absolutely loved the way Strawberries & Cream smelled. I also like the scent which isn’t overpowering. She also loved what it did for her hair. Her hair would tangle so badly, and having something that helped make it softer and easier to manage was a big deal.
For the longest time, she wore her hair long. Eventually, I bobbed it shorter because it made things a whole lot easier to maintain. But those memories of washing her hair, working through the tangles and trying to make the whole process a little less of a battle stayed with me.
And that’s why I still reach for Strawberries & Cream Conditioner today. Suzanne has been gone for so many years now that Charlie jokes it was “since the dinosaurs roamed the face of the earth.” That’s Charlie.
But sometimes something as simple as a scent or a bottle on a bathroom shelf can bring a person right back into your thoughts. For me, Strawberries & Cream does that. The bottle I have today is the Alberto VO5 Strawberries & Cream Conditioner, not the shampoo.
VO5 describes this line as being made with its Power of Five vitamins and natural oils. Current product information lists vitamin C, vitamin B5, vitamin E, biotin and vitamin B3, along with oils including sunflower, mango, sweet almond, chamomile and rosemary.
The current formula is also described as helping leave hair soft, smooth and manageable, which is exactly the kind of thing I look for in a conditioner. And that makes sense considering why I originally loved this product for Suzanne. Soft and manageable hair mattered when you were dealing with those tangles.
I know somebody is probably going to look at Strawberries & Cream and think, “That’s a woman’s conditioner.” Well… Tell that to David and Charlie. They will use it too and Bradley has as well.
In our house, we don’t really worry about whether something is labeled for men or women if it works and everybody likes it. If you like the smell, use it. If it makes your hair feel good, use it. If it happens to be pink, that’s okay too.
Although I have a feeling Charlie may have a completely different opinion about the pink bottle than Suzanne did but then again he may not because pink is also one of his favorite colors.
One of the things I love about VO5 is you don’t necessarily have to hunt down some specialty beauty store to find it. I can find VO5 at places like Walmart and grocery and drug stores, and current listings also show the Strawberries & Cream conditioner at Dollar Tree as well as Amazon.
And you know where I’m probably going to buy my next bottle? Dollar Tree. Even though the store is more than a $1 now if I can get the conditioner there, that’s probably where I’m going to look for the shampoo too. Because I like a good bargain and even at there prices its cheaper than other stores, and I’m not ashamed to say it.
I may have picked up the wrong bottle for tonight’s review, but I don’t think I picked the wrong product. I picked up a bottle of Alberto VO5 Strawberries & Cream Conditioner. And that little bottle carries a whole lot of history for me.
It reminds me of being a little girl and using VO5 myself. It reminds me of Suzanne. It reminds me of her long hair, those impossible tangles and the little tricks a mother will use to convince her daughter to wash her hair.
And yes, it reminds me that pink really can make a difference when you’re trying to win a battle with a child. Suzanne loved pink. She loved the smell of Strawberries & Cream. She loved how soft it made her hair. And all these years later, I still love it too.
Now I just need to figure out where everybody keeps putting my shampoo. Because apparently, I have plenty of conditioner… but no shampoo. So this review gets 5 out of 5 hearts from me — with one little note:
I need to go buy the shampoo. And when I do, you’ll be getting a second review. Because around here, apparently, shampoo and conditioner cannot be trusted to stay together. Is it this way in your home as well?
Grateful, Thankful, and Blessed.
Thank you,
Glenda, Charlie and David Cates