I tried Clairol Balsam Color for my hair for two main reasons: One, I needed to cover my gray hair, and two, Clairol has always been a leader in hair coloring products.
I picked #611, Medium Brown for my color. My hair color was light brown with a lot of gray, so I knew it would be a bit darker when finished. And it stated 100% gray coverage.
The process was fairly easy: simple to mix and apply to dry hair. The problem was that it had a strong chemical smell. Then I had to sit around with this smelly stuff on my head for 25 minutes. When it was time to rinse it out, it seemed to take an extremely long time for the water to “run clear”, as they say, showing it was safe to dry it.
They include no conditioner, as other products do, so my hair was difficult to comb out, until I added some of my own conditioner to my hair.
When finally done, my hair was a very dark brown, and still smelled of the chemicals. There were also places where some of the gray still showed, and I don’t mean at the temples or hairline, but through the thicker hair.
All in all, I was disappointed in the performance of this product, and I let Clairol know about it.

Rating: 8