You paid for colour and it looked expensive for about three weeks. Now it looks flat. The roots are still fine, you are not due back for another month, and rebooking colour early is a lot of money to fix something that is not really wrong yet.
Two separate things cause that. Pigment washes out a little with every shampoo, and the surface of the hair roughens with heat and time so light stops bouncing off it. Dull colour is usually as much a shine problem as a pigment one, and it gets misdiagnosed constantly.
The Colour Vibrancy Booster works on the second half of that. It conditions and smooths so the colour you already have reads rich again and holds its tone longer. $50 for 45 minutes. It is maintenance between colour appointments, not a colour service.
What it does — and what it is not.
Read this part before booking, because the name promises more than the service does and we would rather you knew now than in the chair.
It is not a toner and not a colour. It does not deposit pigment and it does not lift any out. It will not take brassy blonde to ash, it will not go a shade darker, and it will not cover a grey root. Nothing about your shade changes.
What it does is put condition and shine back into hair gone dull, and smooth the surface so the pigment still in there washes out more slowly. The colour looks like itself again because light is reflecting off it properly.
If the tone has genuinely turned or the roots have grown out, that is a colour appointment and not this. Root touch-up is from $70, full colour from $100, colour correction from $100. If it is only the painted ends of a balayage that have gone flat, say so when you call — sometimes the answer is a toner with your colourist instead.
Where it fits in your colour calendar.
Say you had balayage. Three hours, from $180, and you are back in three to four months. The middle of that stretch is where this earns its keep.
Weeks one to four, the colour looks like the thing you paid for. Weeks five to eight is when it goes flat, and that is the window for a $50 booster rather than rebooking three hours of colour early. Week ten onwards, no treatment substitutes for colour.
It also sits neatly on top of a root touch-up on the same day: roots done at the top, booster through the length, and the whole head matches instead of fresh colour against tired ends. Add it when you book that appointment, because it is still its own 45 minutes.
Worth knowing what fades colour in the first place: very hot showers, washing daily, chlorine, strong summer sun, and a flat iron over the same section every morning. Change one or two and both your colour and this treatment last noticeably longer.
What actually happens in the chair.
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01
Your artist reads the colour first
There is a difference between colour that has faded and colour that has turned. Faded is what this helps. Turned needs pigment, which means your colourist. You get told which one you have.
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02
Washed to clear build-up
Product residue dulls colour by itself, and a fair amount of what people diagnose as fade is build-up sitting on top of perfectly good colour.
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03
Applied through the coloured lengths
Worked through the mid-lengths and ends where fade shows first, then processed with heat for the bulk of the 45 minutes.
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04
Rinsed, dried, and told where you are
You leave seeing the shine back, and with a straight answer on how much colour life is left and roughly when to book the real appointment.
Questions we get asked.
How much is a colour refresh in Winnipeg?
The Colour Vibrancy Booster is $50 and takes 45 minutes start to finish. That is the treatment by itself. Booked onto a colour appointment the same day, it is added to that price and you get the total before any work starts.
Will it change my hair colour?
No. It does not deposit pigment and it does not lift any out, so your shade afterwards is the shade you walked in with. What changes is condition and shine, which is why the colour looks richer and less flat.
My blonde has gone brassy. Will this fix it?
No, and this is what people most often expect it to do. Brassiness is a tone problem, and correcting tone needs a toner, which is colour work rather than a treatment. Book that with your colourist. The booster is for colour gone dull and flat, not colour that has turned the wrong shade.
Will it cover my grey roots?
No. Nothing in this treatment deposits colour, so grey stays grey and a grown-out root stays visible. Root touch-up starts at $70 and takes about an hour and a half. Plenty of clients have both on the same visit — roots covered, then the booster through the lengths so the whole head matches.
Is this the same as a hair gloss?
Close, but worth separating. Gloss gets used for two different things. Some salons mean a tinted service that lays a sheer film of pigment over your colour, which is colour work and here it is booked with your colourist. The Colour Vibrancy Booster is the treatment version: shine and condition back, tone held longer, shade unchanged.
Do you take walk-ins?
We do take walk-ins, but please call 431-844-5500 first to check availability before coming in. The booster is a 45-minute booking with a specific artist, and if it turns out you need colour rather than a treatment we will want to get you the right appointment instead.
The booster is done by Karan, Noor, RV and Zahara. You choose your artist when you book.
Every service and starting price is listed on the booking page. Nothing is "price on request", and your exact price is confirmed in the chair before work starts.
567 St Anne's Rd, Unit 2, Winnipeg — in St Vital, minutes from Southdale, Windsor Park, Island Lakes and St Boniface. 431-844-5500
Monday 10–7 · Tuesday to Saturday 10–8 · Sunday 10–6. See directions and hours.