April 19, 2024 • 27 mins
Vanessa Tyler speaks with visionary and business mogul Jane Carter about hair care and her new line of products, Jane Carter Evolved.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Spring us here then summer. What are you gonna do
with your hair? Natural braids, weave wigs, a hat or nothing,
I mean no hair at all. Lately, women have been
going viral for ripping off their wigs and freeing themselves,
like Niki Vontea, who has alopecia and has become a
sensation for shaving her head. Baby but bald on TikTok.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
I've had alopecia since i was nine years old, which
means I've been wearing wigs since i was nine years old.
But first we shaving his head and I finally got
some new razors. I've been needing them for a long time,
and I'm telling you there is no greater feeling than
shaving your head with a fresh set up razors.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Let's talk hair, not hair styles, hair and there is
only one woman who can really do it, Jane Carter.
Yes that Jane Carter I.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Did have a huge fan base, and I'm very glad
and grateful that you know that women trusted and respected.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Remember the popular Jane Carter hair Caroline Jane Carter's solutions.
Hear her journey, the ups, downs and back up again
next on black Land and now as a brown person
who just feels so invisible. And where we're from, brothers
and sisters. I welcome you to this joyful day and
(01:19):
we celebrate freedom.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Where we are, I know someone's heard something and where
we're going.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
We the people means all the people.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
The Black Information Network presents Blackland with your host Vanessa Tyler.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
Thank you for that introduction. That was quite lovely.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
You can't see me, but I'm actually bowing to the
Jane Carter welcome.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
I love you, thank you, thank you. I can tell
you that probably one of my greatest strengths has been
that I'm a hairstylist. That I started out with the
business degree and on salons, so you know, and then
I became allergic to you know, I was working for Clara,
(02:07):
as I told you, and I'm in the Salona fourteen
stylists my first salons in Cranford, and I developed like
this whole like bronchitis, weird something. And that's when I
started to read labels and decided to go back to
study chemistry.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
You were one of the first what made your products
so special?
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Ultimately I became a member of the Society of Cosmetic
Chemists and to this day in the Northeast chapter, I'm
probably the only, uh should I say, a little brown girl,
a black woman who's part of this organization. And I
kind of make the joke. It's like it's like the
white boy fraternity, like and you know, you know the
(02:53):
fact that I like, as a stylist, I live on
the ground with the consumer. I see what their challenges are.
My interest is addressing them using the most natural ingredients possible.
And a lot of these other cosmetic chemists they like
live in a closet. It's like, bro, have you ever
(03:14):
been in a salon? Like, you know, just spend a
day and just see what it is that goes on
for these women. And I think that that is a
big deficit. So as an example, Vanessa, you know, one
of my first my first born babies, was nurseh and Shine.
You know, at that point, women were still doing a
(03:35):
lot of hair relaxing and we come to the salon
every two weeks. And scalp care is critical because since
the whole natural hair movement, all of the products have
gone on shelf in retail and there's still nobody who
can really explain what to use, how to use it,
(03:57):
what you're dealing with and really like look at your
out and address it, because that's where everything begins.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
You are a hair scientist, talk about what you discovered
about our hair, specifically the four sea hair that they're
calling now, explain that.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Okay, So I'm going to say two things. One is
that the definition of black hair. It's kind of a
funny story because, like I said, I started out as
a hair color as a hair color educator. Black hair
is the color of asphalt. We come in with hair
(04:36):
and skin tones in all sizes, shapes, and colors. Okay,
So the four C basically, if you maybe remember as
a kid playing the Plato right, and maybe you would
like use the Plato thing and you'd push it out
of a round circle and it comes out straight. And
(04:57):
if you use the plato and you're like pushing it
out out of like an oval, it twists and turns
as it comes out. So the shape of your follicle
is the determining characteristic of your hair and how it
comes out of your follicle. So if your follicle, the
shape of your follicle is long and oval, your hair
(05:20):
twists and turns as it's coming out. Now, the outside
layer of your hair looks like the scales on a fish.
So if your hair follicle is long and oval, and
it twists and turns as it comes out, it cracks
the cuticle. The cuticle is like the scales on a fish.
If your hair follicle is perfectly round, the hair comes
(05:42):
out straight and not curly, curly, whatever you want to
call it. So that is critical. So often the more
the four sea characteristics about hair is that the cuticle's cracked,
like I said, the scales on a fish, and they
lay flat and reflect light. They're shiny. When your hair
(06:02):
comes out of your follicle, that's super oval. The cracks
cuticle which are like the scales on a fish, and
your hair tends to be drier because it doesn't hold
moisture because your cuticle is raised. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (06:17):
It makes sense. But you know what the bottom line
is for me and a lot of other black women.
Why the hair does not grow period, Why it doesn't
grow it can fall out? Why does it take so
long and so difficult for our hair to grow?
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Okay, So, typically your hair basically exists in three stages,
the growth stage, the resting stage, and the shedding stage.
So once Again, if you look at women that have
waist length hair, again, they're follicle is perfectly round, so
(07:01):
their hair comes out straight with no cracks in the cuticle. Okay,
if your follicle is very oval and long, your hair
actually twists and turns to get out, which cracks your cuticle. Now,
the shedding, resting, and growing stage is typically part of
(07:23):
your DNA, So there's the characteristics of hair and how
it grows out of the shape of your follicle, which
determines whether it's straight or coily or curly. And the
more weul we'll say coily, the more coily it is,
(07:44):
the more crack the cuticle is. And typically now there's
actually ingredients raw materials. I'll say ingredients because I do
formulas that will actually keep your hair in the growth
stage longer and sounds fantastic, and the resting stage shorter.
(08:06):
The other thing is that you naturally lose about two
hundred and fifty hairs a day, So my hair is
pretty curly, but most of us have multiple textures, so
my hair is way tighter and coarser in the back
and a little finer around my hairline in the front.
So if I put my hair in a scrunchy for
(08:30):
like three days, and then I get in the shower,
I rinse my hair, and then I use a paddle brush.
After I shampoo it, add conditioner, use a paddle brush
from ends to root to detangle it. The amount of
hair in that paddle brush would scare you. But if
you think about it, if you didn't shampoo your hair
(08:51):
for four or five days, you're gonna lose one thousand hairs.
That's just natural, so the next hair can grow out.
The key is to remove the hair because it's you know,
you know, nothing else can grow out or the new
healthy hair can grow out if you're not shampooing and
(09:12):
you know, paddle brushing and all of that to remove
the hair that's going to be in this shedding stage.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Jane Carter, formerly of Jane Carter's Solutions. I really should
note that you no longer owned the company that you started,
which is a whole nother story and one we've seen
in the past. I know it's long and at one
point the subject of litigation, but could you, in a
nutshell tell what happened?
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Oh, essentially, we had an equity line of credit. We
were doing all of our own in house manufacturing because
I did not want to share formulas and I had
great control from doing that. And I hired a consultant
that I found on a professional site for everybody that
(10:02):
gets insurance in the cosmetic industry to come in when
our equity line of credit was going to be increased.
And apparently he had an ulterior motive and it was
only supposed to be, like I said, a consultant to
come in for a minute. And you know, I'm traveling
around the world speaking to women about their hair in
(10:24):
Europe and amsonam in Paris and London, and of course
you leave your digital signature stamp with your bookkeeper and
your controller in your office. That began the nightmare.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
For years Jane Carter and not only lost the company
but the use of her own name. But as a
strong believer, she knew it would turn in her favor
and now she is starting over, just like she did
when she founded the company more than thirty five years ago.
Your products were sold all over the world. When speaking
with women about Jane Carter Solutions, people remember those products,
(10:59):
and you had a huge fan base.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
I did have a huge fan base, and I'm very
glad and grateful that you know, that women trusted and
respected and okay, so all right, So, like we were
talking about the nursing Join one of the first products,
so some of the ingredients in that product. First of all,
(11:24):
it's all natural. And it's kind of a funny story
because my first three fragrances, which were used in all
of our products, were created by the only black female
fragrance in the country, Naomi, and she did a great job.
And she taught me a lot about top notes, middle notes,
and bottom notes and how your brain, how that affects,
(11:47):
like lavender calms you down, you know, and how all
of that effects like the products that you use. And
you're kind of almost emotional attachment based on how they
make you feel from the from the natural smell or
the natural essential oil fragrance. So one of the new
products that I'm doing is called Ditch the Itch, and
(12:11):
it's gonna be scalp drops that will hydrate your scalp,
get rid of any fundus, help to prevent you from
developing any dandriff. So, like I said, if I was
not a stylist in seeing you know a lot of
the things that go on for women. So one of
(12:35):
the other products that I just finished working on is
basically gonna be called scalp Restore. It's in order oil
and water emulsion with brown sugar, so you're gonna use
it as a shampoo, and the brown sugar will exfoliate
any skin that's built up on your scalp, which covers
(12:55):
your follicle, which is what your hair grows out of.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
M hm, I am. I'm speaking with hair guru scientists
Jane Carter. Many of you use her products, Jane Carter Solutions,
over the years, and you are just telling us about
new products you are introducing.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Scalp Care is the beginning of hair care. That is
the key. Scalp Care is the beginning.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
I mentioned at the top, women saying forget it, I'm
cutting it all off.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Well, they're gonna cut it all off because they don't
have a great stylist to come to to advise them
on what to use. So one of the other products
is called Design and Define. It's a liquid, it's got
some hold. So another one that I'm doing is called
(13:48):
Hold in Control. It's a foam, so if you're wearing
your hair natural, you can add the foam to kind
of rehydrate and reduce the frizz, but it doesn't super
rewet your hair. So my job is to make your
life easier by showing you exactly what you need to
(14:09):
do to have your hair be more workable.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
What about these oils you have companies swearing by Rosemary Oil,
Jamaican Black castor Oil, Good Oil, Shady butter, what really
works well?
Speaker 3 (14:28):
I mean it depends. It's like you don't want to
cover up the problem, so you could put anything on
your scalp that you want, but if you didn't cleanse
it properly and scrub it to remove the layers of
skin that are trying to get off of your scalp
which look like dandruff. But your face would do the
(14:51):
same thing. If you didn't wash your face, it would
be kind of scally. So I feel like, okay, so
let me just say this, Jane Carter Evolved will be
the name of the new brand, and you could just
go and put in Jane Carter Evolved and or info
(15:11):
at Jane Carter Evolved, and I'll get an email so
that I can reach out to you. Maybe we can
do a zoom consultation or something like that.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
So she's back in the lab creating the natural proprietary
potions she's known for.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yes, so this is a brand new one and I've
not seen anything like this, And it is a shampoo.
It's going to be a two and one shampoo that
you're gonna put on your scalp. And Girl'll me tell
you something. This scrubs off everything because brown sugar. You know,
(15:51):
you can't put it in shampoo because shampoo's water, and
then it just blends in with the water and it's
no more brown sugar. So the way that it's got
to be us used is important. So you know, the
six or seven products that I'm doing. You know, when
we reintroduce this very shortly in social media, there'll be
(16:12):
a very distinct explanation of how to use with pictures
and instructions of you know, which I did and one
hundred years ago an act that they did that that said,
you know, here is the system that you need to use.
You know, if this is your hair type or texture,
(16:34):
and many of us have, like I said, multiple hair
types in different places on our heads. So that's why
it's so important to have an efficient stylist who's well
educated and really understands all the variables necessary about what
to use where and when?
Speaker 1 (16:54):
What kept you in the lab, because during this whole
fiasco with the company thing, you were in the lab
every day.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Girl, Listen, I'm still in the lab every day.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
What keeps you going? What makes you continue in this work?
As I said, it's been heartbreaking, quite honestly, your whole
journey that happened after you had like a multi million
dollar company and then that happened where you know, you
kind of lost the company, but now you're back. But
what keeps you going? Especially to help women in their
(17:32):
hair journey?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
It is a labor of love. I have spent most
of my lifetime in this industry and then going back
and looking and doing research where I know that even
a lot of these brands that were considered black owned,
they're not stylists the girls that own them. And I'm
(17:54):
not saying this to be you know, not kind to them.
They're not stylists and then not chemists. So the question
is who's really making their products? And you know, and
there is and does still occur as a lot of
racism in uh the industry because very often what you
(18:17):
what I've experienced in training some beauty school chains is
that when you get seven hundred hours for instance, and
you go on the floor and you start practicing, you know,
the teacher at the door will give a you know,
a white grandma to the white girl, black grandma to
the black student. So you know, my taglines was always
(18:41):
hair has no race, and there will be a lot
of people that would dispute that, but it's like, you know,
you know, just walk as if you're blindfolded, Like you know,
your skin color doesn't necessarily have a determining characteristic of
what your hair needs. A health in yours.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Healthy hair.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
Healthy hair is healthy hair exactly, and having a professional
who really understands you know how to instruct you and
provide products with great healthy ingredients makes a night and
day difference. So when the whole natural hair explosion occurred,
(19:27):
and it's a little crazy because there was recently a
lawsuit because now these the brown girls would have like
wash day, they washed their hair once a month, okay,
And the result of that consumer new consumer behavior caused
a big problem with hair co wash because people were
experiencing hair loss because it's like you're putting lotion in
(19:50):
your hair and rinsing it. That doesn't cleanse your scalp,
especially if you haven't washed your hair for a month.
So there's like all of this behavioral understand that's critical
when you're making products, and you know, and.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
You know there's current lawsuits against the people who had
the relaxers because of cancer concerns from blackhoms.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Absolutely absolutely if Vanessa I said, I wasn't even going
to get crazy with this. But what we talked about
earlier is to take everything your bathroom, sit in front
of your computer, go to Google and everything on the
ingredient deck at the bottom. Put in the question what
purpose does this server? What is the function of this
(20:34):
or is this harmful? And I think that it's important
that we do the research because clearly it's not been
done on our behalf.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
That day, he had to do a biopsy because he
saw something in my guar in lining.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Three days later, I got a call.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
I'm twenty eight years old and I was just diagnosed
with uterine cancer. That's Jennifer Mitchell at a news conference
last year announcing the lawsuit against Riel, maker of Dark
and Lovely, and that Misstay Laboratories, maker of olive oil relaxer.
All the big companies, including Revlon, maker of Cream of Nature,
facing class action lawsuits after the National Institutes of Health
(21:17):
study found an association between the chemicals and the relaxers,
mostly used by black women, and uterine cancer, a connection
that companies denied, claiming their ingredients were approved. Lawyers for
the women, including civil rights attorney Ben Grump, say the
products are harmful.
Speaker 5 (21:34):
We're here on behalf of Jenny Mitchell and so many
women who are coming forward to seek justice against corporations
that put profit over people.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
This is a national health crisis, so we have to treat.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It as such. But more importantly, if you are there
and you have little black girls, stop today using these
chemical relaxes.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
And black women, many like Jennifer, who has had a
relaxer since age eight, will never be able to carry
a child.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
I'm thirty two years old right now and I'm still
filling that void. I'm not being able to bear my
own child.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
That's why Jane Carter says she only chooses ingredients with
the health of black women in mind.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
There are, you know, a lot of side effects and
everything I've ever made, I cross reference with one of
the medical sites to see if any ingredients potentially could
be harmful, whether it's a preservative, or you know or whatever.
(22:52):
One of the professional products that I'm working on is
basically this whole new thing about this whole silk crests.
So if you don't want to relax your hair, you
don't want to wear wigs or weaves or braids of
you know, you want to go and get your hair
blown out and conditioned. You know, I looked at all
(23:13):
these ingredients. Every single one of them have silicones or
dimetic cone, which is basically what they use in armorole
from retires that's water resisted. A lot of the products
being made for us are not being made by us
where we understand the real need and obstacles of this consumer.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Again, she emphasizes the health of the scalp is what
grows and keeps our hair.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
So if you have hair loss and the skin grows
over the hole which your hair grows out, and you
don't exfoliate those layers of skin, nothing that you put
on your scalp can grow your hair. You know. It's
kind of like if a man gets an ingrown hair
and pulls the end grown hair out of his beard,
and there's literally a hole where he pulled it out,
(24:04):
then the skin fills up that hole. So if your
hair stops growing out of that hole your follicle, then
the skin covers the follicle. So unless you're doing the
serious like one of the surfaces is this whole scalp
detox which eliminates. I actually have an oxygen machine that
I use with it that eliminates any irritation because basically,
(24:28):
you know, what I'm spraying on almost gives your scalp
like a bit of a like a sunburn, but the
oxygen gets rid of any irritation. But you know, then
literally take a toothbrush and go through your whole scalp
and you would be shocked at how much skin is removed.
And now I look at with the microscope and I
(24:49):
can actually see a hole. So whatever I could put
on your scalp now can penetrate all the way to
your papilla, which is where your hair starts to grow.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Her plan with Gane card or Evol does not to
return to the shelves, but to sell to you.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Well, I'm not selling through stores. I'm selling direct to
consumer because they are my people and I want to
make sure they're well taken care of and well advised.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
Advised and educated about what we're putting in our hair,
and equally important, how we are treating our fragile locks.
Speaker 3 (25:21):
There was a medical study that I've researched about women
that are pre diabetic, have elevated blood sugar or diabetic
and wearing braids, and the braids in their crown fall
out and they develop keloids. They have to be surgically removed,
and they don't never grow hair back there again.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
So she's back in the lab and wants to hear
from old heads and those finding her for the first time.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
My job is to analyze, is to prescribe, to create,
give you products, instructions, and potentially do treatments or haircut
and all the other stuff. Because this is what I've
been doing my whole life, and it is definitely a
labor of love.
Speaker 1 (26:05):
Jane Carter needs more power now than when she started out,
because the build back is steeper, the hustle is real,
the obstacle's many. But other black women have faced impossible
odds throughout our history, women like Harriet Tubman. You have
made it one hundred miles to freedom all by yourself.
Speaker 5 (26:24):
Would you like to pick a new name to mark
your freedom?
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Harriet Tubman from the movie. Harriet, our history heroine who
would not quit, Come get you, bring all of you
to freedom. Do you know what would happen if you
got caught?
Speaker 2 (26:42):
You got lucky?
Speaker 5 (26:43):
Harriet.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
I made a discall mome, So don't you tell me
what I can't do? Yes, Harriet. Tubman's undefeatable spirit gives
Jane Carter so much inspiration. It literally made an indelible ran.
Speaker 3 (27:00):
I got a new tack in my arm that is
large enough that made my daughters have a panic attack
when they saw it. That says, don't tell me I can't.
That's Harry Tubman's line, so.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
I love it. Reach out. She wants to hear from
you at info at Janecarterevolved dot com. That's it for now.
I'm Vanessa Tyler. Join me next time on Blackland
Spring us here then summer. What are you gonna do
with your hair? Natural braids, weave wigs, a hat or nothing,
I mean no hair at all. Lately, women have been
going viral for ripping off their wigs and freeing themselves,
like Niki Vontea, who has alopecia and has become a
sensation for shaving her head. Baby but bald on TikTok.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
I've had alopecia since i was nine years old, which
means I've been wearing wigs since i was nine years old.
But first we shaving his head and I finally got
some new razors. I've been needing them for a long time,
and I'm telling you there is no greater feeling than
shaving your head with a fresh set up razors.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Let's talk hair, not hair styles, hair and there is
only one woman who can really do it, Jane Carter.
Yes that Jane Carter I.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Did have a huge fan base, and I'm very glad
and grateful that you know that women trusted and respected.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Remember the popular Jane Carter hair Caroline Jane Carter's solutions.
Hear her journey, the ups, downs and back up again
next on black Land and now as a brown person
who just feels so invisible. And where we're from, brothers
and sisters. I welcome you to this joyful day and
(01:19):
we celebrate freedom.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Where we are, I know someone's heard something and where
we're going.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
We the people means all the people.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
The Black Information Network presents Blackland with your host Vanessa Tyler.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
Thank you for that introduction. That was quite lovely.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
You can't see me, but I'm actually bowing to the
Jane Carter welcome.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
I love you, thank you, thank you. I can tell
you that probably one of my greatest strengths has been
that I'm a hairstylist. That I started out with the
business degree and on salons, so you know, and then
I became allergic to you know, I was working for Clara,
(02:07):
as I told you, and I'm in the Salona fourteen
stylists my first salons in Cranford, and I developed like
this whole like bronchitis, weird something. And that's when I
started to read labels and decided to go back to
study chemistry.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
You were one of the first what made your products
so special?
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Ultimately I became a member of the Society of Cosmetic
Chemists and to this day in the Northeast chapter, I'm
probably the only, uh should I say, a little brown girl,
a black woman who's part of this organization. And I
kind of make the joke. It's like it's like the
white boy fraternity, like and you know, you know the
(02:53):
fact that I like, as a stylist, I live on
the ground with the consumer. I see what their challenges are.
My interest is addressing them using the most natural ingredients possible.
And a lot of these other cosmetic chemists they like
live in a closet. It's like, bro, have you ever
(03:14):
been in a salon? Like, you know, just spend a
day and just see what it is that goes on
for these women. And I think that that is a
big deficit. So as an example, Vanessa, you know, one
of my first my first born babies, was nurseh and Shine.
You know, at that point, women were still doing a
(03:35):
lot of hair relaxing and we come to the salon
every two weeks. And scalp care is critical because since
the whole natural hair movement, all of the products have
gone on shelf in retail and there's still nobody who
can really explain what to use, how to use it,
(03:57):
what you're dealing with and really like look at your
out and address it, because that's where everything begins.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
You are a hair scientist, talk about what you discovered
about our hair, specifically the four sea hair that they're
calling now, explain that.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Okay, So I'm going to say two things. One is
that the definition of black hair. It's kind of a
funny story because, like I said, I started out as
a hair color as a hair color educator. Black hair
is the color of asphalt. We come in with hair
(04:36):
and skin tones in all sizes, shapes, and colors. Okay,
So the four C basically, if you maybe remember as
a kid playing the Plato right, and maybe you would
like use the Plato thing and you'd push it out
of a round circle and it comes out straight. And
(04:57):
if you use the plato and you're like pushing it
out out of like an oval, it twists and turns
as it comes out. So the shape of your follicle
is the determining characteristic of your hair and how it
comes out of your follicle. So if your follicle, the
shape of your follicle is long and oval, your hair
(05:20):
twists and turns as it's coming out. Now, the outside
layer of your hair looks like the scales on a fish.
So if your hair follicle is long and oval, and
it twists and turns as it comes out, it cracks
the cuticle. The cuticle is like the scales on a fish.
If your hair follicle is perfectly round, the hair comes
(05:42):
out straight and not curly, curly, whatever you want to
call it. So that is critical. So often the more
the four sea characteristics about hair is that the cuticle's cracked,
like I said, the scales on a fish, and they
lay flat and reflect light. They're shiny. When your hair
(06:02):
comes out of your follicle, that's super oval. The cracks
cuticle which are like the scales on a fish, and
your hair tends to be drier because it doesn't hold
moisture because your cuticle is raised. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (06:17):
It makes sense. But you know what the bottom line
is for me and a lot of other black women.
Why the hair does not grow period, Why it doesn't
grow it can fall out? Why does it take so
long and so difficult for our hair to grow?
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Okay, So, typically your hair basically exists in three stages,
the growth stage, the resting stage, and the shedding stage.
So once Again, if you look at women that have
waist length hair, again, they're follicle is perfectly round, so
(07:01):
their hair comes out straight with no cracks in the cuticle. Okay,
if your follicle is very oval and long, your hair
actually twists and turns to get out, which cracks your cuticle. Now,
the shedding, resting, and growing stage is typically part of
(07:23):
your DNA, So there's the characteristics of hair and how
it grows out of the shape of your follicle, which
determines whether it's straight or coily or curly. And the
more weul we'll say coily, the more coily it is,
(07:44):
the more crack the cuticle is. And typically now there's
actually ingredients raw materials. I'll say ingredients because I do
formulas that will actually keep your hair in the growth
stage longer and sounds fantastic, and the resting stage shorter.
(08:06):
The other thing is that you naturally lose about two
hundred and fifty hairs a day, So my hair is
pretty curly, but most of us have multiple textures, so
my hair is way tighter and coarser in the back
and a little finer around my hairline in the front.
So if I put my hair in a scrunchy for
(08:30):
like three days, and then I get in the shower,
I rinse my hair, and then I use a paddle brush.
After I shampoo it, add conditioner, use a paddle brush
from ends to root to detangle it. The amount of
hair in that paddle brush would scare you. But if
you think about it, if you didn't shampoo your hair
(08:51):
for four or five days, you're gonna lose one thousand hairs.
That's just natural, so the next hair can grow out.
The key is to remove the hair because it's you know,
you know, nothing else can grow out or the new
healthy hair can grow out if you're not shampooing and
(09:12):
you know, paddle brushing and all of that to remove
the hair that's going to be in this shedding stage.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Jane Carter, formerly of Jane Carter's Solutions. I really should
note that you no longer owned the company that you started,
which is a whole nother story and one we've seen
in the past. I know it's long and at one
point the subject of litigation, but could you, in a
nutshell tell what happened?
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Oh, essentially, we had an equity line of credit. We
were doing all of our own in house manufacturing because
I did not want to share formulas and I had
great control from doing that. And I hired a consultant
that I found on a professional site for everybody that
(10:02):
gets insurance in the cosmetic industry to come in when
our equity line of credit was going to be increased.
And apparently he had an ulterior motive and it was
only supposed to be, like I said, a consultant to
come in for a minute. And you know, I'm traveling
around the world speaking to women about their hair in
(10:24):
Europe and amsonam in Paris and London, and of course
you leave your digital signature stamp with your bookkeeper and
your controller in your office. That began the nightmare.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
For years Jane Carter and not only lost the company
but the use of her own name. But as a
strong believer, she knew it would turn in her favor
and now she is starting over, just like she did
when she founded the company more than thirty five years ago.
Your products were sold all over the world. When speaking
with women about Jane Carter Solutions, people remember those products,
(10:59):
and you had a huge fan base.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
I did have a huge fan base, and I'm very
glad and grateful that you know, that women trusted and
respected and okay, so all right, So, like we were
talking about the nursing Join one of the first products,
so some of the ingredients in that product. First of all,
(11:24):
it's all natural. And it's kind of a funny story
because my first three fragrances, which were used in all
of our products, were created by the only black female
fragrance in the country, Naomi, and she did a great job.
And she taught me a lot about top notes, middle notes,
and bottom notes and how your brain, how that affects,
(11:47):
like lavender calms you down, you know, and how all
of that effects like the products that you use. And
you're kind of almost emotional attachment based on how they
make you feel from the from the natural smell or
the natural essential oil fragrance. So one of the new
products that I'm doing is called Ditch the Itch, and
(12:11):
it's gonna be scalp drops that will hydrate your scalp,
get rid of any fundus, help to prevent you from
developing any dandriff. So, like I said, if I was
not a stylist in seeing you know a lot of
the things that go on for women. So one of
(12:35):
the other products that I just finished working on is
basically gonna be called scalp Restore. It's in order oil
and water emulsion with brown sugar, so you're gonna use
it as a shampoo, and the brown sugar will exfoliate
any skin that's built up on your scalp, which covers
(12:55):
your follicle, which is what your hair grows out of.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
M hm, I am. I'm speaking with hair guru scientists
Jane Carter. Many of you use her products, Jane Carter Solutions,
over the years, and you are just telling us about
new products you are introducing.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Scalp Care is the beginning of hair care. That is
the key. Scalp Care is the beginning.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
I mentioned at the top, women saying forget it, I'm
cutting it all off.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Well, they're gonna cut it all off because they don't
have a great stylist to come to to advise them
on what to use. So one of the other products
is called Design and Define. It's a liquid, it's got
some hold. So another one that I'm doing is called
(13:48):
Hold in Control. It's a foam, so if you're wearing
your hair natural, you can add the foam to kind
of rehydrate and reduce the frizz, but it doesn't super
rewet your hair. So my job is to make your
life easier by showing you exactly what you need to
(14:09):
do to have your hair be more workable.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
What about these oils you have companies swearing by Rosemary Oil,
Jamaican Black castor Oil, Good Oil, Shady butter, what really
works well?
Speaker 3 (14:28):
I mean it depends. It's like you don't want to
cover up the problem, so you could put anything on
your scalp that you want, but if you didn't cleanse
it properly and scrub it to remove the layers of
skin that are trying to get off of your scalp
which look like dandruff. But your face would do the
(14:51):
same thing. If you didn't wash your face, it would
be kind of scally. So I feel like, okay, so
let me just say this, Jane Carter Evolved will be
the name of the new brand, and you could just
go and put in Jane Carter Evolved and or info
(15:11):
at Jane Carter Evolved, and I'll get an email so
that I can reach out to you. Maybe we can
do a zoom consultation or something like that.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
So she's back in the lab creating the natural proprietary
potions she's known for.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yes, so this is a brand new one and I've
not seen anything like this, And it is a shampoo.
It's going to be a two and one shampoo that
you're gonna put on your scalp. And Girl'll me tell
you something. This scrubs off everything because brown sugar. You know,
(15:51):
you can't put it in shampoo because shampoo's water, and
then it just blends in with the water and it's
no more brown sugar. So the way that it's got
to be us used is important. So you know, the
six or seven products that I'm doing. You know, when
we reintroduce this very shortly in social media, there'll be
(16:12):
a very distinct explanation of how to use with pictures
and instructions of you know, which I did and one
hundred years ago an act that they did that that said,
you know, here is the system that you need to use.
You know, if this is your hair type or texture,
(16:34):
and many of us have, like I said, multiple hair
types in different places on our heads. So that's why
it's so important to have an efficient stylist who's well
educated and really understands all the variables necessary about what
to use where and when?
Speaker 1 (16:54):
What kept you in the lab, because during this whole
fiasco with the company thing, you were in the lab
every day.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Girl, Listen, I'm still in the lab every day.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
What keeps you going? What makes you continue in this work?
As I said, it's been heartbreaking, quite honestly, your whole
journey that happened after you had like a multi million
dollar company and then that happened where you know, you
kind of lost the company, but now you're back. But
what keeps you going? Especially to help women in their
(17:32):
hair journey?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
It is a labor of love. I have spent most
of my lifetime in this industry and then going back
and looking and doing research where I know that even
a lot of these brands that were considered black owned,
they're not stylists the girls that own them. And I'm
(17:54):
not saying this to be you know, not kind to them.
They're not stylists and then not chemists. So the question
is who's really making their products? And you know, and
there is and does still occur as a lot of
racism in uh the industry because very often what you
(18:17):
what I've experienced in training some beauty school chains is
that when you get seven hundred hours for instance, and
you go on the floor and you start practicing, you know,
the teacher at the door will give a you know,
a white grandma to the white girl, black grandma to
the black student. So you know, my taglines was always
(18:41):
hair has no race, and there will be a lot
of people that would dispute that, but it's like, you know,
you know, just walk as if you're blindfolded, Like you know,
your skin color doesn't necessarily have a determining characteristic of
what your hair needs. A health in yours.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Healthy hair.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
Healthy hair is healthy hair exactly, and having a professional
who really understands you know how to instruct you and
provide products with great healthy ingredients makes a night and
day difference. So when the whole natural hair explosion occurred,
(19:27):
and it's a little crazy because there was recently a
lawsuit because now these the brown girls would have like
wash day, they washed their hair once a month, okay,
And the result of that consumer new consumer behavior caused
a big problem with hair co wash because people were
experiencing hair loss because it's like you're putting lotion in
(19:50):
your hair and rinsing it. That doesn't cleanse your scalp,
especially if you haven't washed your hair for a month.
So there's like all of this behavioral understand that's critical
when you're making products, and you know, and.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
You know there's current lawsuits against the people who had
the relaxers because of cancer concerns from blackhoms.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Absolutely absolutely if Vanessa I said, I wasn't even going
to get crazy with this. But what we talked about
earlier is to take everything your bathroom, sit in front
of your computer, go to Google and everything on the
ingredient deck at the bottom. Put in the question what
purpose does this server? What is the function of this
(20:34):
or is this harmful? And I think that it's important
that we do the research because clearly it's not been
done on our behalf.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
That day, he had to do a biopsy because he
saw something in my guar in lining.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Three days later, I got a call.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
I'm twenty eight years old and I was just diagnosed
with uterine cancer. That's Jennifer Mitchell at a news conference
last year announcing the lawsuit against Riel, maker of Dark
and Lovely, and that Misstay Laboratories, maker of olive oil relaxer.
All the big companies, including Revlon, maker of Cream of Nature,
facing class action lawsuits after the National Institutes of Health
(21:17):
study found an association between the chemicals and the relaxers,
mostly used by black women, and uterine cancer, a connection
that companies denied, claiming their ingredients were approved. Lawyers for
the women, including civil rights attorney Ben Grump, say the
products are harmful.
Speaker 5 (21:34):
We're here on behalf of Jenny Mitchell and so many
women who are coming forward to seek justice against corporations
that put profit over people.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
This is a national health crisis, so we have to treat.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It as such. But more importantly, if you are there
and you have little black girls, stop today using these
chemical relaxes.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
And black women, many like Jennifer, who has had a
relaxer since age eight, will never be able to carry
a child.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
I'm thirty two years old right now and I'm still
filling that void. I'm not being able to bear my
own child.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
That's why Jane Carter says she only chooses ingredients with
the health of black women in mind.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
There are, you know, a lot of side effects and
everything I've ever made, I cross reference with one of
the medical sites to see if any ingredients potentially could
be harmful, whether it's a preservative, or you know or whatever.
(22:52):
One of the professional products that I'm working on is
basically this whole new thing about this whole silk crests.
So if you don't want to relax your hair, you
don't want to wear wigs or weaves or braids of
you know, you want to go and get your hair
blown out and conditioned. You know, I looked at all
(23:13):
these ingredients. Every single one of them have silicones or
dimetic cone, which is basically what they use in armorole
from retires that's water resisted. A lot of the products
being made for us are not being made by us
where we understand the real need and obstacles of this consumer.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Again, she emphasizes the health of the scalp is what
grows and keeps our hair.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
So if you have hair loss and the skin grows
over the hole which your hair grows out, and you
don't exfoliate those layers of skin, nothing that you put
on your scalp can grow your hair. You know. It's
kind of like if a man gets an ingrown hair
and pulls the end grown hair out of his beard,
and there's literally a hole where he pulled it out,
(24:04):
then the skin fills up that hole. So if your
hair stops growing out of that hole your follicle, then
the skin covers the follicle. So unless you're doing the
serious like one of the surfaces is this whole scalp
detox which eliminates. I actually have an oxygen machine that
I use with it that eliminates any irritation because basically,
(24:28):
you know, what I'm spraying on almost gives your scalp
like a bit of a like a sunburn, but the
oxygen gets rid of any irritation. But you know, then
literally take a toothbrush and go through your whole scalp
and you would be shocked at how much skin is removed.
And now I look at with the microscope and I
(24:49):
can actually see a hole. So whatever I could put
on your scalp now can penetrate all the way to
your papilla, which is where your hair starts to grow.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Her plan with Gane card or Evol does not to
return to the shelves, but to sell to you.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Well, I'm not selling through stores. I'm selling direct to
consumer because they are my people and I want to
make sure they're well taken care of and well advised.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
Advised and educated about what we're putting in our hair,
and equally important, how we are treating our fragile locks.
Speaker 3 (25:21):
There was a medical study that I've researched about women
that are pre diabetic, have elevated blood sugar or diabetic
and wearing braids, and the braids in their crown fall
out and they develop keloids. They have to be surgically removed,
and they don't never grow hair back there again.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
So she's back in the lab and wants to hear
from old heads and those finding her for the first time.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
My job is to analyze, is to prescribe, to create,
give you products, instructions, and potentially do treatments or haircut
and all the other stuff. Because this is what I've
been doing my whole life, and it is definitely a
labor of love.
Speaker 1 (26:05):
Jane Carter needs more power now than when she started out,
because the build back is steeper, the hustle is real,
the obstacle's many. But other black women have faced impossible
odds throughout our history, women like Harriet Tubman. You have
made it one hundred miles to freedom all by yourself.
Speaker 5 (26:24):
Would you like to pick a new name to mark
your freedom?
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Harriet Tubman from the movie. Harriet, our history heroine who
would not quit, Come get you, bring all of you
to freedom. Do you know what would happen if you
got caught?
Speaker 2 (26:42):
You got lucky?
Speaker 5 (26:43):
Harriet.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
I made a discall mome, So don't you tell me
what I can't do? Yes, Harriet. Tubman's undefeatable spirit gives
Jane Carter so much inspiration. It literally made an indelible ran.
Speaker 3 (27:00):
I got a new tack in my arm that is
large enough that made my daughters have a panic attack
when they saw it. That says, don't tell me I can't.
That's Harry Tubman's line, so.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
I love it. Reach out. She wants to hear from
you at info at Janecarterevolved dot com. That's it for now.
I'm Vanessa Tyler. Join me next time on Blackland
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