Stories: Nicole and the Colour Between Appointments

Nicole runs a salon in Zurich, in the Wiedikon district: four stations, two colleagues and a clientele that comes for colour about half the time. The colour services go well. The problem comes afterwards.

Three or four weeks after a copper colour, clients look in the mirror and say the same thing: "It still looks nice, but it has lost its glow. Can't we do something without redoing the whole colour?" And the younger clients, already lightened, show her powder pink and lavender on their phones. Nicole listened, but kept putting it off: a full colour was not needed, and a pastel without a precise method was a leap in the dark.

Two requests, one question

Nicole noticed that the two requests had something in common: in both cases the clients did not want to lighten, they wanted to add colour to a base that was already there. She needed a product that deposits colour without developer, and a reliable way to predict the result.

One evening, after closing, she searched Google in German: "Farbmaske Salon Pastell ohne Entwickler". Among the results she found a cliCHair guide to Code Zero Gems and the 31 formulas of their colour chart. She activated her PRO account, free and with no obligation to buy, and ordered the chart together with a few shades.

Why Gems

They are semi-permanent colour masks, ready to use, without ammonia and without developer: they are applied after the shampoo and rinsed out.
They deposit colour without lightening: what is underneath stays, and the shade adds to it.
There are 19 shades, plus Gems C Clear, the pigment-free mask used to dilute them.
The Gems Colors Chart shows every shade on real hair strands, with 31 official formulas and the percentage of each shade.

What convinced her was one sentence in the guide: with Gems, the base decides the colour. For the first time she had a clear rule to explain to her clients.

First service: reviving the reflection

The first to try it was a client with a copper colour done four weeks earlier, faded on the lengths. Nicole chose Gems 44 Intense Copper and followed the label protocol:

Shampoo, then blot the excess water.
Apply the mask and comb through.
Leave on for 5 to 15 minutes according to the desired reflection intensity: she stopped at 10.
Rinse thoroughly.
As the last step, Stabilizer pH 3.5 sprayed on the lengths, then the blow-dry.

A short service, done together with the blow-dry, with no mixing and no developer.

Second service: the first pastel

A few days later Lea came in, 26, platinum blonde lightened in the salon a few weeks earlier, with a photo of a powder pink. Before choosing, Nicole assessed the base as the guide describes:

Level: very light, almost even.
Underlying pigment: a pale, light yellow.
Evenness: roots and lengths at the same level.
Porosity: ends more porous than the lengths.

With the chart open on the counter, she showed Lea the strands of the Rose family and together they chose Rose 1: 95% Gems C Clear + 5% Gems 62 Fuchsia. On bleached strands the label protocol calls for clean, dry hair and 15-20 minutes of processing time. Nicole first tested a hidden strand and applied the ends last, because porous hair takes the pigment faster. To finish, Stabilizer pH 3.5 and the blow-dry.

What changed

Her two colleagues use the chart as a consultation tool: before every Gems service they show clients the real strands and assess the base together with them. The reflection refresh has become a service that clients book between two colour appointments. When her pink starts to fade, Lea comes back to revive it, and last time she asked to try the lavender.

"I used to tell clients to wait for the next colour," says Nicole. "Now I can offer something straight away, and explain why it works on that base."

Nicole is a fictional character, inspired by common situations in Swiss salons. The result of every service depends on the client's starting base; the salon sets the price of its services.

The products in this story

Gems Colors Chart: the 19 shades and C Clear on real hair, with the 31 official formulas
Gems C Clear: the pigment-free mask to dilute the shades and make pastels
Gems 62 Fuchsia: the fuchsia in the Rose 1 formula
Gems 44 Intense Copper: the intense copper used to revive the reflection
Stabilizer pH 3.5: the acidic leave-in spray for the last step