With her short, naturally-blonde hair, Kelly is practically a professional at coloring her hair at home as she grows it out. With previous good luck with Garnier products, she was eager to try the brand’s HerbaShine Ten Minute Hair Color. But did this new quick fix hold up to her past positive experiences, or did it fall flat?

I color my hair at home. Often. This month, I decided to check out the Garnier HerbaShine Ten Minute Hair Color. I selected a level three ash brown, which basically means that it is a really dark, cool brown. It is the same color I have been using for several months. The big difference is the brand.

Depending what is on sale, I tend to bounce back and forth between L’Oreal and Garnier hair color (and sometimes I use Clairol Professional). HerbaShine comes in 18 colors and includes bamboo extract, which is touted to be the next big thing in strengthening products. (It will show up everywhere, mark my words.) The reason I wanted to check it out is because I do like the ease of the 10 minute hair colors and I generally like Garnier hair color. For this color to be successful for me, all it had to do was cover my roots, in the same cool dark brown tone. For the record, my natural hair (which I haven’t seen in forever) is actually blonde.

Here is how it looked after I dyed my hair for the allotted 10 minutes, rinsed, conditioned and styled.

Huge fail. It didn’t cover the roots at all and now I have to dye my hair again in the same month, which I had resolved to stop doing since I am letting it grow.

This really didn’t work for me and for once, I can’t see an upside of trying it. But if you can, tell me in the comments!

I bought this myself. At least it was on sale.
Photos: Garnier, Kelly Gould