— I'm Timothy Greig. I live in Wellington, New Zealand, and work
for AIM Proximity. I'm interested in game design, information architecture, librarianship, and transmedia storytelling. Updates? — Try the RSS.

I’m one of those people who likes to read things as I use them. I’ll examine the chocolate wrapper as I munch, read all the fine print on the pen I’m using as I daydream…

So every morning in the shower – whether I’m stealing Michelle’s shampoo, or just using my own (a crumbly rock-thing from Lush) – I’ll read and ponder the back of the herbal essences bottles.

I guess the packaging designers at Herbal Essences realized this, and so they included something for me to read.

There’s something comforting about reading what a product is doing for you… and usually, you’re just reading the ingredients list on the back, wondering what half of the things you’re putting into your hair are.

Whether or not herbal essences are a nice company, or if their shampoo is very good, I don’t know – but this nice narrative about how good I’m going to feel after using their shampoo is a really neat touch.

Shampoo has such a strong visceral component: how it smells, what it feels like when you put it in your hair. I feel like this story on the back helps enhance the visceral by adding a reflexive feeling too.

Just look at all the great words they’re using: dousing, silky, rich, protect, shiny, healthy, light, lustrous, happy. So awesome… I kind of want to go wash my hair now.