Over the past year or so, we have also seen a break away from tradition. A very small handful of home-brewers are now cooking up water-based pomades out of their kitchen. Prior to this, all water-based pomades were formulate and manufacturing in beauty labs across the world -- I will say more about this later. Benjamin David (Anchors Hair Company) has been at the forefront of this change on the formula side; however, I believe Clayton O'Douds (O'Douds All Natural) will be the face of this change. Anchors Shape Maker (Teddy Boy Original) and Sirens & Sailors (Teddy Boy Matte) are the first water-based pomades that truly never dried to be marketed as pomades. Based off much higher end salon-level products, Benjamin created a formula that was superior to all other water-based pomades and relatively affordable. Note that when I refer to water-based pomades, I encapsulate any hair product that is water-based and marketed as a pomade. Other water-based pomades at the time were based on the Sauvecito standard. It is important to note that this innovation was made by a home-brewer -- not a lab or big name brand. O'Douds Water-Based Pomade has also stepped into the arena of home-brewed water-based pomade but must be held distinct from Anchors. Their pomades are actually nothing alike. For more information on each product individually, please refer to the Anchors Teddy Boy Original and O'Douds WB Pomade reviews. The O'Douds WB Pomade still retains many characteristics normally associated with oil-based pomades. It provides those advantages and adopts the conveniences of a water-based pomade.

Despite this innovation, many of the large pomade-specific companies that focus on a (their) water-based pomade lineup have refused to update their pomade. They continue to sell what can better described as a gel pomade. It is a hybrid of the two types of product: pomade and gel. For example, Suavecito Pomade can style almost like a pomade (instant hold and control) but will harden up and dry after a few hours like a gel. This has many advantages. However, it also has many disadvantages for an experience pomade-user.

In short, we are currently witnessing large strides being made by home-brewers. This has exponentially increased with the introduction of brewing community forums to allow the exchange of ideas. However, larger companies remain stagnant and unwilling to update their formulas. Their new products are still based on years old formulas with a small change in scent and increase in price. As long as the home-brewers never get comfortable, we will continue to see improvement.

A Q U I C K C O M M E N T O N F O R E I G N P O M A D E

In this first paragraph, I'd like to specifically refer to the Maritime Southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore -- along with a few others such as Japan and Australia. These are countries where pomade was only popularized recently. In the US, the concept of pomade/brilliantine/hair dressing has existed for decades. This means they have had time to fester and develop into new products. This history is important to make sense of why a majority of the innovation is made in the US and Europe. Nevertheless, no matter where the pomade is, it is highly influence by American rockabilly or menswear culture -- both of which I have ZERO taste for. The influence is too strong and actually, stunts develop. For example, Indonesia is a Muslim and Indonesian-speaking majority nation, yet almost all their products are marketed and labeled with English. The choice to use English, despite the many typos, is representative of a desire to mimic and recreate a long-dead component of American culture. As long as they continue to simply mimic pomade formulas and look up to America, we cannot expect any innovations.

Due to some misunderstanding:

The message of the above paragraph was to point out the strong influence of American culture on Maritime Southeast Asia. It's unbelievably strong. When fixies (fixed gear bicycles) became popular in the US, they became popular over there after 1-2 years. After the pompadour and pomade began to trend in the US, it began to trend over there within the next year or so. This relationship carries the undertones of colonialism and is currently structured as a one-way path: US to Indonesia/Singapore/Malaysia. Our culture influences yours. Yours does not influence ours. Now, the purpose of the paragraph was to suggest that as long as this relationship remains, we can't expect Indonesia/Malaysia/Singapore to surpass us in pomade development. You can't surpass your teacher if you're still trying to learn from them.

Japan, on the other hand, is very interesting. There is obviously a niche-community their that fetishizes American culture (just like how we have anime communities here in the US). They are INSPIRED by American culture but not lead by it. We still this in the Cool Grease line and existence of traditional Japanese pomades such as Tancho and Yanagiya Pomade (I think these two have been popularized and manufactured outside of Japan now). These products have adopted American names/labels but are nothing like our products here.

In Germany and surrounding countries, the community that surrounds pomade has adopted an almost cosplay-level of style. The focus has not been on pomade itself, but the aura that surrounds it. Hence, the Reuzel line of products was very mediocre. It's comical to note that their pomades (at least, the first few runs) were manufactured in the US. That's means anyone who actually purchased the product paid mostly just for the shipping from here to the Netherlands and back. These countries appear to see pomade simply as a step into the psychobilly subculture.