Indola

Indola is a professional hair colour and care brand owned by the German consumer-goods company Henkel AG & Co. KGaA [6]. Although it now sits within Henkel's professional haircare portfolio alongside Schwarzkopf Professional, the brand began in the Netherlands: it was founded in 1929 in Voorburg as the firm Hollander & Kohn, a supplier of products for salons and barbershops [7]. Today Indola positions itself as a salon-only brand built around colour, blonde services and a compact care range, sold to independent hairdressers across European and other international markets.

The brand is sometimes confused with the German Schwarzkopf company, which leads some sources to describe Indola as German in origin [11]. Independent Dutch records document a different history: the founding firm Hollander & Kohn was based at Westeinde 86 in Voorburg, with Indola NV established in 1932 [7]. The German association dates only from 2004, when Henkel acquired the brand, and from its place beside Schwarzkopf Professional — not from where it started.

Indola's roots lie in the Dutch hairdressing-supply trade of the late 1920s. The firm Hollander & Kohn opened in Voorburg in 1929, producing shaving cream and other goods for salons. In 1932 a separate company, Indola NV, was set up to handle electrical hairdressing equipment such as hood hair dryers and curling irons.

The company became known for technical firsts in salon equipment. According to a Dutch hairdressing-industry history archive, Indola introduced what it records as the first European hood hair dryer in 1936, and in 1948 launched Europe's first electric permanent-wave system [8]. By the early 1950s the business had grown into a substantial exporter, shipping to dozens of countries from production sites in the Voorburg and Rijswijk area.

Indola changed hands several times over the second half of the twentieth century. In 1965 it merged with Van der Heem NV to form Indoheem NV. The cosmetics operations were later sold by Hagemeyer to the American company Alberto-Culver in 1983, reportedly for US$6 million [7].

The brand's current owner is Henkel. In 2004 Alberto-Culver sold Indola to Henkel, a transaction the trade press reported as effective on 1 June 2004 [10]. Alberto-Culver is therefore a former parent (1983–2004), while present ownership rests with Henkel AG & Co. KGaA, confirmed through the brand's own legal imprint, which names Henkel as the operator of the Indola website [6]. Within Henkel, Indola sits among a wider group of hair brands that includes Schwarzkopf Professional, Syoss, Palette and Got2b.

Henkel describes Indola as an exclusively professional brand aimed at entrepreneurs — particularly small salons and independent stylists looking to grow their business [9]. The brand frames itself around a "street style" identity and a "simply smarter" idea: a compact but complete portfolio that, in its own words, lets stylists do "more with less" [1]. Its stated brand DNA is "real, authentic, commercial, wearable," and it markets colour as trend-driven and meant for everyday wear rather than runway looks. Indola says it aims to bring "tomorrow's trends" to salons through twice-yearly street-style collections, education programmes and creative direction from global ambassadors.

The commercial promise is built on price as much as performance. Henkel summarises the proposition as high-performing products and concise ranges offered "at a smart price," targeting independent hairdressers rather than the consumer-retail shelf [9].

Indola's catalogue is centred on professional colour. Its flagship line is PCC (Permanent Caring Colour), which Henkel describes as offering up to 103 shades together with the brand's Colour Transformer technology. Other colour ranges include XPRESSCOLOR, marketed for fast root touch-ups; RAPID BLOND+ and Blonde Expert for lightening; and CREA-BOLD, a semi-permanent line. The care and styling assortment, described by the company as compact and high-performing, spans shampoos, conditioners, treatments, masks and styling products, including a dedicated Blonde Expert care range.

The brand attaches several named technologies to these products, among them Smart Lift, Smart Creatives, Colour Transformer, Hair Bond and Pixel Technology. It also makes specific performance claims for individual products — for example up to 100% white-hair coverage for PCC, and outgrown roots covered in under 30 minutes for XPRESSCOLOR — which it presents as product attributes rather than independently verified results.

Indola publishes a set of production and packaging commitments. The company states that its two manufacturing sites — in Wassertrüdingen, Germany, and Maribor, Slovenia — run on 100% renewable electricity and that its operations are carbon neutral, which it quantifies as saving 625 tonnes of CO₂ a year [2]. It also reports sending zero production waste to landfill.

On packaging, the brand describes moves to lighter, more recyclable materials: a Blonde Expert lightener pouch redesigned in mono-material form, and PCC packaging using recycled aluminium tubes, recycled-plastic caps and largely recycled cardboard cartons. Indola says it prioritises vegan ingredients and uses only naturally derived ingredients in its care and styling products, summarising its stance as the view that "clean beauty should be honest beauty." No external certification bodies are named in support of these claims.

Indola is an active brand. Its official website is maintained by Henkel and shows current street-style collections and a 2026 copyright notice, and production continues at the two European sites. The brand operates across multiple professional markets in Europe and internationally, distributed to salons rather than sold directly to consumers [9].