Our Brands

OYA’s story is rooted in generations of professional beauty. Founded and supported by the Schwarzkopf family, whose history in professional hair spans generations, OYA was created as a private, independent venture with a vision to evolve what professional hair color and care could be. The idea was to take decades of industry knowledge and move it forward—creating a brand where exceptional professional performance didn’t have to come at the expense of thoughtful formulation.

That vision became the philosophy at the heart of OYA: Technology Meets Nature. OYA combines advanced professional color technology with nourishing, nature-inspired ingredients to deliver the vibrancy, coverage, shine, and creative freedom artists expect while taking a more considered approach to what goes into the formulas they work with every day.

In an industry where powerful professional color has historically relied on aggressive chemistry, OYA chose a different path. Its professional color products are formulated without PPD, 4-ABP, gluten, persulfates, and parabens—an approach that remains uncommon in professional hair color and reflects OYA’s belief that the industry can continue to evolve. Rather than asking artists to choose between performance and a more thoughtful formulation, OYA works to bring the two together.

And that is where the true evolution of professional hair care begins: not by compromising the artistry or results professionals depend on, but by continuing to question how those results can be achieved better.

At its core, OYA has always been about the professional behind the chair. The brand believes beautiful hair is touched by professionals, and its purpose is to give those artists exceptional color, care, education, technology, and creative freedom while respecting the craft they have built their careers around.

OYA is more than professional hair color. It is a brand built on heritage, driven by innovation, inspired by nature, and continually looking toward what professional beauty can become next.

Technology Meets Nature. Professional performance meets thoughtful innovation. And every artist is given the freedom to Own Your Art.

As the professional beauty industry began shifting, Jin James Choi saw an opportunity to rethink one of the salon’s most established services.

More stylists were leaving traditional salon environments and building businesses of their own inside individual salon suites. But there was a problem: offering professional keratin smoothing treatments often meant investing in expensive bulk product, finding room to store it, and hoping enough clients booked the service before that investment—or the product itself—went to waste.

Choi believed there had to be a smarter way.

His goal was to make professional smoothing treatments more practical and accessible for the way today’s stylists actually work. That idea ultimately became Kerapod: a professional smoothing system built around individually sealed, precisely portioned treatment pods.

One pod could give a stylist what they needed for a service without committing to a large bottle taking up valuable salon space. It could simplify inventory, make treatment costs easier to predict, reduce unnecessary product waste, and help protect the integrity of the formula by keeping each treatment sealed until it was ready to be used. 

Traditional Keratin treatments can require measuring, transferring product into bowls, cleaning those bowls and repeatedly opening the same bulk container. Kerapod streamlined that process into a ready-to-use system designed around simplicity, purity and precision.

Shear Police began with Jim Roberts and a simple belief that professional stylists deserved more from the people supplying one of the most important tools in their hands.

As a longtime professional in the beauty industry, Jim understood that a great pair of shears isn't simply another piece of salon equipment. It's something a stylist works with hour after hour, day after day. The quality, balance, fit and performance of that tool can influence everything from the precision of a cut to how a stylist's hands and body feel at the end of a long day.

That understanding became the foundation for Shear Police.

Jim built the company around helping professionals find shears that actually fit the way they work—not simply selling them another pair of scissors. Over time, Shear Police grew into a professional resource for hairstylists and barbers, bringing together quality craftsmanship, professional-grade and Japanese shears, innovative designs and the kind of knowledgeable support that comes from understanding the industry firsthand.

The relationship doesn't end when a stylist chooses a shear.

Education, maintenance, sharpening and ongoing support have become an important part of what Shear Police represents. It's a more personal approach to professional tools—one centered around helping stylists protect their investment, understand their equipment and choose tools that can support their craft for years to come.

Today, the Shear Police collection includes options for different cutting techniques, preferences and professionals, from precision cutting shears to specialized blending and texturizing tools. Across the collection, the goal remains the same: give professionals dependable tools designed for the work they actually do.

For the Stylist. By the Stylist.

That's one of the biggest reasons Shear Police belongs at CHEM-STEEL-DISTRO. We don't believe professional tools should be chosen solely by what looks good in a case. They should perform, feel right in your hand and come with people behind them who understand how much you depend on them.

Jim built Shear Police around that relationship with the professional—and it's a philosophy we are proud to stand behind.

Before Kerapod reimagined the way stylists approach smoothing treatments, Jin James Choi was already asking a similar question: How can we make the tools professionals use every daywork better for the long hours stylists require.

Jin's path to IZUTECH began with design. With a background spanning graphic and industrial design, he brought together two things that had interested him from an early age—art and technology. His career eventually brought that perspective into the professional beauty industry, where he became involved in the development of professional hair styling tools.

When an earlier styling-tool venture he had worked on came to an end, Jin wasn't ready to walk away from the idea.

He saw an opportunity to take what he had learned and build something of his own—something more focused, more innovative and designed specifically around the demands of working salon professionals.

In 2014, IZUTECH was born.

Jin set out to create professional hot tools where thoughtful design wasn't simply about how a product looked, but how it performed in a stylist's hands. Fast heat-up, consistent performance, durability, efficiency and technology that could keep pace with a full day in the salon became central to the brand.

Over the years, the company has worked closely with industry professionals and used their feedback to continue developing and refining its tools. That collaboration helped shape a philosophy that still defines IZUTECH today: designed with stylists, for stylists.

From professional dryers and flat irons to curling and styling tools, IZUTECH has continued to focus on the essentials professionals reach for every day—then looked for ways to make them better.

And, if you've already read the Kerapod story, Jin's name probably sounds familiar.

The same problem-solving mindset that eventually led him to rethink the traditional keratin treatment with Kerapod can be seen in the foundation of IZUTECH years earlier. Different products, different problems, but the same belief: professional beauty can always work smarter.

That's what made IZUTECH such a natural fit for CHEM-STEEL-DISTRO.

We look for brands that understand what it's actually like to work in this industry. Products need to do more than look impressive on a shelf. They need to perform through long days, repeated services and the demands professionals put on their tools.

IZUTECH was built with that professional in mind from the beginning.

Innovative technology. Purposeful design. Professional performance.

It's a fitting final piece of the Chem Steel family—and another example of what can happen when someone looks at the way things have always been done and decides there's room to build something better.