Toothbrush heads are out of control.

I’ve used an electric toothbrush for years. I can distinctly recall visiting an orthodontist in Bromsgrove as a child, being made to chew a disclosing tablet and then taught over the course of what I remember as 28 hours how to manually brush properly. And there were areas of my teeth that even the hygienist couldn’t clean off with a brush – she ended up scraping it off with one of those metal implements.

So, frankly, I can’t see a reason why we’d put ourselves to that much effort when there’s an easier, better alternative. And it’s served me well, until now.

You see, in 2020 Oral-B or Braun or whoever they are discovered a new technology that was better at trapping mould and toothpaste residue than their original design, coincidentally just as the patents on their previous one expired.

They called it iO, because that’s what startups do with their websites, and at some point in 2023 I ended up upgrading. The battery on my older-style one was failing, and these new iO brushes were cheaper on Nectar Price than the originals.

They get you on the heads, of course

What I neglected to realise at the time was that this was a printer ink scenario. The toothbrush heads – to be replaced every 3 months – are actually a lot more expensive than the originals, unchallenged by proper competition as a newly patented design and, I assume, a small customer base not worth chasing by others.

It’s been OK. I’ve had one replacement under warranty – the battery was expiring in about a day of brushing  – and actually ended up with a newer, revised model in return. The heads were lasting the 90 days they were supposed to, and the brush heads are either on Nectar Price or Amazon for a reasonable sum.

But something has changed lately. The last three brush heads I’ve used – from an Amazon batch – have become exhausted rather quickly. The heads are supposed to last 90 days each, with progress tracked by a blue dye on the outer bristles which wears away.

But thanks to holidays, I know mine aren’t lasting that long. I took a new brush head on holiday with me in February, reset the counter (a fancy feature of the iO brushes) when I started using it on 21 February. But by the time I was due to head on holiday again on 9 May, the head was entirely white. That’s just 77 days. I hadn’t noticed it degrading particularly, so I’ve no idea how long I’d been using it like that.

I swapped it again, but even worse than that – yesterday, 22 days later – the head is once again entirely white.

And I’m not alone. Reddit is full of users of iO toothbrushes complaining their head isn’t lasting as long as it used to, and the common denominator appears to be Amazon.

The challenge is on

I did as all modern people do, and sought out an AI to tell me what was going on.  And Claude reckons that these are counterfeit heads finding their way into the supply chain even of Oral-B itself:

Second, the real issue. I couldn’t find any evidence Oral-B has officially downgraded genuine iO heads in a recent batch. What I did find, repeatedly, is that fake iO heads are everywhere — and that’s exactly what premature splaying looks like. The giveaway in counterfeits is bristles made of a different, more loosely-packed material and slightly-off plastic mouldings, which is precisely why they flare out in weeks instead of months.

The trap: buying from Amazon doesn’t protect you, even from the official “Oral-B store” listing, because Amazon commingles stock from all sellers, so a fake can ship against the genuine listing. Heads, razor blades and batteries are the most-faked categories precisely because they’re cheap, frequent repurchases.

I’m not sure I’m fully convinced. So this time I’ve gone to Sainsbury’s. Let’s see what happens next.  I’ll report back in … however many days it lasts.