Thinning Goes Mainstream

I watch way too much T.V. Notice that I even capitalize it. But one thing about watching a lot of it is that you know what a lot of other people are watching. I was mentioning this to a good friend of mine, Greg Taylor of Taylormade Hair in San Francisco (as background, he is the guy that invented the vacuum cap). I was talking about how so many companies are now developing products to help women with thinning hair. I knew this was going to happen 20 years ago. I was actually starting to doubt my prescience since it was taking so long for it to happen. But wait long enough and all predictions come true.

For a couple of years now you have seen shampoo companies coming out with ‘volumizing’ shampoos and styling aids. Now we are seeing them come out with powders too that hide the scalp and thicken the hair shaft. I have some of this in the salon and they are really quite cool. And on the T.V. last week I see Joan Rivers (what did she do, exactly, to become famous??) selling a new hide the scalp make-up. It looks like an eyeshadow brush that you apply to the scalp. But wait, there’s more! And there is.

Several companies that did nothing but manufacture religious wigs have now started making partials for women with thinning hair. Wholesalers that did nothing but men’s hair systems are now desperately trying to make something to help women. One of the reasons why they are failing (in my view) is that they are making women’s partials by taking a man’s design and putting longer hair in it.
More and more women are trying to do something about their hair loss there is now a response from the market. This is good and bad. Now that the market is responding there will be a flood of good products and really bad products, and a few harmful products. This is not a fanciful guess. I am 46 years old and I may not hear like I used to and play hockey like I used to, but I have been around long enough to recognize that some events unfold as they always do. I guess we’ll see in the next little while what happens. But in the meantime women with thinning hair should take some comfort in that they are not alone, and more people are listening to them every day.