GOLDEN LOCKS TRADE
H'WOOD HAIR EXTENSIONS HAVE COME A LONG WAY
By JENNIFER GOULD KEIL
October 15, 2006 -- Standing on the red carpet at the Golden Globes, surrounded by fans and paparazzi, Scarlett Johansson modeled her dress from Valentino, her jewels from Chopard and her hair extensions - from India.
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Helping fuel a national obsession with hair extensions, starlets like Johansson, Lindsay Lohan, Sienna Miller and Jessica Simpson are also helping shine a light on one of the hottest commodities in the world: hair from India.
Imports into the U.S. are soaring, according to government statistics, and prices have jumped 47 percent, according to one distributor. Salons now charge $3,000, or more, for human hair extensions.
As Johansson stood in the center on the entertainment universe that January evening, she may not have had any idea that her much-ogled locks probably came from an Indian peasant woman who donated the hair to her temple for good luck.
Thus began one of the most unusual journeys in the fashion world - a trip made with increasing regularity as both Hollywood and Main Street fall in love with the hot fashion accessory.
In fact, one business-minded starlet, Simpson, loved the accessory so much she started HairDo, a line of real and synthetic extensions that sell for $50 to $500 and debut at salons across the country this month.
One of the largest U.S. distributors of hair from India is Great Lengths USA, which reports that it expects hair extensions from India to grow into a $25 million to $30 million business this year.
Brett Butcher, its national program director, said increased demand from its 4,000-salon customers based across the country has juiced sales by about "35 to 55 percent each year for the past five years."
The company now receives "about five or six tons of hair every five to six weeks" from temples in India, which hold regular auctions, said Butcher, who noted the 47 percent rise in prices.
One temple, Tirupati, made $5.6 million from hair auctions in 2002, according to a 2003 report in The Wall Street Journal.
"Hair is a commodity, like anything else," said Butcher. "We get 100 percent virgin hair with no chemicals or henna for our deep pigmentation process, which is a highly held, patented secret."
At the ultra-chic Warren-Tricomi hair salon on W. 57th St., about one-quarter of the 200 clients who visit the salon each week come in for some kind of hair extension, said co-owner Edward Tricomi.
And about 150 to 200 clients a week get extensions in all five of the Warren-Tricomi salons, he added.
"It's a huge trend," Tricomi said. "Women love options. A lot of hair is cut broader with shorter lines this season. Extensions give women the option of long."
Clients pay anywhere from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars for the locks, which can be as simple as creating a fuller up-do for an event to full extensions that can last months.
Both Indian men and women regularly donate their hair at temples, said Raghu Sundaram, an associate professor of finance at New York University's Stern School of Business.
The Tirupati temple in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh is a "particularly popular spot" for South Indians, he said.
"The people who donate their hair are not concerned with what happens to it. If the money is put to good use, I see nothing wrong with that," said Manoj Joshi, an economic counselor at the Indian Embassy in Washington.
"If those who currently have a shiny bald head, would have had this available to them back in their twenties, they would be walking today with a thick head of hair"...Jason, sales rep and client.
