The New York Times has a story about charities such as Locks of Love, which makes wigs for kids suffering from hair loss for medical reasons. The actress Diane Lane cut her hair for Locks of Love on live television. It’s all the rage to get haircuts to help “kids with cancer,” though as the charity’s website explains, most of the hairpieces go to kids with alopecia areata.
The Times reports, “As much as 80 percent of the hair donated to Locks of Love, the best known of the charities, is unusable for its wigs, the group says. … Even hair that survives the winnowing may not go to the gravely ill, but may be sold to help pay for charities’ organizational costs.” The wigmaker then rejects about half of the remaining hair.
To put it baldly: If you want to make a drastic hair change, do it for yourself. You’re probably the only person who is going to benefit. If you insist on cutting it for a higher purpose, read the Locks of Love FAQ first.
Hey! I think I heard that horse say,
“You can kiss my ass!”
I am so glad you did a post on this.I had long hair last year and wanted to give it to Locks of Love but my husband said that it would not be used like I thought it would.I have the really thick,black Indian hair so I was in a mood when I did not donate it but your article here proves my husband right!!!
OMG, only in America! I’ve never heard of this before.. In Brazil, a couple of years ago when the hair extensions thing was really big, you could actually get money from selling your hair to hairsalons:-S But of course, to sell it, you needed a perfect smooth hair..i suppose lots of hair were rejected as well. *lol*
Such a nice idea in theory. I’d be totally pissed if I cut all of my hair off and they didn’t use it.
Just to clarify, I should say that I think Locks of Love is a fine idea and I’m not accusing them of running some kind of scam or something! It’s just that the hype around it has far exceeded what is useful. They have a small staff that is up to its knees in hair donations, so unless you have hair that is very perfect and usable, there’s just no sense in doing it, IMHO.
Is that you below?
you are so cute!!!
a kiss
Wow, I did not know that. I was planning to donate my hair when it was still really long, but never got around to it. I’m glad that you brought this to our attention!
– Lillian from paperchandelier.net
@frasypoo: Are you going to tell your husband he was right? (A word of advice…never admit to such a thing)
@Kira, yes, that’s me with the dark hair in the posts below. Thanks!
Hi wendy
Unfortunately he was right here when I was reading that post!!!He admitted to lying though!!