5 ms·

And whats so unbelievable about this stat?

by vuyani 10y ago

prawn 10y ago
Seems high to me too. Even accounting for it being an expensive and complicated service, what would hairdressers in Africa really be charging that wouldn't cause the global average spend to drop? It's saying that half a billion people are spending $1000/year each. I wonder if they've extrapolated from an optimistic figure?
nandemo 10y ago
According to this [0] the sum of black population, plus australoid (for the sake of the argument, let's say they will be part of the target audience regardless of how they self-identify ethnically) and mixed caucasian+black, caucasian+australoid etc is about 27% of world population. Let's round that up to 30%. Also, let's round up the world population estimate to 7 billion, and assume men are part of the target audience too. So total target audience is about 2.1 billion. Which is probably a huge overestimate but it doesn't matter... A U$500 billion market then means the average person spends about U$240 per year on hair care. Which is ridiculously high. [0] https://www.quora.com/Can-anyone-break-down-the-racial-demographics-of-the-human-race-population-by-percentage https://www.quora.com/Can-anyone-break-down-the-racial-demog...
- neilk 10y ago
  $20/month? That wouldn't be enough even for most white women. Black women's hair appointments are more expensive; many hair salons charge a premium. Plus they use a lot of products and elixirs to change the nature of their hair. Plus, many of them wear a wig-like accessory, often of real human hair, every single day. The process of 'weaving' that into their natural hair can cost hundreds or even thousands, at the high end. Source: black friend in college wrote an essay about this for a journal I was editing at the time, plus, common knowledge. There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. I don't know if you can get this to work out to $500B; other industry numbers I could find are like $10B, which would be about $50/month for every black woman in the USA.
  - sah2ed 10y ago
    > There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. You've basically identified the source of a "problem" that shouldn't even exist to begin with: an inferiority complex.
    - nostrademons 10y ago
      Isn't this basically the driving force behind every consumer product made since food & shelter became abundant?
      - sah2ed 10y ago
        I agree that mimetic pressures drive consumption but I was trying to dwell on the bit about black women becoming less proud of natural hairdo to make the market for hair attachments massive like it is today. I don't think Michelle Obama ever donned natural in her 8 years as FLOTUS. It used to be that women of African descent would sport plaits, Jheri curls (80s), Afro (70s) etc. These were styles that rarely required the use of hair attachments or wigs. Wigs used to be for masking hair loss ...
  - adamnemecek 10y ago
    You know how half of the population lives in less than a dollar a day or so? It's impossible that 2.7b can afford $20/month.
    - reckoner2 10y ago
      Of course. It's an average. Also included in that average are girls who get a $1000 weave twice a year plus monthly cuts, coloring and styling. And I'm guessing the product is catered more towards the second group.
  - 40acres 10y ago
    > Source: black friend in college wrote an essay about this for a journal I was editing at the time, plus, common knowledge. There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. I have to disagree here. There has been a 'natural hair' movement circulating through the black female community for some time now[1]. I'm not sure if it's because the dangers of chemically manipulating hair have become more prominent or other factors, but black women in my circle (which includes high school, college aged, middle aged, and 'professional age') have all been transitioning to a more natural style and it's a very well embraced trend. My girlfriend has been natural for a few years now and while it is harder to maintain she's told me that she will never go back. Source (anecdata of course): A black man. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_hair_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_hair_movement
- reckoner2 10y ago
  Some anecdotal data that might surprise you then: A good friend of mine gets her hair cut once a month and says with tip it's about $100. Then coloring a few times a year at $200 a pop, then lots on shampoo, conditioner, hair products, new hairdryer and brushes every few years. She's spent over $1000 for a weave multiple times in her life. She's of course at one end of the spectrum, but $240 on average a year doesn't surprise me that much.
  - nandemo 10y ago
    That doesn't surprise me at all. You've cherry-picked someone who's far richer (in absolute terms) than the average person within those 2 billion. You're probably talking about an American (or a Brit or a French person? Someone in the developed world) who's at least lower-middle-class. Consider someone in an emerging country. For the average Brazilian or Colombian, a U$1000 weave would be far too expensive. And the vast majority of the target population is living in Africa and is much poorer than the average Brazilian. FWIW, I don't see anything wrong with the startup. I just making a back of envelope calculation that shows the market estimate is BS.

And whats so unbelievable about this stat?

by vuyani 10y ago

And whats so unbelievable about this stat?

prawn 10y ago

Seems high to me too. Even accounting for it being an expensive and complicated service, what would hairdressers in Africa really be charging that wouldn't cause the global average spend to drop? It's saying that half a billion people are spending $1000/year each. I wonder if they've extrapolated from an optimistic figure?

nandemo 10y ago

According to this [0] the sum of black population, plus australoid (for the sake of the argument, let's say they will be part of the target audience regardless of how they self-identify ethnically) and mixed caucasian+black, caucasian+australoid etc is about 27% of world population. Let's round that up to 30%. Also, let's round up the world population estimate to 7 billion, and assume men are part of the target audience too. So total target audience is about 2.1 billion. Which is probably a huge overestimate but it doesn't matter... A U$500 billion market then means the average person spends about U$240 per year on hair care. Which is ridiculously high. [0] https://www.quora.com/Can-anyone-break-down-the-racial-demographics-of-the-human-race-population-by-percentage https://www.quora.com/Can-anyone-break-down-the-racial-demog...

neilk 10y ago
$20/month? That wouldn't be enough even for most white women. Black women's hair appointments are more expensive; many hair salons charge a premium. Plus they use a lot of products and elixirs to change the nature of their hair. Plus, many of them wear a wig-like accessory, often of real human hair, every single day. The process of 'weaving' that into their natural hair can cost hundreds or even thousands, at the high end. Source: black friend in college wrote an essay about this for a journal I was editing at the time, plus, common knowledge. There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. I don't know if you can get this to work out to $500B; other industry numbers I could find are like $10B, which would be about $50/month for every black woman in the USA.
- sah2ed 10y ago
  > There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. You've basically identified the source of a "problem" that shouldn't even exist to begin with: an inferiority complex.
  - nostrademons 10y ago
    Isn't this basically the driving force behind every consumer product made since food & shelter became abundant?
    - sah2ed 10y ago
      I agree that mimetic pressures drive consumption but I was trying to dwell on the bit about black women becoming less proud of natural hairdo to make the market for hair attachments massive like it is today. I don't think Michelle Obama ever donned natural in her 8 years as FLOTUS. It used to be that women of African descent would sport plaits, Jheri curls (80s), Afro (70s) etc. These were styles that rarely required the use of hair attachments or wigs. Wigs used to be for masking hair loss ...
- adamnemecek 10y ago
  You know how half of the population lives in less than a dollar a day or so? It's impossible that 2.7b can afford $20/month.
  - reckoner2 10y ago
    Of course. It's an average. Also included in that average are girls who get a $1000 weave twice a year plus monthly cuts, coloring and styling. And I'm guessing the product is catered more towards the second group.
- 40acres 10y ago
  > Source: black friend in college wrote an essay about this for a journal I was editing at the time, plus, common knowledge. There are some interesting cultural questions about how in North American society, natural black hair is deemed unacceptable, and this has generally been internalized by black women. If you choose to just be natural (as my friend did) you get a lot of flak from other black women. I have to disagree here. There has been a 'natural hair' movement circulating through the black female community for some time now[1]. I'm not sure if it's because the dangers of chemically manipulating hair have become more prominent or other factors, but black women in my circle (which includes high school, college aged, middle aged, and 'professional age') have all been transitioning to a more natural style and it's a very well embraced trend. My girlfriend has been natural for a few years now and while it is harder to maintain she's told me that she will never go back. Source (anecdata of course): A black man. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_hair_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_hair_movement
reckoner2 10y ago
Some anecdotal data that might surprise you then: A good friend of mine gets her hair cut once a month and says with tip it's about $100. Then coloring a few times a year at $200 a pop, then lots on shampoo, conditioner, hair products, new hairdryer and brushes every few years. She's spent over $1000 for a weave multiple times in her life. She's of course at one end of the spectrum, but $240 on average a year doesn't surprise me that much.
- nandemo 10y ago
  That doesn't surprise me at all. You've cherry-picked someone who's far richer (in absolute terms) than the average person within those 2 billion. You're probably talking about an American (or a Brit or a French person? Someone in the developed world) who's at least lower-middle-class. Consider someone in an emerging country. For the average Brazilian or Colombian, a U$1000 weave would be far too expensive. And the vast majority of the target population is living in Africa and is much poorer than the average Brazilian. FWIW, I don't see anything wrong with the startup. I just making a back of envelope calculation that shows the market estimate is BS.