The Rise of SMP: Why More People Than Ever Are Getting SMP In East London & Essex
The male hair loss industry is booming. Esquire investigates one of the most popular alternatives to expensive surgery is Scalp Micropigmentation from companies like Hair illusion.
Scalp micropigmentation is but one fast-growing branch of the booming male hair loss industry, which is set to be worth well over £20 billion worldwide by 2025. According to the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery, a non-profit medical association of more than 800 hair restoration doctors, the number of men paying for hair transplants – the most expensive and invasive of the male pattern baldness treatments – rose 60 per cent from 2014 to 2016. Others have flocked to hair loss start-ups like Hims and Keeps, which have imbued hair growth supplements with a previously lacking sense of cool courtesy of Instagram-savvy ad campaigns (sample strap-line: “handsome – is no longer genetic”). Meanwhile, 3D microfibres, which are combed through thinning strands to create density, continue to rise in popularity. Then there’s the surprising re-emergence of male wigs.
Which all might have you wondering: why now? Is SMP really the answer to male pattern baldness? And why do we need one in the first place?
“Let me tell you, don’t go to a therapist – go to a barber. They’re cheaper.”
Lanzante is leading me around his long white-walled studio, past black leather barber chairs and bird’s-eye portraits of dotted scalps. “On Saturday my first three customers had split up with their wives,” he continues. “One guy wore a baseball cap his whole life. I should get paid extra.” As a veteran barber and balding man, the 61-year-old has an intimate understanding of how confidence-sapping hair loss can be – and how potentially lucrative its cure.