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With the cost of living sky rocketing I already find myself cutting back on life's little luxuries.
I try to go longer between hairdresser visits and can't remember when the last time I bought any expensive beauty products
I'm also on low/no buy new clothes this year and trying to utilise the clothes I already have. That's besides making changes to the heating and fuel in the car. Also less cinema trips and meals out.
Okay the thing that intrigues me is this. I have many friends who are 'really' high maintenance. And they're not all well off.
If I use Friend X as an example.
She has microbladed eyebrows that need topping up every now again.
She has her nails done every 4 weeks.
She also has eyelash extensions which have to be redone regularly.
As well as that she has regular facials and botox. She doesn't have extensions, but some of my friends do, and apparently they need to be moved at extra £££ every couple of weeks.
It's not just older ladies having this done, lots of younger people have gone down this high maintenance expensive route as well
How on earth will they manage to keep up with all this expensive grooming?
Listening to some of them talk, I get the impression that the top ups and ongoing maintenance is sometimes almost as much as the original treatments!
Because of the horrendously rising high cost of living do you think we'll see a return to more natural looking women, as the majority won't be able to afford to have these things done anymore?
I am partially sighted and visit a chiropodist every 6-8 weeks. That costs £40 but otherwise I would be mopping up blood and worried about infections.
A mobile hairdresser visits 2 monthly, I wash my hair, she cuts it and I allow it to dry naturally for £20.
Before Covid I had my eyebrows threaded for £3 every few weeks, and I have not returned since.
Norah and still paying taxes🥴
PamelaJ1
All I can say is that I am very busy. None of my clients are cutting back.
Great!
You're employed, wonderful news - salons are busy.
I do my part. Hair cuts, balayage, facials - I need help! 
All I can say is that I am very busy. None of my clients are cutting back.
We've cut down on meals out, takeaways etc., but I'm not cutting down on my hair treatments or nails. It's important to me, and DH agrees.
What concerns me, at the moment, is that our NHS dentist has stopped treating patients on the NHS, so we had to look for another dentist, as we hadn't been too happy with our NHS dentist for a while, but stuck with it, as we knew there were no other NHS dentists in this area.
We have found a very good private dentist, have attended once (for an extraction), and it was great, but I need a lot of remedial/cosmetic work done (as I said, my previous dentist wasn't too hot), and I am dreading what the cost will be....😳🙂😳
An old thread, but still relevant to the times.
I only visit a hairdresser about twice a year and do all the other beauty ‘stuff’ myself, so don’t spend money on it.
Everyone will just have to cut back and spend on the essentials more and more.Unless they have loadsa money of course.
£200 a month? Crikey!
I spend just under £200 a month on keeping slim and facial hair free. If I had to cut back, the above would be the last to go!
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I wouldn't go without my regular 6/7 weekly Cut/Wash/Blow dry with my hairdresser and I could stretch the time scale by a week or two.
I went grey after cold capping during chemo when you can't do anything to your hair and what didn't fall out, grew out so I had half colour and half grey. Thankfully it grew back and the grey is a colour I'm happy with so need to go back to colouring.
But the chemo curls are another thing altogether so the regular trimming and thinning is needed if I'm not to look like a woolly sheep!!
Stressedok
Also always thought what happens of u start on the magic no wrinkles.cream.and then stop using it. Does the skin just sag more and just melt off ya face?
🤣🤣🤣
Why do you think we keep using it? The manufacturers are counting on us thinking exactly that.
What beauty treatments. I use a bath or a shower and that's it..I just don't have the time, money or motivation to do all that. Also always thought what happens of u start on the magic no wrinkles.cream.and then stop using it. Does the skin just sag more and just melt off ya face??
Thinking well-being and mental health in terms of beauty treatment is an issue.
I used to drive a very old (didn’t ask her age) lady to and from the hairdresser once a week. She told me she needed it to look good but she went for the chat and a cuppa too.
if she was still alive, it might also be a chance for an hour in the warm.
Oh dear, reading this thread I maybe high maintenance compared to some. When we go to a hotel with a Spa, that’s where you will find me, I enjoy a body massage and a facial, so relaxing.
Regular manicures/pedicures, hair cut with woven highlights/low lights.
Gym membership.
Thankfully I can afford them, and judging by how far in advance things have to be booked locally and the abundance of Hairdressers, Nail Bars and Beauty Salons I am not the only one.
I colour my own hair and only because I get a patch of grey at the temples. If I could wake up one morning and be grey all over I wouldn't bother.
I was the same during lock down eazybee. My hair style is very short and when it begins to grow out it looks really awful. Not having it cut for a couple of months when I have it cut every 4 weeks was a nightmare.
Beauty treatments are generally morale boosters and I think many will go if money is scarce, but not all. I went for many months during lockdown without a haircut and it was dreadful, my hair and my morale; it would be the last thing I would give up.
I heard the other day that Churchill did not ban the production of lipstick during the war because it was a morale booster, and I believe it was one of the first things women freed from the death camps asked for as their health returned.
snowberryZ
And will we see the more expensive salons and spa and beauty places go out of business?
People will be after a bargain. Maybe mobile hairdressers will come into their own as people will no longer be able to justify paying £200 at a salon.
Who pays £200 at a salon??!!! I stopped colouring my hair 6 years ago (oh, the relief from the tyranny!) and pay about £40 to my local salon for a cut and dry. £200 may be London prices but not here in the provinces!
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Most threads on gransnet are first world, saggi.
Even in the poorest societies people choose to adorn hair and body. Yes there are limits where I think things are OTT on spending but its not an all or nothing issue.
hollysteers - yes indeed, not to mention the fact that, as a few others have said, sometimes things like manicures, pedicures, massages etc, may be the one 'little treat' which lifts a person's spirits or helps them cope with mental health issues. I have a friend who is bipolar and suffers from severe anxiety, but she finds that going out once every few weeks to have her nails done helps her face the outside world. It's not always a question of vanity or being high maintenance.
What a virtue signalling remark Saggi.
Yes, we live in the first world and our everyday matters are of interest to us. We can’t be banging on heavyweight matters all day long.
It also has a serious element as people are conscious of money matters in the present climate.
Have my hair cut every six weeks. Never had a manicure or pedicure or whatever threading is to my eyebrows ….my eyebrows are the ones I was born with !! Never have worn makeup …so I am pretty low maintenance I think . I’m clean….tidy and fashionable up to a point. I don’t drive so have to go everywhere on foot or public transport …where the real poor with real problems are. What a very first world thread.
Essential maintenance then ;)
I have none of those - I've stopped getting my hair cut and coloured at the hairdresser. Now I do my colour at home and try and go as long as I can without having to go and get it cut. I do, however, admit to going to the local beauty salon every few weeks for facial waxing/threading - but again, I'm trying to extend the period between appointment to save a little. If I didn't go at all, I'd soon be giving the bearded lady from The Greatest Showman a run for her money!
As said, haircut is not really a beauty treatment, as such.
Do you have regular nail extensions?
Hair extensions?
Eye brows 'slugged'
Eyelash extensions?
Botox?
Other 'minor' plastic surgery?
It all adds up to large sums of money over a year - decade, and more.
The point of the thread is, what do you do if the money becomes tights and tough choices have to be made?
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