Beards boom, and so do businesses catering to them
Politicians sometimes wear them, and so do a few chief executives. Urban hipsters have become synonymous with them, yet rugged outdoorsmen have been sporting them for years.
Beards — having become so popular that they've even had an annual movement ("no shave November," now more or less a year-round display) named after them — are part of a growing category of the male grooming market, which sees more than $6 billion in sales annually, according to Euromonitor data.
The slow decline of clean-shaven faces has given rise to a new male archetype, one that's becoming a coveted market demographic in its own right and spurring the rise of small businesses that cater to pampering hairy faces....