Designate the Fate of your Pate

I love adverts for “miracle” baldness cures. They’ve fascinated me since I was a child, chiefly because my dad was convinced I’d be a slap-head by the time I was 19. In fact, everyone was convinced of this, mainly because my dad was very convincing – and talkative.

As a teenager, I “articulated” these deep fears in an appallingly-drawn cartoon strip entitled The Onset, in which a bald man, short on confidence and money, goes to buy a toupee. Looking at the available range, including “The Elvis” and “The Jimmy Savile”, he has to settle for the cheapest syrup in the shop – “The Pedal Bin”, a horrid, nasty rug made out of two Brillo pads, strung together into the shape of a comb over.

Anyway, 23 years after this, ” The Onset” hasn’t happened to me yet. I was falsely alarmed. That’s not to say it won’t happen, but at least I made it to 40 with my barnet intact; as Rolf Harris used to say, some kids aren’t so lucky.

So it’s not out of any form of smug satisfaction that I chortle at ads for hair regrowth. It’s just that they remind me of my pathetic, youthful cartoon efforts; and how I always wish the advertisers would give their “After” photos a celeb or style-related tag, just so you can truly visualise what you’re investing in. How about these examples for a sure-fire sale?