Maintenance Costs In Hell-with-Good-Restaurants @ AMERICAN DIGEST

March 11, 2013

Maintenance Costs In Hell-with-Good-Restaurants

Lauren Greenfield photographed these New York professionals and found out how much they spend each month on their personal grooming. Does spending more mean looking better? (Left to right) Laura (25), $145 per month, Suzanne (36), $1720 per month and Claudine (29), $80 per month.

WELL, WHAT'S A GIRL TO DO when hookups, advancement and position still depend on Very Personal Grooming? She spends and spends and spends... and it would seem spends even more as the years add up. In this photo essay you can see some of the rituals, rites, and supplies that women -- even in this enlightened age -- still feel compelled to pile on themselves in their search for dates, mates, and advancement.

Beauty has become a pricey commodity; spending on Botox, spa treatments, designer makeup, cosmetic surgery, fitness and dieting total up to $160 billion dollars each year. Some women spend $1700 monthly on beauty, more than many women pay for rent.

Sounds like a lot, but think of it as an investment in a rent-free future.

Posted by Vanderleun at March 11, 2013 10:38 AM

Comments:

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New York "professionals?"

Oh, as in "career" women. I first read that as meaning call girls.

I'm so silly. :-)

Posted by: Don Rodrigo at March 11, 2013 12:39 PM

Unfortunately for the one in the middle, $1700 per month for 'grooming' won't buy the difference between 26 and 36. The ship has sailed, Honey Bun!

HaHaHaHaHaHa!!!

Posted by: Lorne at March 11, 2013 5:01 PM

Don,

That's how I read it. Silly!

Youth is a beauty all it's own. Sadly, the woman in the middle is trying to recapture the ephemeral. What a waste of time and money.

Posted by: pdwalker at March 11, 2013 5:54 PM

If was in the "acceptable" social strata of these broads, I would be smart and rich enough to avoid them like the plague. Hell, I AM smart enough already to avoid them.

I guess there could possibly be some rich Chinese men that might fall it.

Posted by: Mumblix Grumph at March 11, 2013 7:14 PM

It's not just professional women in NYC who do this. I've seen girls fresh out of the villages in Thailand and Indonesia spend every spare baht or rupiah from their meager store-clerk or receptionist salaries to buy cosmetics. These girls, many of whom were naturally gorgeous and needed no help from the "beauty" industry, had still been brainwashed, and I don't think that's too strong a term, into believing they had to have the latest products.

Posted by: waltj at March 12, 2013 8:21 AM