I originally had started to grow my hair from shoulder length again with the intent of donating it to Locks of Love.  This was perhaps 3 years ago.  My hair is now waistlength and beautiful!  I was browsing through these forums, as I do at times, and was alerted about LoL's practices.  While I acknowledge that this site and others are biased in favor of long hair,  the data provided was displeasing enough to me that I will not be donating to them.  In fact, now that I have learned how to put my hair up in a bun (my favorite piece of hair jewelry is a handmade "brass" hairfork) I rather like my hair and no longer want to cut it.   

I am loving the compliments I get, although I don't know how to respond other than a simple, "Thanks!" and a charming smile to (most commonly) "Wow! Your hair is so long!".  I hope that by the tone of their voices that it is in admiration, and not in condonation... and a simple "Well, duh" would not be appropriate. 


Thanks again everyone! 

I will be spreading the word and informing each and everyone that suggests I make a donation to grow their own. 

Does anyone here know how to grade hair for wig sales and how much can one get?  I don't plan on cutting any time soon but was curious.  My hair is undyed, un-curlable, untainted from hair products, hairdryer-free, and gets washed about once or twice a week (this really helped ALOT in getting healthier looking-  and feeling- hair).

Information for any newcomers can be found below.

From the BBB about Locks of Love:
http://www.give.org/reports/care2_dyn.asp?733

http://www.tlhs.org/faq.html

In plain English:

Locks of Love is a charity organization, which collects human hair to create wigs for cancer patients.

So far a noble idea. However during long lasting discussions and research activities of our members, LoL did not get out of the game in such noble fashion. It is said that the performance of the organization is not as good as one would like to, in fact it is said that they gathered much more pony tails than wigs manufactured. I would highly recommend to give a donation a second thought, to keep the hair and better donate money to a charity you know well enough.

Please follow as well this link, a report from the Better Business Bureau.
Read as well this text coming from a member of ETLHS, nicely written together:

We disapprove of Locks of Love because:

- Their stated purpose is to make wigs for alopecia sufferers, but news stories and talk shows say the wigs are for children with cancer who lose their hair to chemo. This gets more human interest from their audiences. But chemo patients are generally better served medically and functionally with synthetic wigs, and many are more comfortable with turbans or caps. Most children with

cancer prefer not to wear wigs. The organization seems to make no effort to correct the misconception about who gets the wigs.

- They make far fewer wigs than the number of ponytails they collect would supply, and seem to have no valid explanation for this disparity.

- The Better Business Bureau has found them not to be totally compliant in following proper procedures for administering a charity.

- Locks of Love has publicly acknowledged that they have ample supplies of hair, but they make no effort to switch their solicitations to cash rather than more hair. All they seem to want is for more and more people to cut off their hair. This seems to be much more important to the press, the organization, and its proponents than the wig making.

- Television and print media is constantly showing long haired women being shorn. They show all this cutting, and only rarely anything about the wig recipients. It suggests that long hair has no value to its wearer except as something to be chopped off. Although there are obviously many people who adore seeing hair chop events, many other people LOVE seeing long hair like mine. My hair gives pleasure to me and to others who see it and DOES serve a worthy purpose being on my head. You should hear the women in my aunt's nursing home admiring my hair. It gives them a lot of happiness to see it.

- Most of the donated hair does NOT wind up on a child's head. It is sold to commercial wigmakers who are selling their wigs to models, celebrities, etc., or sits in a warehouse.

- Thousands of long haired women are nagged by both well-meaning and mean-spirited people that they should give up hair they love in the name of this charity. This is just plain rude. Why aren't they giving their car away to a poor person, giving their home away to a homeless person, or selling their jewelry and other possessions to donate the cash to the less fortunate? To women on this site, it is NOT just hair, just as a to a car aficionado their automobile is not just a car that is disposable. Generally, our hair means more to us than it would mean to Locks of Love's intended recipients.

Go to ebay to check out human hair ponytails. They don't go for much at all. You have to consider that you'd be competing against women in third world countries.

It's really not worth bothering with the idea.