Movember

It's the most wonderful time of the year, as the song goes. And no we dont meant Christmas. Its a much better time for mustache lovers, Movember!

Hopefully it is something you may have heard of, with that simple and catchy name, and it's something that is almost upon us.

A lot of charities and awareness organizations like to have a concentrated campaign spread over a month, and the month of November is best known for hosting the marvellous "Movember" around the world, a global campaign to raise awareness and funds for men's health causes through the medium of facial hair.

While the debate goes on over whether or not a beard is 'allowed' as part of this growing campaign (to which our answer is 'Hell yeah baby'), one thing that cannot be disputed is above the lip, 'mustache' is what puts the M in Movember after all.

This unusual but effective awareness campaign traces its roots back to two separate incidents in Australia, in 1999 a group of around 80 young men in Adelaide came up with the idea of raising funds for the RSPCA by getting their November moustaches growing for what they called "whiskers for whiskers", an idea which with the help of national news coverage spread to good acclaim. Then in 2004, an unrelated group in Melbourne did a 30 for 30 a good 5 years before ESPN gave it a go - only this involved 30 men growing moustaches for 30 days, all in the name of prostate cancer and depression amongst men.

The latter was of course the movement that would become the Movember Foundation{movember.com}, founded officially the previous year but reaching registered charity status in 2006, and not too many Novembers later found itself gaining strong global attention (the foundation has officially expanded to over 20 countries at the time of writing) as people around the world took up the challenge for what has expanded to become a general range of men's health issues, though the primary associations are still with prostate cancer, testicular cancer, mental health, and promoting clean living.

The only rule of the challenge, really, is to start November 1st as clean-shaven, and raise funds and/or awareness as your upper lip in particular gradually becomes less and less clean-shaven. And that's not to say only men are allowed to take part either, while women, teenagers, and children of course are genetically less able to grow an impressive moustache, they are encouraged to join in as well as any contribution is welcome (although you would presume that most children have been successfuly doing the 'no shaving' challenge every day of their lives).

The official campaigning doesn't stop with that though, as the Movember Foundation has through their own initiatives and collaborations developed a number of other events to bolster their reach, including the "Sweaty Mo" (a fitness / distance goal challenge), and "The Distinguished Gentleman's Ride" (a joining of classy moustaches and vintage motorcycles for a globally-synchronised group ride), as well as many events organised on a local and individual level.

What effect those individual events have on the fundraising events is for the internal accountants and event press releases afterwards, but it is known that the Movember Foundation has in it's history raised over AU$850m for the causes it represents. With the AU$1b mark likely to be broken within the next two Movembers, long may it continue.

And if you're taking part (you better be), you may well find like thousands before you, that on December 1st you quite like that furry top lip that you've just spent a month growing, long may that continue too...

Movember Mustache Growing Kits

You can help that tache on it's way to freedom by purchasing one of our Movember mustache growing kits. Full of premium ingredients to promote growth and prevent itching, along with handy pocket sized scissors and comb, for essential on-the-go maintenance.