D.C.-based Grooming Lounge launched as an e-commerce site in 2000, selling moisturizers, shaving creams and other grooming products for men, and was among the first to seize on the growth in the number of men willing to spend money on products that improved their appearance.
Two years later, it opened its first stand-alone salon and spa, exclusively for men, in downtown D.C. at 1745 L St. NW Four years later, it opened a Tysons outpost at Tysons Galleria.
The men’s grooming products business in the U.S. has grown from $3.5 billion a year in 2000 to an estimated $21.7 billion now, Grooming Lounge estimates.
Grooming Lounge has ridden that wave of growth.
“When we launched the website, the goal was to provide a resource to our beer drinking, football watching buddies who were too embarrassed to buy the skin care they needed at a department store,” said founder Mike Gilman.
When it started in 2000, The Grooming Lounge sold three moisturizers for men. Its website and salons now carry 36 facial moisturizers, 11 face serums, 17 eye creams, 7 lip balms, and 11 masks, all specifically for men. It currently carries a total of 700 men’s grooming products, compared to 30 when its website launched 20 years ago.
Grooming Lounge says beard care has been one of the fastest-growing segments in the men’s grooming segment, with an 800% increase in the number of beard products available since 2000. Grooming Lounge itself says in the past two years, it has been sent 150 new beard products for retail consideration.
Grooming Lounge’s annual America’s Most Handsome Cities list, based on how much men spend on personal-care services and products, shaving needs and apparel and how fit cities are, ranked Arlington, Virginia, the most handsome city in America on its 2019 list.
