TAIF, 4 March 2006 — The women of Taif are beginning to notice that priceless beauty is really beauty at a high price, according to a report published recently in Al-Watan. They complain that most of the beauty and fashion salons in Taif are primitive and misdescribed as “beauty centers.” There are, they say, very few reputable beauty salons in the city.

Many, they say, are simply flash facades with ornate decorations that front dismal and dirty interiors.

To set up a “salon,” a woman (or man, for male customers) needs only a fancy neon sign with a catchy name, a well-furnished apartment, a couple of Filipino seamstresses and some inexperienced make-up “artists”. These makeshift establishments use counterfeit cosmetics and non-sterilized tools on their clients.

Characteristically, these salons have no reception desk that receives customers and organizes appointments. There is often a pervading odor of stale Asian food and, on too many occasions, bugs are in evidence. The premises are often simply three or four-room apartments.

Beauty and fashion salons are ranked according to the kind of service they provide and by where they are located. For example, in fashionable districts there are some very fancy looking beauty and fashion enterprises. However, even though the prices are very high, there is a noticeable lack of professional beauty therapists or seamstresses.

Solons in the less expensive districts have a less-attractive appearance and tend to sew school aprons and do some simple hair cutting. Cosmetics in such salons are often past their expiry date, are counterfeit or very cheap.

Reservations — or rather the lack of them — cause problems between customers because they are inefficiently organized and run on the principle of overbooking. Customers end up fighting or embarrassed with each other. Sometimes these salons even provide medical prescriptions or remedies without licenses from the authorities to do so.

Um Husam, a regular customer at one down-market salon, said she had visited this particular salon for years because their prices suit her. As for the cleanliness of the salon, she said she did not trust any of the employees and she visits the salon only for their seamstresses.

“I go to a regular salon in my neighborhood to have my hair dyed,” she said.