O, to be lip and happening | Latest News India - Hindustan Times
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O, to be lip and happening

Hindustan Times | By
Jul 01, 2008 09:20 PM IST

If American cosmetic giant Estee Lauder is to be believed, you can beat the blues by mmm-ing your lips with a lipstick: preferably, of course, an Estee Lauder lipstick.

Oh stop moping and put on that lipstick. We know that you’ve been in a funk since you heard that inflation has gone up to double digits and that planes are flying with sleeping pilots and the end of the world is nigh. But if American cosmetic giant Estee Lauder is to be believed, you can beat the blues by mmm-ing your lips with a lipstick — preferably, of course, an Estee Lauder lipstick. It was after September 11, 2001, that company chairman Leonard Lauder decided to start a Lipstick Index after noticing that US sales in the lipsmacking product had increased quite a lot after the post-9/11 gloom. Similar results were obtained in recession-wracked Europe. Thus, the correlation found between beating depression and wearing lipstick.

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HT Image

The happiness-lipstick link is yet to become a ‘rule’ like the one that tells us that countries that have McDonald’s outlets never go to war against each other. (Will Iraqis shout out, ‘We’re lovin’ it!’ with regard to democracy if McDonald’s outlets dot Iraq’s landscape?) The fact that lipstick, especially on the collar, may not necessarily lead to a happy domestic situation, is a well-known cultural observation. But you can’t challenge empirical evidence — especially in the form of sales figures.

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Keeping that in mind, does one detect the possibility of Estee Lauder — and other cosmetic giants jostling their way into India — hoping we here keep moaning and groaning? Just for the record, our preferred shade happens to be hazelnut creme.

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