Study finds almost half of all beards contain faecal matter

A new study by Manchester Metropolitan University and Fragrance Direct reveals 47% of male beards contain faecal matter. Although it sounds gross, it could be a great selling point for retailing daily beard shampoos to your clients. A variety of beards were sampled in the study, and even short beards and stubble contained high amounts of bacteria. The research reveals that almost 50 per cent of male beards have traces of faecal matter. The study involved swabbing and analysing beards, in a bid to discover what germs lurked beneath the surface. Researchers found that the facial hair on 47% of the men sampled contained the microorganism ‘Enterococcus spp’, which is also found in the human bowel and in faecal matter. The majority of participants claimed they had washed their beards with soap on the same day as the test, and the beards were of varied lengths and styles, meaning even shorter beards contained bacteria. Surveys have found that around 60% of men don’t wash their hands after using the toilet, which could help explain the disturbing amounts of bacteria found in male facial hair.