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  • What you're seeing is 200,000 ponytails of human hair.

  • Combined, that's at least 25 miles of hair.

  • The hair is just busting out all over the place. Too much.

  • All these ponytails are donated.

  • But not all of them will be made into wigs.

  • In fact, many get eliminated at the beginning of the wig-making process.

  • Cannot be used.

  • So, it's a shame that these people donated their hair and they thought that it was gonna do something nice for somebody.

  • But it's not usable.

  • So, how do they decide which ponytails to keep and which to toss?

  • And once hair makes it through inspection, how does it go from this to this?

  • Cutting the hair is only the first step of the process, and perhaps the easiest.

  • From there, workers perform over 50 hours of manual labor to transform the single ponytails into full-fledged wigs.

  • This can take four to six months.

  • Hair We Share is a nonprofit that provides free wigs to people with hair loss due to a medical condition.

  • So, most people, when they think hair loss, they think cancer.

  • We're way more than that.

  • In the last month, we've serviced a motorcycle accident, domestic violence, and two burn victims.

  • Its cofounders enlist the help of 20 volunteers to sort through the abundance of donations at their New York headquarters.

  • The donated hair is sorted into categories of color, texture, and length.

  • One more.

  • Nope, that's brown.

  • Sorters measure the hair to make sure it reaches the minimum length of eight inches.

  • Otherwise, it can't be used.

  • The length doesn't need to be exactly the same.

  • If it's 3, 4 inches, even 6 inches is fine, just not 2 feet and 8 inches.

  • In addition to hair that's too short, a lot of other things disqualify donated hair, like hair that's highlighted, tangled, or just has unnatural colors.

  • This is a big problem. Like, this cannot be used.

  • It cannot be used.

  • Because the hair is not tied together in a rubber band, and it's reversed, it will tangle.

  • So it's not usable.

  • The post office has rollers that the mail goes through, and if it's in an envelope that's just a regular envelope, it gets torn.

  • And the hair gets caught in the rollers.

  • And so, unfortunately, this is beautiful blond hair, which we're always in need of, but we just can't use it.

  • This came to us wet, so we appreciate that the person washed their hair, but it needed to be dry before they sent it to us.

  • This is now molded, and it smells bad, and it just cannot be used.

  • When we can't use hair, unfortunately we discard it.

  • We have tried to find companies that will use it to clean up oil spills, and any of the companies we've contacted said that they're getting too much hair.

  • So, I'm gonna put one together now, OK?

  • Yeah, so this is black.

  • So, watch.

  • Watch.

  • No, yep, we can call this black.

  • The hair is sorted into eight colors.

  • When I look at hair, I see 40 colors.

  • I don't see eight hair colors.

  • Once the hair's all mixed together, you're not gonna know if it's light brown or medium brown.

  • And we all have more than one color in our hair, so it's perfectly fine.

  • It takes six to nine ponytails to make a single wig.

  • Those of similar color, texture, and length are packaged together and sent to Hair We Share's manufacturer.

  • There, the ponytails go through a hackle to evenly blend the hair and remove any uneven or weak strands.

  • During this stage, anywhere from 10% to 60% of the hair can be lost, depending on its strength and health.

  • But what is left is smooth, blended hair.

  • The freshly hackled hair is then pressed into a holding card with tiny metal pins to ensure it doesn't get tangled again.

  • Part of the hair is sewn into wefts, which are then sewn onto the sides and the back of the wig cap.

  • The rest of the hair strands are ventilated by hand.

  • This is what makes the wigs look realistic.

  • Small strands of hair are pulled through the cap with a hook one by one.

  • This is an extremely meticulous process that can take up to 10 hours per wig.

  • After the last strand is ventilated, the manufacturer sends the finished wig back to Hair We Share, where it is washed and styled.

  • But not all the donated ponytails are guaranteed to make it to a manufacturer, even if they're perfectly usable.

  • The ponytails cost us nothing because they're shipped to us.

  • It's all labor-intensive.

  • Unless we have the financial donation for this year, we won't have enough money to create 3,700 wigs.

  • Those ponytails have to sit in inventory until they're sponsored or funded.

  • But for the hair that does get made into wigs, it finds a new purpose with a recipient.

  • You know, I'm just excited.

  • Excited to get the wig.

  • Oh, it's lovely.

  • Looks beautiful.

  • It is.

  • I can't even believe it's not my hair.

  • I got used to being bald, but honestly, putting the wig on and having that beautiful... just this hair makes me feel a little bit like my old self.

  • Which is a blessing.

What you're seeing is 200,000 ponytails of human hair.

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