Elon Musk Touts His Newest Venture: Perfume That Smells Like Burnt Hair
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Elon Musk Touts His Newest Venture: Perfume That Smells Like Burnt Hair

The world’s richest person is selling the ‘finest fragrance on Earth’ on Boring Co.’s website for $100 a bottle

By JOSEPH PISANI
Thu, Oct 13, 2022 9:08amGrey Clock 2 min

Elon Musk is giving himself a new title: perfume pusher.

The Tesla Inc. chief executive announced on Twitter Tuesday night that he’s selling a $100 perfume that smells like burnt hair. Hours later, he tweeted that he sold 10,000 bottles, which would add up to $1 million in revenue.

The fragrance is currently being sold on Mr. Musk’s Boring Co.’s website, which describes the scent as, “The Essence of Repugnant Desire.” It shows a picture of a smoking red perfume bottle. The product isn’t expected to ship until early next year.

“With a name like mine, getting into the fragrance business was inevitable—why did I even fight it for so long!?,” Mr. Musk tweeted Tuesday night. He later added: “Can’t wait for media stories tomorrow about $1M of Burnt Hair sold,” a tweet which included a sideways laughing emoji.

He also changed his Twitter bio to “Perfume Salesman.”

Mr. Musk didn’t say how or where the perfume will be manufactured. Representatives for the Boring Co. and Tesla didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on Mr. Musk’s endeavour.

Mr. Musk is the world’s wealthiest person and one of Twitter’s most prominent users with more than 100 million followers. He has been in a prolonged back-and-forth to potentially take over the platform, one that he has often used to make big pronouncements—some serious, some not. He once tweeted he was buying English soccer team Manchester United only to say hours later it was a joke.

In addition to Tesla, he runs rocket company SpaceX, formally known as Space Exploration Technologies Corp., and founded Boring Co., an underground tunnel business, and neuroscience startup Neuralink Corp.

Mr. Musk’s newest venture comes as he’s tackling several high-profile business and geopolitical issues. SpaceX ferried astronauts to the International Space Station last week just as Tesla’s stock price slumped sharply following the car company’s disappointing delivery figures.

He also stirred a political dust-up when he suggested that Crimea, an area previously part of Ukraine that Moscow annexed in 2014, rightfully is part of Russia. The comment drew pushback from Kyiv, including Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky.

And in the same week, he also disclosed that he planned to go forward with his $44 billion takeover of Twitter, a surprise about-face after almost three months of trying to abandon the deal.

“Please buy my perfume, so I can buy Twitter,” Mr. Musk said in a tweet Wednesday.

Mr. Musk’s companies have sold unrelated things before, including a Tesla tequila and a Boring Co. flamethrower.

Jonathan Preston said he bought two bottles of Burnt Hair Tuesday night, one to save and the other to sniff. He received an email after the purchase with the subject line, “You’re on fire!”

“Hey, hot stuff!,” the message said. “This email confirms your purchase of Burnt Hair by Singed. It’s going to be lit. We’ll let you know when it ships, expected Q1 2023.”

Mr. Preston, 41 years old, is used to waiting for Elon Musk-related goods. It took seven months for the Tesla electric car he ordered to arrive, and even longer to get home internet service from Mr. Musk’s satellite-internet business, Starlink.

Mr. Preston, who is semiretired and lives in Phillipsburg, Mo., said he bought the perfume as a gag and that it won’t replace his usual scent, a peppery Axe body spray.

“It better smell like burnt hair,” Mr. Preston said about Burnt Hair. “If it doesn’t, I may try to return it, just out of disappointment.”

Mr. Preston said he thinks the perfume will be made, and if not, he assumes he’ll get a refund.

Mr. Musk teased the perfume in September.

“‘Burnt Hair’—Scent for Men by Singed,” he tweeted. “Stand out in a crowd! Get noticed as you walk through the airport!”



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What We Fight About When We Fight About Money

New research tackles the source of financial conflict and what we can do about it

By JULIA CARPENTER
Mon, Nov 27, 2023 3 min

When couples argue over money, the real source of the conflict usually isn’t on their bank statement.

Financial disagreements tend to be stand-ins for deeper issues in our relationships, researchers and couples counsellors said, since the way we use money is a reflection of our values, character and beliefs. Persistent fights over spending and saving often doom romantic partnerships: Even if you fix the money problem, the underlying issues remain.

To understand what the fights are really about, new research from social scientists at Carleton University in Ottawa began with a unique data set: more than 1,000 posts culled from a relationship forum on the social-media platform Reddit. Money was a major thread in the posts, which largely broke down into complaints about one-sided decision-making, uneven contributions, a lack of shared values and perceived unfairness or irresponsibility.

By analysing and categorising the candid messages, then interviewing hundreds of couples, the researchers said they have isolated some of the recurring patterns behind financial conflicts.

The research found that when partners disagree about mundane expenses, such as grocery bills and shop receipts, they tend to have better relationships. Fights about fair contributions to household finances and perceived financial irresponsibility are particularly detrimental, however.

While there is no cure-all to resolve the disputes, the antidote in many cases is to talk about money more, not less, said Johanna Peetz, a professor of psychology at Carleton who co-authored the study.

“You should discuss finances more in relationships, because then small things won’t escalate into bigger problems,” she said.

A partner might insist on taking a vacation the other can’t afford. Another married couple might want to separate their previously combined finances. Couples might also realize they no longer share values they originally brought to the relationship.

Recognise patterns

Differentiating between your own viewpoint on the money fight from that of your partner is no easy feat, said Thomas Faupl, a marriage and family psychotherapist in San Francisco. Where one person sees an easily solvable problem—overspending on groceries—the other might see an irrevocable rift in the relationship.

Faupl, who specialises in helping couples work through financial difficulties, said many partners succeed in finding common ground that can keep them connected amid heated discussions. Identifying recurring themes in the most frequent conflicts also helps.

“There is something very visceral about money, and for a lot of people, it has to do with security and power,” he said. “There’s permutations on the theme, and that could be around responsibility, it could be around control, it could be around power, it could be around fairness.”

Barbara Krenzer and John Stone first began their relationship more than three decades ago. Early on in their conversations, the Syracuse, N.Y.-based couple opened up about what they both felt to be most important in life: spending quality time with family and investing in lifelong memories.

“We didn’t buy into the big lifestyle,” Krenzer said. “Time is so important and we both valued that.”

For Krenzer and Stone, committing to that shared value meant making sacrifices. Krenzer, a physician, reduced her work hours while raising their three children. Stone trained as an attorney, but once Krenzer went back to full-time work, he looked for a job that let him spend the mornings with the children.

“Compromise: That’s a word they don’t say enough with marriage,” Krenzer said. “You have to get beyond the love and say, ‘Do I want to compromise for them and find that middle ground?’”

Money talks

Talking about numbers behind a behaviour can help bring a couple out of a fight and back to earth, Faupl said. One partner might rue the other’s tightfistedness, but a discussion of the numbers reveals the supposed tightwad is diligently saving money for the couple’s shared future.

“I get under the hood with people so we can get black-and-white numbers on the table,” he said. “Are these conversations accurate, or are they somehow emotionally based?”

Couples might follow tenets of good financial management and build wealth together, but conflict is bound to arise if one partner feels the other isn’t honouring that shared commitment, Faupl said.

“If your partner helps with your savings goals, then that feels instrumental to your own goals, and that is a powerful drive for feeling close to the partner and valuing that relationship,” he said.

A sense of mission

When it comes to sticking out the hard times, “sharing values is important, even more so than sharing personality traits,” Peetz said. In her own research, Peetz found that romantic partners who disagreed about shared values could one day split up as a result.

“That is the crux of the conflict often: They each have a different definition,” she said of themes such as fairness and responsibility.

And sometimes, it is worth it to really dig into the potentially difficult conversations around big money decisions. When things are working well, coming together to achieve these common goals—such as saving for your own retirement or preparing for your children’s financial future—will create intimacy, not money strife.

“That is a powerful drive for feeling close to the partner and valuing that relationship,” she said.

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