“It’ll be $20 extra as there’s more surface area if you know what I mean.”
A spray-tan provider’s tax on larger women has seriously triggered internet women – and is said to be “rocking the tanning community.”
In a Facebook Messenger exchange, in which the names were blurred out, a would-be customer asked a beautician how much she charged for specific spray tan.
The spray-tanner responded by asking about the woman’s dress size. “Hey hun. It’s $35 for a 1 hour express. I just had a look at your Instagram and I’m just wondering what size you are??” she asked.
“Oh haha, I’m a size 10-12 AU why is that?” the woman messaged back.
The spray-tanner then explained that she would have to charge her extra for the additional supplies and time.
“My regular clients are a max size 8. It’ll be $20 extra as there’s more surface area if you know what I mean,” she said.
Surprised by the the surcharge, the woman posted the messages to a Facebook group, asking whether charging by surface area was standard practice.
The spray-tanner apparently saw the post and followed up with a message suggesting that the woman “lose a little” rather than complaining.
“Yeah hi I saw your post in advice and just wanted to say that if you don’t want to pay a $20 surcharge maybe lose a little!” she said. “Not trying to be mean, it’s just the industry x.”
The entire exchange was subsequently posted Tuesday to the All Things Tanning Facebook page, where it earned thousands of outraged comments from defenders of women’s rights, some of whom demanded that the company be “named and shamed.”
“It’s blatant discrimination,” said one Facebook user.
“I am a professional spray tanner and this absolutely disgusts me!” said another, who was among a number of professed beauticians who claimed a fat-tax was not common practice.
A more self-deprecating user admitted that a metered spray-tanning system would be pricey for her, joking: “In that case my spray tan would cost my fat ass $125.”
A fat-tax would seem to be bad business in much of the United States, where the average woman now weight about 170 pounds, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Some two-thirds of Americans are overweight and 40 percent are obese.
Progressive fat-acceptance and body-positivity campaigns have thus clashed with concerns about an obesity epidemic across the developed and developing world.
Speaking to the women’s blog Mamamia later on Tuesday, the woman, who remained anonymous, seemed less upset than many of her defenders.
“Honestly, I just laughed when she said to lose a little, the woman said. “I’m just glad it wasn’t said to an impressionable young teenager who could have developed [serious issues] from her comments.”