It has been a few weeks now that you suddenly started seeing more moustaches than usual and you are wondering why ?

In 2003, two Australian blokes, Travis Garone and Luke Slattery founded a charity called Movember. They actually realized that the moustache was not fashionable anymore. The first year, they succeeded in reruiting 30 Mo Bros (short for Movember brother) but unfortunatly they raised £0.

£527,492 had been raised

Thanks to word of mouth, by 2005,  £527,492 had been raised and Movember found its first official partner : Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia (PCFA). A few years later, the charity can count on Mo Bros from 21 countries worldwide and in 2013, GQ Australia magazine awarded the Social Force of the Year award to the foundation.

Today, the Movember Foundation can rely on a little less than 5 million Mo Bros et Mo Sistas. For sure, you know one of them…maybe you ARE one of them. But what is the motivation for people to get involved in this project ? Why this charity more than any other ?

Well, we can’t say that there is a lot of prevention around male deseases. The Medias rarely deal with this subject. That’s where the moustache comes in!

It generally is intriguing and leads people to wonder why some men are actually wearing it. It is a way to start conversations, put down taboos and eventually move to more serious topics.
Moreover, the movement has a real festive side ! First, you can openly make fun of your friends wearing the moustache, especially if they look like idiots with it. And believe me, it has no price. Then, the charity encourages Mo Bros and Sis to organize parties and events to collect even more money.

Finally, I think you should have a look at the TedxToronto conference Adam Garone gave in 2011. He is telling his story, his “Movember journey”, giving us some quite funny anecdotes and sharing all his love.

So, next year, think about it and speak about it around you. It is so important for the research and the education above all. Let’s keep in mind that faster a cancer is revealed, more luck there is to recover from it.