FROM HEMP TO HIP, SHOW HAS IT ALL

Problems with frizzy hair? Need to restore some shine to your locks? Try
rubbing in a little hemp seed oil. A Beverly Hills, Calif., company is
promoting its line of hemp seed shampoos at a convention of salon owners
and operators under way here.

The hemp seed oil comes from the tall, stalk version of the cannabis plant.
The female version of the plant is smoked as marijuana.

"The chemical that produces marijuana's effects is not in the oil,"
explained Lane Malone, director of major accounts for Alterna Applied
Research Laboratories, which bills itself the "first salon hair care line
to venture into hemp."

Malone is supervising the company's display at the huge two-day show of
hair, nail and skin care products being staged here by Armstrong McCall, a
national distributor of professional salon products. The event has
attracted between 15,000 and 20,000 salon owners and operators from around
the country to see new product line displays and demonstrations at some 150
booths in the Convention Center. The show continues through today and
offers everything from hair cutting and glitzy choreographed hair-styling
demonstrations to displays of mobile utensil carts, special shampoo sinks
and other equipment. And, oh, bikini wax.

The show isn't open to the public, but was jammed Sunday with buyers eager
to see demonstrations or to purchase products to sample.

For huge firms such as Matrix, the show is "a premiere event" among the 120
shows it participates in each year. It chose San Antonio to unveil its new
Via Dezign line.

Matrix has about 50 people staffing its displays and demonstrations, most
of them models and college students from the San Antonio area hired to
demonstrate new techniques and products to create the "smashed bob,"
"bobbed up" and "chaotic control" hairstyles expected to be "in" during the
next year.

Over at Graham Webb, a Generation Y line (the 13 to 28 year olds) called
Montage had Sara Jones, executive vice president of sales, excited because
of the range of products and affordable prices keyed to young lifestyles.

By comparison, Alterna's booth is a small space in the middle of the
exhibit hall, but it garners attention with a white banner bearing the
familiar five-stem green hemp leaf.

The two-year-old company was born into controversy over its use of hemp
seed oil in its hair and beauty products and its hemp leaf logo.

"It is not legal to grow industrial hemp in the United States," Malone
said, "but it is legal to import it from any of the dozens of other
countries. We are now importing our hemp from Canada," she continued, "but
I can assure you that everyone along the line has made sure our products
have no drugs in them."

Company officials note more than 25,000 products can be made from
industrial hemp, including rope, blankets, pizza and beer.

"For the beauty industry, cosmetic hemp is the aloe vera of the new
millennium," company Vice President Mike Brady stated in a news release.

Hemp seed oil is used because it's extremely rich in protein and amino
acids said to nourish healthy hair. The product -- about $14 a bottle -- is
sold through beauty salons.

Alterna's use of the hemp leaf on its products prompted antidrug group DARE
America to lobby city officials in Los Angeles to remove the firm's shampoo
ads from city-owned bus benches.

The firm responded by placing the ads instead on LA Metro buses, which the
city doesn't own.

"We recently got permission for an experimental project to grow industrial
hemp under strict controls at the University of Hawaii, but it is just one
acre in size," Malone said.

Earlier, Alterna sued Victoria's Secret, accusing it of copying its
distinctive designer-style containers.

If the rich hemp oil, attractive bottles and affordable prices aren't
enough, Alterna's products are laced with nostalgic aromas that smell like
certain foods or the taste of favorite foods.

How could anyone pass up a shampoo that smells like the taste of an orange
Dreamsicle? Now that could be addictive.