Man happy to tell hair-raising story

A man who has advised A-list Hollywood stars on hair transplant surgery has gone public on his previously covert career.

On the face of it, Mr Spencer Stevenson, 36, of Farndon, is a married property developer with four-year-old twins.

But over the last decade he has also built a reputation for being the leading hair transplant guru in the industry.

His respected advice has meant he has travelled all over the world to give men worried about hair loss the inside track on the treatment available.

They include well-known celebrities, from A-list actors to soap stars, who Mr Stevenson cannot name because of confidentiality agreements.

All this has been done under a pseudonym, Spex, a childhood nickname he revived to use in hair transplant forums where he shared his own experiences.

“I kept my story even from my closest friends. There was no need for them to know,” said Mr Stevenson, who endured five hair transplants and spent £33,000 in his own battle against baldness.

His problems began aged 21 when he began losing some of his brown messy locks.

In 2000, while travelling in America, he saw an advert for a hair-restoration clinic in New York.

Over the next few years he had four procedures at the clinic at a cost of £25,000, but was still not happy with his hair.

Mr Stevenson then found out about one of the leading hair transplant surgeons in the world, Dr Alan Feller, who is based in New York.

Dr Feller fixed the previous unsuccessful procedures and at last gave Mr Stevenson the natural hairline he wanted.

For the past eight years Mr Stevenson has been working for Dr Feller as an adviser, giving independent advice to thousands of men considering hair transplant surgery, and acting as a showcase of what is possible.

His website spexhair.com is seen as the go-to place on the internet for advice on hair loss treatment. He has also written an ebook on the subject.

Mr Stevenson, who is married to Mrs Natalie Stevenson, 34, and has twins, Lily and Alfie, said he received overwhelming support since coming out about his secret second career.

Mr Stevenson, a former pupil of Highfields School, Newark, was brought up in Shelton and for many years played for Newark Rugby Club. Even his rugby friends have been supportive.

Mr Stevenson said it helped that high-profile personalities such as footballer Wayne Rooney had gone public about their hair transplant treatment.

There has also been a boom in male grooming, a subject of a recent documentary by Morgan Spurlock, the maker of Super Size Me, which Mr Stevenson contributed to.

He said: “My aim is to help make it more socially acceptable. I want to make people aware of what is possible and educate them.

“It is really important that people understand that this industry is a very unsavoury environment.

“There are a lot of clinics out there that will tell you what you want to hear just to make money.”