Cafe Alopecia

Roland beamed broadly, pushing open the door as he welcomed the first customers to Cafe Alopecia.

This rare and unusual condition, Alopecia universalis: is characterised by the absence of all of the hair, not only on the scalp, but also on the entire body. Affected individuals are born without eyebrows and eyelashes and never develop axillary or pubic hair. There are hair follicles but they are devoid of hair. The disorder is inherited as an autosomal recessive trait. It is caused by a mutation in a gene dubbed HR in chromosome band 8p21.2 that is the human homolog of the mouse "hairless" gene -- the human version of the gene in the mouse that is responsible for hairless mice.

When Roland first heard of it he realised the potential for a chain of restaurants where you could guarantee no patron would receive a meal with a hair in it.

Selecting staff from only the pool of people with the condition was an absolute boon. Some people are scared when they meet someone with Alopecia universalis, because they look strange. Now it was becoming cool, in the hospitality industry, to be bald from top to toe.