Faudra Tif Hair: Understand the punny names behind French hair salons

When it comes to naming their salon, it seems French hairdressers like nothing better than to play on words.

This punny trend, which has been growing for some years now, usually raises a smile, but you may roll your eyes at some of the names that feature in newspaper compilations of “favourite hair salon funny names”.

A Facebook group called Neurchi de jeux de mots de coiffeurs (hunters of hair salons’ play-on-words) was even created in 2017 for members to post pictures of particularly good – or cringeworthy – examples.

Attrac’tif word play

Salon wordplay relies extensively on two words: ‘tif’ (slang for hair) and ‘hair’ in English. 

Between 7% and 13% of all hair salons in France have integrated one of those two words into their signage, according to data compiled by Infogreffe.

Common examples featuring ‘tif’ include Seduc’tif (seductive), Attrac’tif (attractive), Exo’tif (exotic) or Cap’tif (captive). Google lists more than 77 Cap’tifs and 20+ Attrac’tifs around the country.

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Owners are more creative when it comes to using ‘hair’.

Here, stand-out salons include Popul’hair (populaire), of which there are three in Manche; a Faudra Tif Hair (faudra t’y faire; get used to it) in Dijon, a Dif'hair'ence (difference) in Sainte-Menehould (Marne) and 33 Miss‘T’Hair (mystère or mystery). Tête en l’Hair (tête en l’air; to be absent-minded) is another common one.

In Montpellier alone you will find Defini'Tifs Coiffure, Crea'Tif, Instinc'Tifs, Seduc'tifs, Parten'Hair and Mo'Tiffs Coiffure.

“I spent a whole day thinking about what I would call the salon with my daughter, who was 11 back then. ‘Cap’, because the shop is located on Cap-de-Croix street. ‘Tif’, because of the play- on words,” said Nathalie Zappia, an independent salon owner for 19 years of Cap’tif in Nice.


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“It came up after a discussion with my grandfather, who told me that I would one day be “connu et populaire” (famous and popular). It stayed with me. I wanted something that would stick in people’s minds. It was simple and straightforward,” said Maëva Gourbin, the owner of the three Popul’Hair salons in Manche, mentioned above

A similar reason was cited by Jonathan Nicolas, owner of Faudra Tif Hair in Dijon, to France 3. He said it was reminiscent of one of his childhood verbal tics and funny to remember.

Hair-raising facts

Data compiled by Le Monde in 2016 showed more than 2,320 salons named with hair, ‘tif’ or both words – representing 10% of hair salons in the country. 

Some 1,600 contained the word ‘hair’, against 713 for ‘tif’. Of the 2,320, 23% of them bore a similar name.

There were 134 registered Créa’tif or Créa’Tifs salons in 2016, the most common name, followed by l’Hair du temps (l’air du temps; be fashionable) and Cap’Tif. 

Grand-Est (13.7%), Corsica (12.8%) and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (11.7%) were the top three regions with the highest incidence of salon names featuring ‘hair’ or ‘tif’. Brittany was the lowest with 7.1%.

Some salon names have hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons.

Veby Erdogan, a salon owner who opened his shop Hair Dogan in Bourgoin-Jallieu (Isère) was harassed on social media after Damien Rieu, an MP from far-right party Rassemblement national, published a picture of his sign on Twitter with the comment: “Turkish hairdresser in Bourgoin”.

People incorrectly assumed it was a play on words with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and accused the shop of money-laundering schemes and drug trafficking.


Elsewhere, Nordpresse, the Belgian equivalent of The Onion or The Daily Mash, circulated a picture of a salon called Adolf Hitl’Hair, located on rue des Juifs in Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin), which bore the slogan: ‘Specialist in hair combed on one side’.

A vast number of people retweeted the picture, believing it was real.