A gadget to blow away those hairstyling woes

Laurie Coleman, wife of Republican Senator Norm Coleman, has invented a tool for hands-free hair drying called BLO & GO.

People who have tried to style their hair by wielding a hairdryer in one hand and a brush in the other know it can be an exasperating juggling act.

The challenge of blow-drying at home is what inspired Coleman to invent the BLO & GO, a hairdryer holster.

For years, Coleman had been rigging wire coat hangers as holders for her hairdryer so she could use both hands to style her hair. “You go on a trip with senators, you have 45 minutes and you have to be ready to go,'' says Coleman, who does not have the luxury of travelling with a hairstylist. “Norm's not going to blow-dry my hair.''

Getting ideas

Her makeshift holsters were awkward but they worked. That led a friend, Anthony Turk, now her business partner, to encourage her to develop and manufacture the device.

It took four years of working with a product designer and now, BLO & GO is available in the USfor $19.99 (Dh73).

Coleman is a former model, mother of two and a one-time actress (Homeland Security, Three Days of Rain). She says the name was not her idea.

It came out of a committee. It was all in the brainstorming, during which “Freedom Styler'' was rejected.

And so it went: You get your hair blown out. You get blown ... out. And then bingo: “Blo & Go!''

This portable device does not grip the nozzle of the hairdryer; instead, it cradles the handle. It holds by suction to any non-porous flat surface such as a mirror or a window.
High and dry

Coleman's website, www.bloandgo.com, went live recently and her infomercials have started running as well. She does not know how many BLO & GOs she has sold so far but she says “all my friends and family have bought them''.

Including her husband, she says. “He's proud of me. He's happy as can be — in fact, he's used it.

Every once in a while, he gets out of the shower and uses it. “Anything that helps the family and pays the bills is good,'' he says.

Press secretary LeRoy Coleman (not related to the senator) confirms that the senator is “indeed proud of his wife and the product designed by her''.