When we wrote about the creepy Facewaver Exercise Mask last year, we thought we’d seen the worst of bizarre Japanese inventions. But now they’ve come up with an even weirder gadget – a silly-looking new product called the ‘Facial Fitness PAO’.
The PAO was designed by Japanese beauty company SHLAB – it consists of a round plastic mouthpiece with plastic paddle wings on either side. In order to use it, you simply hold the device firmly in your mouth and bob your head up and down to swing the paddles.
The company claims that performing this exercise for 30 seconds, twice a day, can significantly tone up facial muscles, making a person look much younger. They demonstrate its correct use in their two-minute advertisement, which is so absurd, I dare you to watch it with a straight face.
Photo: SHLAB/Facebook
“Just because major facial sagging is attributed to aging, is accepting it your only option?” the ad asks. It then goes on to show us the ‘focused 30-second workout for the muscles around the mouth’. They claim that the technique works to firm up facial muscles, no matter how old you are.
“The key to a youthful face is muscle tone!” they inform us. “Facial muscle training tightens the skin, restoring youthful expressions that brim with confidence. This unique training method was developed to efficiently apply load to the muscles around the mouth. That’s Pao Facial Fitness.”
The ad also shows people who have used the Pao and experienced miraculous results. “Recently, I got more positive comments on beauty,” said one woman. Others said that they never realised that their facial muscles need exercise. “I never imagined this result,” said another woman, who reported that her face had become slimmer since she started using the Pao.
There are supposedly three major benefits of using the Pao – firming up smile lines, firming the facial contour and turning up the corners of the mouth. The SHLAB website claims that the product works on five main facial muscles – the lesser zygomatic, the greater zygomatic, the cheek, the risorius and the orbicularis oris.
The Pao works by providing ‘maximum and concentrated load’, ‘left and right equilibrium movement’, and ‘continuous enjoyment’. The mouthpiece has a wave shape and is oval to equally distribute the load. There’s also a stopper installed in the mouthpiece, which prevents it from falling out during the exercise. The balance weights are interchangeable, allowing for three different variations – 18g, 23g and 28g.
Another ad for the product features none other than football superstar Cristiano Ronaldo. Well, he doesn’t actually put the thing in his mouth. He just poses with the Pao while other models demonstrate its use. Perhaps he was afraid he’d look too silly? Or maybe he didn’t want his facial muscles to get ‘ripped’!
“In my everyday training sessions, there is one area of my body that I hadn’t been exercising: my facial muscles,” Ronaldo writes on the SHLAB website. “That is, until I discovered Pao. Pao Facial Fitness is a fun way for building up your facial muscles and shaping your smile.” Well, I don’t care what he says, I still have a hard time believing he actually uses the thing.
“Just watching someone exercising with the Pao makes you want to try it,” the website claims. I’m not too sure about that – it just makes me want to laugh!
