SA man heads back to eBay

2005-01-20 10:08

André Gouws

Cape Town - A man from Somerset West's plan to auction the back of his head for advertising space has sparked such interest that he has decided to run the auction on the internet for longer.

He also decided that the highest bid thus far is a bit "distasteful". The highest bid of $10 000 (about R60 000) that Marius Lourens, 29, received on eBay came from a pornographic website in England.

He does not have a problem to advertise something like this, but "one cannot say the name of the website out loud" and he decided not to accept the bid.

From Thursday morning, the auction on eBay re-opens with a opening bid of $5 000 (about R30 000). People who are interested have ten days to make their bid, Lourens said.

Lourens said there was a lot of interest in his offer to have a tattoo done on the back of his head for advertising purposes, but many large companies could not take a decision on advertising budgets in such a short time and that is why he decided to give them more time.

He advertised the back of his head on eBay after he saw that an American was paid $30 000 (about R180 000) in a similar auction. Lourens decided that he would better the American by having a permanent tattoo done and wearing it for two months.

He said his hair was already shaved on Tuesday night for a television programme on kykNET.

Lourens has also been getting more queries from South African companies after several newspaper reports about his plan.

- Die Burger