Caught on tv this morning, one version of a Titanium Edge tv spot ad “Any Hair Anywhere”, released 7/31/25 (details on the iSpot site here); from this ad:
Titanium Edge, the “2-in-one nose and ear groomer that goes wherever razors can’t … to finish my groom” — with a noun groom, a nouning of the verb groom, to denote a regular routine of grooming, here specifically for men and in fact specifically for shaving; this nouning would appear to be a commercial invention by Titanium Edge’s ad agency
The lexicographic background. The existing resources of the language, from the OED as revised in 2023:
verb groom I.i.3. transitive. To give (a person, oneself) a clean, neat, or smart appearance; to arrange or style (one’s hair, nails, clothes, etc.). Also with up. [1st cite 1837]
noun grooming I.2.a. The action or practice of maintaining a neat and tidy appearance; (now often) the result of this; the appearance of one’s hair, clothes, etc. [1st cite 1875]
Innovations. The OED has no noun groom in roughly the first sense of the nominal gerund grooming above. So what’s the point of coining such a noun? The general principle is that such fresh creations are more specific in meaning than the existing item or are associated with specific contexts of use or, of course, both. In the case at had, both: the nouning is used for a regular routine of grooming, not just any act of grooming; and it’s associated with a commercial product for use in men’s grooming, specifically the shaving part of the routine.
I submit that the though both women and men have grooming routines, as do young boys and adult men, there would be something decidedly odd in talk of Sally’s morning groom or 6-year-old Johnny’s.
I haven’t found any citations of the innovative noun groom other than in reference to the Titanium Edge ad (though groom certainly has been nouned in reference to dog grooming), which suggests that this nouning is genuinely recent. (Though it’s possible that my search strategies are no longer effective.)
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