Ten years ago when it came to men’s grooming, it would have been hard to convince the average man to use more than a single block of soap to look after himself from top to toe, let alone a root-boosting hair tonic, alpha lipoic acid night serum or white algae anti-ageing eye cream.

Today, a daily Korean seven-step personal care routine is becoming more the norm, with a tsunami of new, sophisticated grooming products launching every year. But although we have them, do we know what we’re doing with them?

To save you the mortal embarrassment of heading to the emergency room having ingested half a tub of sugar wax, FashionBeans has put together a definitive guide to all things male grooming: a handbook on hair, a manual on manscaping, a primer on, well, primer. You get the idea.

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How Men’s Grooming Has Evolved

Male grooming can be traced back millions of years to when cavemen used hinged shells to tweeze whiskers from their face. However, the trend didn’t move from the fringe to mainstream culture until much more recently.

The gay community was one the earliest adopters of male grooming during the 1970s, from the ultra-preened and plucked-all-over look to the ‘hairy bear’ tribes. A few decades later in the noughties, the football pitch became the next global platform, with the likes of David Beckham (who now has his own range of men’s grooming products) first castigated then celebrated for his ‘metrosexual’ commitment to cosmetics.

Simultaneously, there was a burgeoning obsession with the gym body. All the while, with the female market reaching saturation, beauty brands began eyeing the men’s category as ripe for growth. Fast forward to the present day, and global revenues in men’s grooming are expected to reach $78 billion (£60bn) by 2023, according to research firm IMARC.