I actually don’t get my hair cut at all. The last time I went to a hair salon was 4 years ago. My hair just grows and grows.
I used to go to “regular” barber shops, until pretty much the only two anywhere near where I live or work became hit-or-miss concerning wait times (and the one near where I work is 10 minutes in the opposite direction from my home). Now, especially as I don’t have that much hair and am not particularly fussy as to who cuts it, I go to a Great Clips (which I consider a barber shop rather than a “salon”) near my office.
At the cheapo hairdressers that I can actually afford they don’t do a very good job. At the expensive places they do slightly better, but not €50 worth of “better”. I’m pretty happy with what I do myself and it costs nothing. Huzzah!
Jake, a women’s hair stylist, has cut my hair for almost seven years now. He’s amazing, in that he doesn’t pester me for instructions, he just makes my hair look great. Also, in seven years, he’s never made me mad.
I tip him well.
“Barber” and “stylist” are pretty much synonymous in my vocabulary. So I go to one of those.
I used to go to a barber college. $4 for a haircut! But eventually, I got tired of even paying that little, so now I cut it myself with an electric clipper. Number 4 guard, buzz evenly everywhere, voila!
I go to one of the local “hair academies”. It’s walking distance from my house and $12.50 for a wash and cut. I had them cut my waist length hair into a pixie winter before last. Now I have a nice bob.
Stylist but she has her own business and comes to me. If I win Lotto, I’m taking her on full time as my personal stylist and she won’t be allowed to work for anyone else.
Aveda Institute. It’s $11 after the $5 off special they’re often running, and they don’t accept tips. The cutters are usually just a month or two away from graduating, and there’s always an instructor walking around making sure they don’t screw up. For a med-long women’s haircut, that’s a steal.
I go to a chain place that’s more “stylist” than barbershop, but not fancy and cheap. For the low cost and fairly low frequency (I stretch it out but every 6-8 weeks would be typical), it’s not something I’m going to pinch pennies over. I don’t have a regular “stylist”- i just go in and get it cut. I have a home haircutting kit and have done that a few times, but it always looked bad for at least a couple weeks and was more of a crutch to practice avoidance in my case.
My wife and kids have a regular stylist, but she is really good and affordable- plus that’s certainly something that’s not negotiable for my wife, and she will point out that her tastes are much less expensive than most women in similar circumstances.
Stylist, I guess. Is that what you call them? I just make an appointment at my local privately owned hair cutting place. It’s like $20 plus tax, plus a tip.
My hairdresser has the front part of the shop, her husband a computer business and internet cafe out the back. For the last 10 years of monthly visits all she has said to me is “you lady, this chair” “you lost lotta weight now” and “cut short, no see grey”. She lies on the last but that isn’t really her fault.
$10 - it should be $12 but she gives me a bloke’s cut so charges me blokes’ rates.
Barber. #2 all over. I know I should be able to do this myself, but working with a mirror would give me vertigo.
Joe has been cutting my hair since about 1977 or so. He has a unisex salon and does more women than men, but does a fair amount of men too.
He’s a great guy and certainly the antithesis of the stereotypical male hair stylist. He’s about my age and a fellow musician who, like me, started playing in bands back in high school. So we always have a lot to talk about.
He’s been charging me ten bucks a pop since the beginning and has never raised his rates. Lots of times I’m his last customer of the day, and we’ll sit around and bullshit long past closing time. We’ve even brought guitars and jammed from time to time.
It’s my hope that he has no plans to retire any time soon. I have no idea what I would do.
Another beauty school customer here (Tricoci).
Regular rate is $14 (plus tip) for ladies wash/cut/blow dry ($4 more for long hair; $5 less for seniors on Tuesdays and Wednesdays).
I usually tell the student roughly the length I want, and invite her to show off her newly-learned styling chops with regard to the details.
We have to agree on the general style so that the instructor can grade her on whether she did it properly. An artifact of worrying about the marks is that the students work v-e-r-y slowly.
I’ve only had a student go seriously off-course once, and even then the cut was technically proficient, if not to my liking. I have gotten compliments on many of the cuts I have gotten there.
I go one of the more upscale locations of Supercuts less than 5 minutes away. You can reserve your stylist online and they have a few hot and friendly ones so I always pick those. They always remember our last conversation from where we last left off. It is like the strip-club version of a haircut if you do it right. I tip well and get a good haircut out of the deal. It only costs about $20 total and that is a steal. For $40, I can get a gay man at the competing upscale salon down the street that will fuss over my hair a lot more but not get better results or a better atmosphere. I just have a basic man’t cut.
Stylist. I have very fine hair and a good cut makes all the difference. However, when I’m just slightly older, I plan to buzz and bleach, with enormous earrings.
My coordination is so bad that cutting myself isn’t an option. And since as a guy I really don’t care what style my hair is as long as it’s short, why spend more than $12 at my local barber?
I get mine done at a cheap barber: in and out in five minutes. The cut’s generally pretty good, with the occasional not so good one. But the difference between a bad cut and a good cut is only a couple of days, so who cares?
I just chop the bangs when they start getting into my eyes. I usually trim the ends while it’s still in braids, and I keep it in either one or two braids all the time.