Just had my first cut at a salon that specialized and it took forever. For once the stylist studied my hair for how it curled and where, then came the dry cutting to see how it fell and such. After that a regular very very good cut. The styling took an hour.
A casual observer might not notice a big difference but I sure do. Everything about having long, thick, super curly hair has gotten better, and is more easily accomplished.
My thought is that some hair and hair styles are high maintenance even if they don’t look it.
Haircuts take longer for curlier hair, black hair happens to be the curliest. Just dealing with caucasian large curls or natural waves involves straightening them so you can reach the point where you have to cut, then cutting it, then letting them go back to their natural state so you can see whether you’ve cut in the right spot or need to trim a bit more, and all that done while the hair is wet (it’s got a different spring and shape than dry). As the curls get smaller, the work gets more and more involved.
My own hair is naturally wavy but loses its wave when long: I’ve had hairdressers tell me “no you don’t!” when I warned them I have wavy hair. I don’t let these touch my head any more, after a couple of times that the cut ended having to be a lot more radical than originally intended because they started cutting without taking the wave into account (when my hair reaches my shoulders with its natural wave, it’s a couple of inches below them when wet).