By Andrew Thomson
There’s a magazine rack and a few chairs for those waiting at the front of the one-room shop. Combs, scissors and razors are scattered across the counter, and clumps of men’s hair lie on the floor.
Giuseppe Colletti has dispensed haircuts and shaves from this location, Pino’s Barber Shop on Charlotte Street, since 1961.
With many hair salons offering services for both men and women and a majority of barbers in their older years, barbershops of yore like Pino’s have become a dying breed.
“It’s too bad we don’t have many (barbers) left . . . there were lots of them in the neighbourhood when I opened,” says Colletti, who began cutting hair in 1946.
He says most of his customers are longtime clients and the newcomers tend to be foreign diplomats just arrived in Ottawa.
Colletti says companies today don’t produce as many barber-specific hair products as before and points to his barber’s chair as an example. The swivelling piece is nearly 50 years old and he says a replacement designed especially for a barbershop would be hard to find.
Barbering is, in fact, one of the world’s oldest trades. According to the Barber Museum in Canal Winchester, Ohio, Egyptian nobles performed barbering services 6,000 years ago.
During the Middle Ages, barbers showed their versatility as dentists and surgeons. In addition to their hair-styling duties, they often performed bloodletting operations on the sick.
One company trying to save the barbershop mystique is The Barber’s Chair, which has five shops in malls across southern Ontario.
The chain is now preparing to open two new locations in Ottawa, including one in the Rideau Centre.
For a single price, men can get a wash and haircut, hot towel shaves with a brush and straight razor, and even eyebrow and nosehair trimming.
“We saw a need in that men find beauty salons intimidating because of things like the smells and needing to make appointments, and a lot of barbers are getting old,” says Domenic Bumbaca, vice-president of The Barber’s Chair franchise.
He describes the shop’s dark burgundy décor as “manly,” featuring sports on TV, cigars, and two barber poles with the familiar red, white and blue stripes.
“It’s just for men. If women come we send them away,” he jokes.
Bumbaca says The Barber’s Chair’s Ottawa locations will use experienced stylists with backgrounds in both barbering and ladies’ hairstyling. Today, separate colleges for barbers are rare; they’re usually “lumped together” with hairstyling courses at various schools, he says.
One downtown barber who has been working for 45 years says business has declined with the arrival of unisex hair salons, but a busy barbershop can still create more revenue on a per-minute basis.
“A barber makes more while he works. There’s not as much time spent on consultation like in a salon,” claims the barber, who runs a barbershop on Elgin Street. He says his average haircut takes 10 minutes.
“I think (barbering) will bounce back a little bit,” he says. “I think eventually women will want their own place again, and there are also men who don’t like getting their hair done together.”
For now, at least one barber isn’t worried about what the future holds.
“Lots like to come for a shave with the hot towels,” says Colletti, who still brandishes a straight razor with a white handle.
“I still enjoy it. At a smaller place, it’s more of being a friend to the customer.”