About Us

I started barbering by accident. I originally wanted to be a graphic designer or architect — however one day my cousin, who now owns "Salvatores" in Stoke Bishop, asked me whether I wanted a part-time job working for his boss's friend in Kingswood. At 15 I had nothing to do on Saturdays, so I accepted a part-time Saturday job at Aldo's on Two Mile Hill.

Within a year I was cutting hair and had decided to go full time at Brunel College at Ashley Down. The two year course gave me qualifications in ladies and gents hairdressing, make-up, manicure, wig making and beauty.

By the second year, because of my in-salon experience, I had been asked to enter hairdressing competitions for the college.

By mid-1989 my college course was over and I was in full-time employment at Aldo's. I stayed there for three years building experience until my cousin asked if I would run a newly purchased shop in Stoke Bishop for him. I saw it as a chance to earn more and agreed to run it for two years at a favourable rent. Saving all I earned gave me the chance to buy my own shop — at an already difficult start to the 90s.

I had looked at the huge Barclays Bank on Henleaze Road but City Glass beat me to it. We then looked at Redland Hardware Store (now Standfast), but with another shop across the road £20k cheaper, my fiancée (now wife) and I decided to go for the cheaper shop and spend the £20k saving on the improvements it needed.

I opened in April 1994, announcing our existence to the area with a special offer £1.00 off leaflet drop. I remember around 500 customers coming in with the vouchers — it was a success, so I did it again in another area. Most of you who have been coming in that long can remember the numerous employees I've had, who have all gone on to own their own salons. Thinking about it, probably half of Bristol has had a haircut by somebody I have trained.

With an interest in computing from a young age and a passion for grooming products, I'd by chance cut the hair of a fragrance rep at my Stoke Bishop shop. He put me in the right direction and by 1997 I was retailing hair and beauty products online — a simple static page, but it was getting orders. From the beginning, orders grew by the amount I was adding to the site and eventually peaked in 2002 when I was one of the first to retail GHDs online. I have since split the online business away from the barbering business and grown the site by adding mirror sites retailing individual brands, and now have a large Amazon and eBay shop.

Always trying to do my best has its disadvantages — queuing. I loathe queuing, whether it's in the Post Office, at the bar or in the supermarket. My first attempt to help customers avoid queuing was putting a webcam in my shop which would update every two minutes. It worked in a way — if you could get to the shop in minutes — but most customers found that half a dozen people had walked in by the time they arrived. So we were going in the right direction, but the problem wasn't solved.

In 2002, I had one of those Saturdays — the faster I worked, the more customers came in, no lunch, no breaks, not even a toilet break. Was this healthy? At one point I counted seventeen customers queued, and when it all kicked off between three customers about who was next in the queue, I knew something had to be done. So I asked everyone what they thought of a booking system. Everyone was positive, though as they say, you can't please everyone — some people didn't want to book ("that's what women do"), but they didn't want to queue either. With the positive feedback I went ahead. If it didn't work we could always go back. But it worked. Weekdays were fuller and Saturdays were calmer. I wish I'd done it from the beginning — all those customers I had lost because of the long queues.

My challenge today is to find a good, trustworthy barber who could help me increase the shop's throughput. If that never happens, I always have my two boys who could take over.

Finally — I wish I could advertise the booking system more broadly, but think it would probably go viral in Bristol. Just imagine all those people still queuing at the barber shop!