I post an email exchange with the Owner of this store (and apparently others in the Bay area) and let the reader consider the information for themselves. I visited Clayton Road store 6 weeks ago. Last month, the owner sent a "dear valued customer letter" to me, asking me to contact her with any issues or concerns (she included her email address). So...
Sent: Monday, June 10, 2013 3:57 PM
To: 'alice@hshears.com'
Subject: your note
Thanks for sending the note. I'm glad you asked about my last visit. I had originally planned simply to "fade away," but actually, I do want to share my experience...
While, occasionally, some of the "younger" employees seem a little apprehensive, the lady who cut my hair last time was especially so (I'm OK with "shy" and "quiet," BTW, but it's reassuring when the stylist has a little confidence). However, during the cut, the stylist kept looking behind her. At the time, I didn't know why, or bother to think much of it. However, as the cut took longer and longer and longer to complete (over 30 minutes), I realized she was having someone check her work from behind us. I'm blind without my eyeglasses, so I didn't really see or realize this until, at the end of the cut session, the employee said some kind of "quality control" blurb and invited the person behind us to "check her work." In retrospect, I realize I was the guinea pig for an inexperienced cutter, and the "quality control" was to make sure she didn't screw up my hair. OK... I'm actually fine with that... I think (perhaps I shouldn't be paying retail for "training" haircuts, though). Again, I'm blind without my glasses, and don't actually see too well with them. So, I paid and left. When I got home, I started to describe my bizarre marathon-long haircut session to my wife and daughter, but they interrupted me with spontaneous laughter. Why were they laughing? Well, as it turns out... they merely had to look at my haircut. It was horrendous (something that a "quality control" check probably should have caught, BTW). The sideburns were a whopping 1/2" different length, and the bang cut was about as jagged as my never-had-braces teeth. And the "blend" between the #3 cut on the sides and back and the scissor cut on the top looked like a set of stairs... uneven ones at that. After spending some time studying this atrocious haircut in the mirror, I jokingly suggested to my family that we should invest in a Flowbee, and save me the trouble of having to leave the house next time. I haven't had a haircut anywhere since then, and so I am definitely due for one... but, honestly, I'm not sure I want to risk another butcher cut... and your $7.99 offer doesn't really seem like much of an enticement for me to try. Your thoughts on my experience?
Her response (cropped for length, and to focus on the important parts. I will add cropped part to reply, if Yelp allows it)--
From: Alice Wagner [mailto:Alice@hshears.com]
Sent: Thursday, July 04, 2013 2:19 PM
Subject: Re: your note
[snip]
However, did you know that almost any service or project involving the human being is learned through the process, yes even high priced attorneys and surgeons. We all have to start somewhere at least these young people are trying to earn their own living. The price for our haircuts are very modest so 100% perfection every time on a person the stylist has just met in under a 15 minute time frame takes a lot of skill and it comes with time. I personally don't consider 30 minutes "a marathon". We believe in fostering young enthusiastic adults, helping them to change or improve their life while imparting great work ethics that will pull them through life. "Quality checks"are a way of helping them become efficient and consistent with good technique. Actually almost everyone coming out of college or any trade school learns on the job. Don't you agree?
I am very sorry that we have to do this training and but even skilled cutters don't nail every cut the first time to a person's preference. For this reason I try to reach out to my customers for their feedback. Honestly, I get a lot of feedback and greatly appreciate it, however your note is the most unkind, sarcastic, unfunny, ridiculing and condescending feedback I have ever received. Did it ever occur to you that maybe your superior intellectual capability is why she was shy? I did notice that no where during your service was she rude or unkind to you. She even cared enough about the outcome of your haircut to humbly have it checked.
I would be happy to reimburse you for your cut. Normally clients come back in and have the cut reworked a little more. Even this inconvenience is regretted, but we're humans...with feelings. Looking forward to a kinder reply, I don't care for this genre.
Candidly,
Alice Wagner read more