When I first started barbering, I was working for my best friends father at a place called Interstate Barbershop and the industry was a lot different. Hardly anyone around was asking for a hard part or a skin fade around town, but as social media became more entrenched into our daily lives, so did the trends that were happening elsewhere. I was lucky to have worked with two of the best barbers around who built a barbershop that won Best of the Best 4 years in a row. Halfway through those four years, I had the opportunity to purchase the barbershop and it has been one of the better decisions I’ve ever made. Along the way, I made some valuable mistakes and took some worthwhile risks as I was trying to navigate the world of entrepreneurship. Throughout this time, I had decided that I wanted to make this shop my own, and that meant changing directions.
Modern Barbarian started as a class project that I called Barbwire, where I envisioned the waiting area to be some sort of cocktail bar with pool tables and dart boards worthy of a Ron Burgundy monologue. While that’s a noble idea, as time went on, I realized that the other stuff was just fluff. People wanted a barbershop that gave them good haircuts, good conversation, and felt like a good atmosphere that helped them feel better about their community, and that’s what I set out to do.
Originally, I wanted to have a big grand opening, but then I was open, and later I planned to have some sort of social mixer once I hired the first new barber, but then we were busy. So, things just kind of kept progressing and getting busier, which was great and I'm more than grateful, but with growth comes new challenges and our humble abode wasn’t prepared for the growth that our community has afforded us. So, the stars aligned and I found a new space and a not so new direction.
As many of you know, we've been in the process of relocating for a while now, so when the state ordered all public-facing businesses to close, I was pretty nervous. Not only was I having to close my barbershop and stop serving my clients and community, but I was uncertain of what would happen next. As it became clear that this situation was more extreme than many of us ever expected, it was plain to see that I had to say goodbye to the old shop.
So, with that said, I wanted this website to serve as a kind of homage to the beginning of our story. Our first chapter. Our teenage years, if you will.
Stay tuned.