STAFF WRITER
NORTH JERSEY — To some, the very idea of a "corner barbershop" might seem like an anachronistic throwback to the 1950s, a reminder of a bygone golden age that was once here but has now vanished into mythical Americana alongside the shoemaker or the local hardware store.
At one time, though, they were renowned as a prominent staple of every town, a place where a man could let his guard down and converse with other men about work or politics, complain about his woman or his car, and, quite simply, be a man. All the while, of course, catching a haircut or a fresh shave with a straight razor.
Often, in the eyes of the regulars, they became more than just a place to get a haircut.
Over the years, however, barbershops have disappeared from the public eye. They’ve been replaced, it seems, by crude chains of cheap unisex haircutting establishments that draw in wandering souls who don’t know where else to go but always walk out a weed-whacked mess.
Quietly, however, real barbershops have not only persevered, but taken off, and many barbers are finding that men are itching for a place to go where they can once again sit back, have some good conversation, share some inappropriate jokes, and take a break from the daily grind.
Sho’Tyme Barber Shop
Just over the bridge leading onto Main Street in Butler sits the brightly painted plate glass façade of the Sho’Tyme Barber Shop, which is proving every day that there is indeed a warm middle-ground for both old-school men looking for a traditional cut and new-school kids looking for the flashiest buzzer work.
One step through the door and Sho’Tyme’s colors daze the eyes — mustard tile floors contrast sharply with blue and white walls, while black and white chairs for waiting customers are lined up in alternating chessboard fashion.
The shop’s owner, 32-year-old Lenny Then, is lean with long black hair and a thin goatee. He says that he created Sho’Tyme for that very purpose, and every day when he opens the door and the line starts forming, he looks over and knows he’s on the right track.
"I’ll have somebody in the chair that’s got gray hair, he’s retired, and then right after him I’ll have a kid that just came from high school," he says. "It’s kind neat just having all types of age groups…. Here, everyone just meets at one door."
Then, who lives in Butler, has owned the shop for eight years, and although his youth is evident, so is his knowledge of not only the barber business, but also whom he’s looking to attract.
"We’re young, but I don’t run it like we’re in the ’hood, cause we’re not in the ’hood," he says. "I like the kids, and the middle age, and the older guys to feel comfortable."
"You see my signs on the walls?" he asks, pointing to several old-school signs painted into the décor. "Those are for the old guys, let ’em know, ‘We didn’t forget about you.’"
Then has been on this track for a long time. As a child, his aunts owned salons, and he first picked up the clippers on his own in the sixth grade, using an upside-down spackle bucket as his first barber’s chair and his younger brother as his first client.
"He was my guinea pig," Then says with a laugh.
Around 12, he realized he had an eye for the trade, and in college, he used it to make money on the side before finally deciding to go to cosmetology school — an ironic state requirement for barbers that Then says is contributing directly to the lack of barbershops.
"All these barbers in the city — and I can show you thousands — none of them have licenses, because no one is going to go to cosmetology school like I did to learn women’s hair, just to do men’s hair," he says.
After graduating, Then worked for other barbers to learn the trade first-hand before opening his own place. He takes pride in his skill with both buzzers and scissors. Nowadays, he says, proficiency with both tools is a rarity.
"It’s a lost craft," he says.
But maybe the most important piece of what he does has nothing to do with his hands.
"Conversation is 100 percent, most important," he says. "This is where a man comes and unwinds, he speaks his mind. He tells you how his day went, he tells you something new that he learned."
At Sho’Tyme, however, there is an "anything goes" philosophy. Then warns that "once you step into a barbershop, all the gloves are off."
"It’s like the movie ‘Barbershop,’" he said, alluding to the 2002 film about a shop on the South Side of Chicago. "If you can’t be straight-up real in a barbershop, where else can you be real?"
When a woman comes in, Then laughs to himself as he watches the men’s attitudes slip back into the conservative realm.
"Everyone zips that mouth and gives that look like, ‘Guys, we gotta’ fall back right now,’" he says. "It’s the funniest thing."
Some girls, especially the ones who grew up with brothers, will announce that it’s all right, they understand about the conversation and where it goes. Soon, things will relax again.
Sometimes, he ends up playing the role of de facto psychologist for guys who might not speak about their troubles anywhere else. Steering them in the right direction when they ask for his advice is one thing they don’t teach you in school, he says.
"You gotta’ really sit there and analyze them and really put your heart and soul into that man’s life, and if you steer them the right way, they’re gonna’ be grateful not just because of the haircut," he says.
"I care about each and every person that comes in here."
Tom's Barber Shop
Norman Greenbaum’s "Spirit in the Sky" plays in the background as a man sits in the leather seat of Tom’s Barber Shop in Pompton Lakes on a Friday morning.
Photos of New York Yankee legends mingle on the walls with Marine Corps memorabilia, old newspaper articles, and a cork-board laced with pictures of clients and their children.
"Nobody does a flat-top like Tom," the man says as he gets up, a smile on his face.
The man pays in a cash before owner Tom Fiorilla, a large 67-year-old man with black hair and an infectious grin, turns and starts giving the history of every piece that hangs from the walls.
One picture is particularly special and has a prominent place in the middle of the shop: a black-and-white photo from 1937 showing his father in the Fiorilla family’s original shop in Hawthorne.
It was from his father that Fiorilla learned the trade — a prospect that he had no say in because his father knew that in good times or bad, people still need their hair cut.
"(My father) said, ‘I survived the Depression making good money, and you’ll never starve, no matter how bad the economy is, you’ll always make a living,’" says Fiorilla. "And he was right, especially the past three or four years. He was very right."
Fiorilla got his barber’s license in 1961. Like Then, he shakes his head at the idea that barbers must attend cosmetology school. In the past, barber school or a simple apprenticeship was enough.
"The best place to learn barbering is in a barber shop, not in a classroom, not working on mannequins, but actually being in a barber shop," he says. "That’s how I learned."
Fiorilla has taken many of his father’s lessons to heart over the years and maintains many of the same policies: work the hours that people can come in (including mornings and evenings), always go to work no matter the weather, and never, ever treat your customers like a number.
Take an interest in their lives and treat them well, he says, and they’ll remember it.
"Interest is the key word," he says. "They’re not just a customer. Take an interest in the individual, in their families and their life. If you treat customers just like a number, forget about it."
That attitude has paid off. He’s had three shops in 50 years: one in Hawthorne, one in Wanaque, and now, his place in Pompton Lakes, and his customers have loyally followed him each time.
That’s why Fiorilla does things like go to nursing homes or people’s houses if they’re down on their luck or can’t make it in. Sometimes, he travels to funeral parlors to give long-time customers their final cut.
He gets invited to his clients’ weddings, their bat mitzvahs, their gatherings, and he’s cut four generations of hair for some families.
They consider him their extended family, and that, to Fiorilla, is everything.
"I love what I do. I love seeing people and old friends and families and listening to their stories," he says. "This is more than barbering."
Jimmy the Barber
His real name is Jimmy Thurstans, but in West Milford, you’ll find him by just looking for the man called "Jimmy the Barber."
He’s been at the same spot on Marshall Hill Road for 21 years and in business since 1966. Like the others, barbering appears to just be in his blood.
Thurstans, 63, says that his English grandparents had owned a wig-making and hairdressing shop in the Old Country before coming to America.
He decided to follow that road himself at the age of 17 after an ill-fated "rock and roll road trip" where he and a friend decided to seek their fame and fortune out on the road.
Unfortunately, they only got as far as about Washington, D.C., before they were arrested as "fugitives" who ran away from home.
"That turned in to a whole ‘What do you want to do with your life?’ discussion," he says. "So I said, ‘I’ll go to barber school.’"
Years later, it turned out to be a pretty good choice. His place caters to everyone, from senior citizens to "young dudes" and average guys from across the economic spectrum.
The difference between his place and the more generic unisex salons is the "no frills" that leaves out the selling of products in favor of a haircut, a shave, and a loyal customer base. Thurstans says that 95 percent of his customers are regulars.
Lately he’s seen a resurgence in the number of barber shops, which he attributes to women cutting back on their own services because of the downed economy.
Haircutters are trying to capture the men’s crowd, he says, who spend less but are more regular in their habits.
No matter what they do or who opens around him, though, his place keeps rolling and has turned into a something of a landmark in the town.
"I always hear people say that I should be the mayor because I know everybody," he says with a laugh. "That’s where you get an average haircutter who can be more successful that a very good haircutter. It’s based on personality."
Not that Thurstans is an average haircutter, of course. His 45 years of experience speak for themselves.
In his place, he strives to keep a light atmosphere that’s filled with jokes and fun, and no appointments are needed, ever. In fact, Thurstans laughs at the very idea of them.
"Nobody does appointments…. It doesn’t work here. An appointment is calling to say, ‘I’ll be there in 15 minutes,’" he says.
Email: janoski@northjersey.com
http://www.northjersey.com/arts_entertainment/134442098_Barber_shops_are_still_making_the_cut.html?c=y&page=1
