Once a front for vice, unisex salons are fast replacing barbershops

Barbershops were plenty in Sabah and they did a roaring trade until the 1980s when they began to lose out to trendy unisex hairdressing salons. Today, there are 10 barbershops left in Kota Kinabalu. They still serve a small faithful clientele of very young children and elderly men. But their future is bleak. Barbers are becoming fewer as many men prefer the hairstyling touches of sexy hairdressers.

When unisex salons debuted 35 years ago, they weren’t what they are today. They were mostly a front for prostitution. Young women with little experience in hairdressing were recruited as barbers by these salons which doubled up as massage parlours. These “girlie” barbers were masseuses who offered more than just a back rub.

“Our business wasn’t affected by them,” says Lee Chee Yen, 41, who has inherited Mei Mei barbershop from his 76-year-old father Shu Kyong. “These girls couldn’t do a good hairdressing job. So, the men still came to us for their haircut.”

Women didn’t have their hair done at unisex salons those days. They stuck with their hairdressers who traditionally did only women’s hair. Now it’s hard to find one who doesn’t do men’s hair. There are 356 unisex salons in Kota Kinabalu, according to city hall.

Chee Yen’s shop at Kampung Air in the heart of Kota Kinabalu has shrunk over the last 20 years as unisex salons, gaining competency and respectability, compete for his business. It is now half its original shop across the street where his father started it in 1964 with just 12,000 ringgit ($3,500).

Young men, in their twenties and early thirties, prefer a haircut at a unisex salon where well trained pretty hairstylists can give them the funkiest of looks. For 20 ringgit they can make them look like their screen idols for a little while. A haircut these days is more than that plus shampooing and a shave. Two hundred ringgit or more can buy a little indulgence: hair-dyeing, a facial mask, manicure, ear-cleaning and a good decent massage.

Mei Mei charges between 5 and 8 ringgit for a haircut for those who don’t want to look like Brad Pitt or David Beckham. It offers little other than shaving, shampooing, hair-dyeing and cleaning the ears. It has five barbers between 40 and 55 years old and it fears losing them.

“The day will come when we will have to close when my barbers and I retire.” Chee Yen says. “My 13-year-old son is not interested in the business. Young people don’t like to become barbers.”

For good reasons. Low earnings and poor working conditions discourage young job seekers from the trade. Barbers earn between 1,500 and 2,000 ringgit a month on an income-sharing scheme. The shop takes between 35% and 40% of their gross takings. Barbers have to buy their own equipment such as clippers and razors. Working hours are long: 10 to 12 hours a day. To earn more, a barber must have more customers. Taking a day off means he has no income for that day. They are not given public holidays, annual leave, medical and pension benefits. This means that barbers are not employees but contractors.

Shu Kyong says during the heydays of the 1970s, barbers earned about 3,000 ringgit a month. Those were the days when a haircut cost about 5 ringgit, a cup of coffee was 40 sen and newspapers were sold for 20 sen a copy.

Yet not all is lost. Wong Sing Sheng, 19, signed up for a hairdressing course after he finished his form five at Kian Kok school. He graduated as a hairdresser after five months with De.Art School of Hair Dressing and Salon. He works as a barber in his father’s barbershop at Gaya Street in Kota Kinabalu.

“This job is very interesting,” Sing Sheng says. “I get a lot of satisfaction from it and I am filled with pride when my customers are happy with my handiwork.”

In fact, Sing Sheng’s father sent him and his elder brother to De.Art to learn how to dress men’s and women’s hair. His brother has worked for his father for nine years now. Both of them prefer working as barbers than as glamorous hairstylists at unisex salons where they may have to make an ugly woman look like Kristin Cavallari or give a punk a Michael Jackson’s hair-do.

“Women and young people are fussy,” Sing Sheng sighs.

His cousin Fan Ming Chung, 24, has also become a barber after receiving training at De.Art which charges 1,500 ringgit for a six-month course. Fees at five other schools are between 4,000 and 7,000 ringgit.

Young people like Sing Sheng take up hairdressing more for its art than anything else. But they are rare. Yet interest in hairdressing in Kota Kinabalu is gaining because of the glamour and earning potentials of unisex salons. A hairstylist at a popular one can earn five to ten times that of a barber. Popularity goes by word of mouth. A highly skilled hairstylist is in great demand.

For Michael Cheng, 41, who hails from neighbouring Sarawak state, the trade of a barber runs in the family. Coming from a third generation of barbers, he has been at his trade for the last 20 years.

“My eldest daughter who is still in secondary school is showing interest in hairdressing,” he says. “I don’t mind if she wants to become a barber. We’re a family of barbers and I’m proud of being one. It’s more than making a living. It’s art.” – Insight Sabah

– With reporting by Ng Jia Xiang

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