We live in Fort Lauderdale near Las Olas and love the area; this Saturday we went out for a family lunch, as usual, with my wife Paula and our kids - Gabrielle, Andrew and Matthew. We like the long hair - surfer look for the boys but they were due for a touch up trim - thus we walked to the Las Olas Barber Shop, at 1400 E Las Olas Boulevard #A.
Matthew's (5 years old) turn came and Bob (who indicated the store operates under his license) took him first. My wife explained to Bob she loved the length of the boys hair and all she wanted was a trim - not too much. Bob said he knew exactly what we wanted: ""half way down the ear"". My wife repeatedly told him she does not want to cut it short, just a little trim - do not take the length, especially in the back.
Bob went to work; pretty soon it became evident he was cutting more than one inch of the hair across the board; my wife told him in a normal tone of voice he was cutting the hair too short, to which he immediately became defensive, verbally aggressive and replied he is doing what we asked him to, and to wait until he is done, because the ""average"" person does not understand hair... He became more and more condescending, asking my wife ""to get out of his face"" - she was standing about 6 ft away from the chair - which is when I got in the conversation and indicated he was not cutting the hair as we had asked him to. With both kids in chairs having their hair cuts we could not just pick up and leave ... In the end Matt's hair was chopped off from about 3.5 inches to 1 inch or less in places.
Bob was extremely rude, arrogant and ignorant in his comments toward both of us - and that in front of our kids. The gist of it was we had no idea about hair cuts, and he, an experienced professional with over 30 years of experience and an instructor in hair styles, knew better than us what was good for our son's haircut. Are you kidding??? In the meantime, Lindsay, the other lady working there was cutting our other son's hair (Andrew - 7 years old) exactly the way we asked her to...
We ended up leaving upset, frustrated - and being asked not to return to the Barber Shop, as to no create any more trouble. The trouble I suppose he was referring to had to do with the fact we were not happy with him not listening to what we wanted in the first place. Bad hair cut aside, the issue is one of customer service and personal respect; this is supposed to be a place that has ben around for years and years - judging by the ambiance and pictures on the wall. We may not be experts in hair style, but we had a pretty clear idea of what we like and do not like in a hair cut for our kids, and we also treat people with respect - a value which we live and instill in our kids. This was a bad experience on all fronts - what was supposed to be a nice Saturday afternoon turned into a frustrating and demeaning experience - we have not felt so mistreated in a very long time. My wife came back home crying and my kids pretty shook up about what they witnessed.
I will for sure not go back to that Barber Shop and definitely don't recommend anyone to either...
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