Long waiting lists for hairdressers
HAIRDRESSERS in Dingle are compiling waiting lists of customers who want to ensure they have early access to professional help with their hair colour, highlights and styles when salons reopen from the coronavirus lockdown on July 20.
With ten weeks to go before the scheduled re-opening of hairdressers nationwide, salons in Dingle have been inundated with calls. “There is huge demand, we will have to prioritise those who had appointments cancelled due to the closure,” said Orla Moran of Classic Hair Design on Green Street. “It will take long hours to fit everyone in, but we will and those with special needs we will cater for separately.”
Orla is currently putting in place plans for the safe re-opening of her salon. “We have to protect our clients, our staff, our elderly and our families,” she said.
Brenda Moroney, whose hairdressing shop is in Orchard Lane, has been sourcing personal protection equipment for the past three weeks in preparation for getting her business restarted on July 20 and is looking at having just one customer at a time in her hairdressers to ensure social distancing and effective sanitising. This will involve extra costs and longer hours and it may not be a commercially viable proposition but, as Brenda sees it, the greater goal is to take care of her customers – the people “you’d meet in the supermarket and they’re in an awful state because they haven’t been able to get anything done with their hair for so long”.
Caitríona Rohan, of Caitríona’s Hair Salon group whose salon in Dingle is managed by Máire Johnson, said that their waiting list is “massive”. Aside from dealing with the requirements of social distancing, Caitríona reckons hairdressers have a big job ahead stabilising their clients’ hair colour. This comes about because some people resorted to a ‘ buying a box’ of hair colour when hairdressers were closed and the results didn’t always work out as planned.
“It may take us more than one attempt to get the colour right,” said Caitríona. However, she added that there is an upside: people will have longer hair by the time hairdressers reopen and that means they will have a greater choice of styles.
In all cases hair salon owners stressed the same point: They will be not be able to accept people walking in the door without an appointment.
In contrast, barbers have always worked on a first come first served basis and Justin Quinlan of The Barber Shop on Main Street, Dingle, expects to be working flat out after he reopens.
“For the first two weeks I will be working longer hours and seven days a week to get them all done,” he said.
To date Justin has not been approached by anyone looking for a haircut during the lockdown, but he has noticed that a number of people have been taking matters into their own hands – or leaving their hair take its own course. “It’s a bit like the 1980s; there are a number of ‘mullets’ out there and alot of dodgy haircuts,” he said.
To ensure social distancing he will reduce the numbers of seats in his barber shop and he is considering a ticketing system, but all of that is in the process of being worked out at the moment.