MOBILE BARBER VAN CREATES A BUZZ
Seen an odd-looking barber shop on wheels that looks like something out of a Frankenstein tale?
It may have been Fritz Watson’s retrofitted van you’ve seen roaming the busy streets of South Florida.
This barber calls himself “the ice cream man,” even though he doesn’t deal in dessert. The 36-year-old Pompano Beach man trims hair inside this old city shuttle, now known as the Cuts on Wheels van.
Watson made this contraption himself in November. He tore out the seats of the shuttle and installed clear plastic
so anyone can see in. (Think guppy in a fish bowl.)
For months, it was Watson’s way of offering cool haircuts until he drove into a big speed bump on Aug. 1: The cops busted him on charges of driving uninsured and with a suspended license.
Watson said he’s now working on meeting all the requirements, including getting his license reinstated.
When Watson would drive down the street, people couldn’t help but look. Maybe it’s the pop hits he blared from his radio speakers, but more likely, it’s the barber’s chair on display in the back of his shuttle bus.
There also are two lightup, spinning barber poles, in addition to the barber’s chair.
This isn’t a boujee barber shop, with prices starting at $15. “It’s paradise in the ’hood, you know?” said Jeremy Peterson, who walked up to the van last month and left a happy customer. “I could walk down and get some exercise and get a haircut.”
Watson would pull over whenever someone flagged him down for a cut. “Everyone is busy, busy, busy and no one has any time, so it’s convenient,” he said.
Watson estimated he would cut hair for 20 to 30 people a day. Unlike a traditional barber shop, he drove around at all hours of the night, sometimes until 2 a.m., he said.
He stopped driving last week when he was arrested, he said. The shuttle’s side mirror was actually a rear-view mirror tied with a rope to the driver’s side, police said.
The van was towed away.