Dawn
Kreutz of Eden Prairie still remembers the bad experience she had
several years ago and how it made her feel. “Angry!” she
typed on her communicator. She had gone to her regular salon for a trim. A new
stylist “grabbed handfuls of hair and just cut.” Kreutz could not
stop the stylist. Her mother Marilyn had stepped out for a few minutes and Kreutz
hadn’t brought her communicator. When Marilyn returned and saw what was
happening, she confronted the stylist, but the damage had been done. Two repair
attempts left Kreutz with shorter hair than she wanted and a style that took
months to grow out. Learning from the experience, Marilyn and Joanne Musick,
Kreutz’s personal care attendant, now monitor salon visits carefully.
This author interviewed
hair stylists and their customers with disabilities at salons around
the Twin Cities and found that when communication between them
breaks down, experiences like Kreutz’s
are common. Getting a good haircut can be a challenge for anyone,
but for customers with disabilities, it can be a traumatic experience.
A traumatic experience for
everyone. Laura Quist-Knox of Newport and stylist Jesse Campbell
of West Saint Paul had an unhappy encounter last month. Quist-Knox,
who uses a DynaVox communicator but does not take it to salons, was
accidentally taken to the wrong salon on Robert Street in West Saint
Paul. Her group home staff dropped her at Campbell’s salon,
Cost Cutters, instead of Great Clips, where she is a regular customer.
The staff member told Campbell to cut Quist-Knox’s hair “short,
but not like a boy’s” and then left to get dinner.
Quist-Knox expressed her agitation but could not make Campbell
understand her. Campbell saw Quist-Knox getting upset and feared
hurting her. When the staff members returned to the salon, Quist-Knox
asked them to help him, but they declined. An argument ensued.
Quist-Knox ended up with a haircut she didn’t like and a
bad memory. “It
was scary,” she later told her father Larry Quist.
The experience was traumatic
for Campbell too. He called the group home several times to complain
to the manager but felt that he wasn’t
being taken seriously. The staff who answered his first calls refused
to give him the manager’s number. His colleague Brenda Devereaux
said Campbell’s experience was common at their salon. “Group
homes often bring people here and dump them. The PCAs go out shopping
or run personal errands. I had one client in who could walk but she
couldn’t tell me how to cut her hair. The man who brought her
left for an hour. I was very angry. He was the supervisor of her group
home so I never did anything about it. What’s the point [of
complaining] if the supervisor does it?”
How can customers and stylists
communicate better with one another? Several stylists agreed that
a good haircut requires effective communication. Stylist Dawn Wade
at River Front Hair Cutters in Oak Park Heights told of one customer
who has trouble sitting for a long time and cannot easily communicate.
In order to ease his anxiety and give him a good cut, she says “I
cut as quickly as I can. I make sure he is comfortable and I tell
him what I’m doing. It
helps that his mother is there holding him.”
Heidi Braylock, a stylist
at Fantastic Sams in Roseville, said that having a care attendant
or family member stay and assist the stylist is important. “Most group home attendants let us know what to
do and help us, but often family members simply drop off a person and
leave them with us. Sometimes we don’t know what to do and
we try to stop the family member if they are going to leave.”
Sean Cooley at Great
Clips in Saint Paul’s Highland Park neighborhood
said stylists keep detailed notes on customers’ preferred haircuts
in their computer profiles, a practice that is helpful for those who
cannot easily communicate. But the system is not foolproof. Cooley
remembered once when a regular customer was brought in by a new aide.
The aide told her to “cut all his hair off.” Cooley knew
this was not the man’s regular cut. She asked the customer but
was unable to understand his response. Then she showed the aide her
notes indicating that this was not the man’s regular cut. The
aide insisted and she complied, but she worried that her customer
would not be happy with the result.
Braylock has one regular
she worries about. “His mom talks for
him, but we can tell from his face he doesn’t want the haircut
mom wants.”
Do stylists discriminate against
customers with disabilities? Cathy Patnode of New Hope thinks so. “Some
places give you a crummy cut because you are handicapped. They don’t
care what you look like.”
Colleen Kirby, cosmetology
instructor at Saint Paul College, disagrees. She said that although
there is “no specialized training” in
styling hair for persons with disabilities, “we have a lot
of persons with disabilities who come for free haircuts. Students
learn to take more time with them. Students like doing things to
help everyone look good.”
Braylock also disagrees
that stylists discriminate. “I
want customers with a disability to get what everyone gets, a good
cut.”
Jill Hocking, Campus
Director of the Minnesota School of Cosmetology in Oakdale, says
her school does not give students any “extra
training,” as people with disabilities are “treated like
any client.” Still she emphasizes to her students that they should
see themselves as care-givers to all their clients. “They are
in a field that is a ‘helping-people profession’ and
that makes them caregivers.”
How to get a better
haircut? Develop a relationship with a favorite hair cutter. Being
a regular at a salon helps, say many stylists and customers. Brenda
Devereaux says, “We have
regulars we know well. We know what kind of cuts to do for them.”
John Schatzlein has
been going to the same salon in Savage for more than twenty years. “They always pull a chair for me [to make
space for his wheelchair]. No problems all these years. They know me
and everything works fine.” Michele Nickerson, Information and
Referral Coordinator at UCP of Minnesota, agrees: “My hair
stylist has known me for more than ten years. Even after moving from
Roseville to Golden Valley, I still go to my salon in Shoreview because
they give all their clients the respect and assistance they might
need.”
Becky Mansaurakos has
been cutting hair at Cost Cutters, 26th and Lake in Minneapolis,
for seventeen years and says there are rarely complaints. She says
that they have “quite a few” customers
with disabilities. “I know most people who come here by name.
I have one regular customer who uses a wheelchair and communicates
with a machine. No problems.”
Are salons adapted to the
needs of customers with disabilities? Stylists and customers both
agree that salons are not ideally equipped to handle customers in
wheelchairs. Braylock summed up the problem for many stylists. “It
would be great if salons were better equipped. We need sinks that
raise up or down. And its hard to cut hair for people in wheelchairs
because they are so low. Kills your back. Would be great to have
lifts for wheelchairs.”
Amy Sharp, a volunteer
at Courage Center in Golden Valley summed it up for many customers. “I’m OK with getting my hair cut
in my chair, but the person who does it usually asks if it is OK for
me to transfer. I like to get my hair cut in their chairs because its
hard to get the hair off my chair later. They use the blow dryer to
get hair off my chair, but they can’t get it all. The main
issue for me is that shampoo basins are hard to get up to. I barely
get up there, having to stretch. My chair tilts and that helps; otherwise
it would be very difficult for me.”
Cooley adds that customers
who use wheelchairs might want to compare facilities at salons. “Newer Great Clips salons have shampoo
bowls that move, so it’s easier to shampoo people in wheelchairs.
Older salons don’t have those, and it can be difficult.”
Is a good haircut important?
Consuella Mackey thinks so. “Looking
good helps one be successful in the business world.” A hair
stylist and fashion designer based in Los Angeles, Mackey founded
Operation Confidence, a beauty industry organization, “to bring
awareness and include people with disabilities into the beauty and
fashion industry” www.operationconfidence.org
Have a customer complaint?
First try the salon manager. Marilyn Kreutz did this for her daughter
Dawn and the staff apologized and offered a “repair free
of charge.” You can also contact
the Minnesota Board of Barber and Cosmetologist Examiners for statutes
and rules violations. Information on statutes and rules and how to
make a complaint can be found at: www.bceboard.state.mn.us/
