BALTIMORE — Since August, hundreds of people have been receiving free haircuts thanks to Conscious Heads Barbershop's community outreach program. The goal is ambitious: cut 1,000 heads before the New Year.
The Barber-Thon is part of an apprenticeship program created by Jabari Natur for his students to master the skill of barbering. In August, he challenged each barber to cut 100 heads by the end of the year.
Hear from the barbers:
Since then, he has been taking his students into the community to shelters and low-income housing complexes to provide free haircuts to those in need.
"We wanna push ourselves to the limit this holiday season and plus it's so many things going on in the world today people are loosing jobs and stamps, things are getting cut and the regular barbershop is very expensive on the regular and I own a barbershop so I know you know what I mean," Natur said. "But it's hard for people to be able to afford those services at all so it's a win win situation."
On Thursday, the barbers were inside the Holiday Inn Express, which serves as an emergency shelter on North Gay Street, giving out free haircuts to anyone who had the time.
Barbers like Joseph Garner say it's helpful because they get experience while making people feel good about themselves.
"Its always a plus you know you help people look good and they feel, you know they feel like they look the part right they do better right and thats what were here for," Garner said. "We want everybody to at least do the best they can at all times so when you look good you do better."
Chiquetta Heath says doing this work inspires her to make barbering more affordable. She plans to have a mobile barbershop one day.
"I feel like people that's less fortunate should feel good about themselves and a haircut can change their whole life in the nick of time," Heath said. "Some people are going out trying to find jobs you know they want you to be neatly trimmed and I don't mind helping."
With each new person in the chair, these barbers are a step closer to becoming masters themselves, just like their teacher.
"Consistency, what they say its the mother of skill and the father of success, so you know what I mean you do those repetitions over and over again you have no opportunity but to get better," Natur said.
So far, the barbers have given out more than 370 free haircuts. Natur says with the holidays quickly approaching, he is confident they will reach the goal of 1,000 haircuts before the end of the year.
To keep the free haircuts coming, they are collecting donations to offset the costs.
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