Website pairs stylists with people needing help with at-home haircuts

NEW YORK - It has been three months since Tristate area salons and barbershops were forced to close their doors due to the coronavirus, which means at this point, many of us need a haircut. Salons are still closed in New York City and New Jersey, but a new business is helping you with an at-home haircut.

"My hair was crazy long, longer than I think it had ever been," Nick Gray told us he needed a haircut. With barbershops and salons closed, the only option is to do it yourself, or like Nick get a loved one to help. "I've got to be honest I love my girlfriend, I do not trust her to cut my hair," Gray said.

Nick turned to the website YouProbablyNeedAHaircut.com. It was created to solve two problems: to help hairstylists out of work, and people at home who desperately want a trim. "We put it up basically almost as a joke and within 24 hours we had 100,000 unique visitors to the website. I think some of the biggest businesses started kind of looking like toys originally. The mission is really to support barbers and stylists," said owner Greg Isenberg.

The site pairs out of work hair stylists with clients. You go online, select the type of cut and then head to a video chat for your hair cut coaching. Trained stylists like Jabarie Anderson use pictures, and hand drawn diagrams to teach you how to cut your hair.  "The stylist told my girlfriend exactly what to do for example hold the clipper close to his head and shave directly up or part the hair and pull it out this much," Gray said.

Sometimes during the haircut stylists have to jump in and yell don't do that. "It is intense sometimes I’m like no, no, no, don’t do that let's slow down," YouProablyNeedAHaircut.com stylist JaBarie Anderson told us. "It's better than a YouTube video because they could actually tell us what we were doing wrong when we were doing it," Gray said.

The clients the company referred us to were happy with their at-home haircut. "We didn’t have many supplies we had a pair of kitchen scissors and comb and a little beard trimmer but everything worked out. I was really impressed with just how much help he was able to give only through the video," Gray said.

For those of you looking to cover those gray roots growing in," It’s one of our biggest requests. Stay tuned you are going to see new services on the website in the next couple weeks," Isenberg said.

Haircut coaching sessions range in price from $30 -$75 dollars depending on the time and intensity of the cut.

Isenberg says he says he plans to keep the business running even when salons are able to re-open, for those that still feel uncomfortable heading in for an in-person haircut without a vaccine for the coronavirus.