15 Essential Barber Skills You Need in 2024

Barbering is a profession that requires many skills and abilities. It’s important to know what these are to be considered a professional barber and not just someone who cut hair. Luckily, there are plenty of resources that can help you learn these skills!

To become an expert, you need to develop new techniques and gain different experiences that will help round out your barber skill set. This blog post will discuss the 15 barber skills all professionals should have and how they can acquire them.

What skills do you need to be a barber?

1. Professionalism

Most people who choose to become barbers will follow a certification course and get a professional diploma before starting to work. To get certified as a barber, you have to pass a final test after learning how to detect certain skin diseases, how to properly sanitize your barber tools, client management skills, and so on.

As a barber, you must constantly invest time and money in courses and training sessions to improve your skills. 

There are a lot of beard styles or trimming techniques that change from year to year, and staying up to date is essential for your business, as you will always need to stand out from your competitors.

2. Attention to details

Even if you have to do a haircut or calculate your income, working as a barber requires a lot of attention to details. Focusing on the small details will make your clients choose you over other barbers because they will be convinced that you can successfully fulfill their needs.

Every client will come with a different request in your barbershop, and if you want to satisfy them, you must focus on doing your best. This will both make your job easier and keep your clients loyal to your shop forever.

3. Time management

All appointment-based businesses can be stressful if you don’t know how to manage your schedule properly. There are still many professionals who use pen and paper to schedule their appointments, but in reality, you can save a lot of time by using a barbershop booking app. 

Goldie allows you to send message reminders to clients before their appointment, create your online booking link where clients can book online, take deposits and tips online, and even take full payments via link or contactless with just your phone, without a POS or any extra equipment required.

Such a tool is a lifesaver for your business, as you can automate many tasks and maximize your potential by booking more clients in a day. Plus, you can activate your “Book Now” button on social media, link it to your Goldie online booking page, and let clients book appointments directly via social media.

You can give it a try by downloading the app for free from the App Store or Google Play. 

“I was very hesitant to switch from paper to technology. After the paper clutter was becoming too hard to keep up with, I started looking for apps to help me with scheduling clients. Goldie has gone above and beyond my expectations. The team is very helpful whenever I run into a problem. My clients have loved the convenience of getting reminder text messages and instant booking messages.” – Dollie D., Goldie user

4. Good taste

Knowing the latest beard trends or advising a client with a cool haircut is one of the best barber skills you can have. Clients are not always decided on what they want when they come into your barbershop, so you should be able to counsel them regarding their new look. 

5. Good communication skills

In every industry, communication skills are a must. For example, if you want to become a successful barber, you have to know how and when to communicate with your teammates and/or your clients. 

Being able to describe the process you’re doing or understand your customer’s needs creates a pleasant experience for them. However, if you need to know more about this, here are the 14 proven ways to improve your communication skills. 

6. Psychological skills

Having valuable barber skills means also knowing the basics of psychology, like being empathic, recognizing people’s temperament, talking to people depending on their mood, etc. 

Also, when you work under pressure, your mind can be both your biggest enemy or your best friend. You are the only one who can motivate yourself to get through a hard time successfully or to give up and fail. According to research, talking to yourself and imagining yourself in a situation is the best psychological strategy for improving your performance. 

7. Customer service

As a barber, you will contact your clients for many hours every day. Therefore, you must practice your customer service skills every moment you spend in your barbershop.

8. Business management skills

Barber skills go even further than knowing some basic stuff. When you work in a barbershop, you will have some management tasks like organizing the space, controlling, leading your team, participating in making decisions, etc. 

These require responsibility and management skills, and you can acquire them only through time, experience, persistence, and permanent education.

9. Basic financial skills

Barbers have to manage their income, which can often become a headache. Not everybody is good at math or has the time to do accountancy for themselves, therefore, many professionals have to find solutions to calculate their monthly financial earnings.

With this reports tool, you can check your total sales for any day, week, month, or year. Also, you can see the services that bring you the most money and the customers who generate the most revenue in your barbershop. Everything’s easier when you can have a look at your total reports with just a few taps. 🙂

10. Self-control

When you interact with many people, it’s impossible not to find one that comes in angry or that had a bad day and wants to argue with you. In those cases, knowing how to deal with angry clients is essential. Self-control, patience, and calm are keys if you don’t want to end up in a fight with someone in your barbershop. 

11. Adaptability

In every industry, you can encounter the challenge of having to adapt to different situations. For example, when your clients are part of a specific social class, and they usually are pretentious, you have to adapt to their behavior, as they are the ones who generate your income. Another example of situations you need to adapt is when you change the barbershop where you work or when your barbershop staff members change. 

Those are just simple examples of moments in which you must have an essential barber skill: adaptability. And you can develop it by permanently challenging yourself to meet new people, interact with strangers, or do things that put you out of your comfort zone.

12. Charisma

Being charismatic is not a skill that everyone has. It is the ability to make someone feel appreciated, lighten the room when you walk in and make people love your vibe.

As a barber, charisma comes with benefits like receiving more tips from your clients, keeping your clients loyal to your barbershop and your services, and contributes to maintaining a good harmony in your salon. A great way to be more charismatic as a barber is to know how to talk like a professional barber. 

13. Promotional skills 

Barbering is a highly competitive industry, generating around $4.5 billion/ year. Working in this industry means that being able to market yourself through your barber skills is a must. 

There are many barbershop marketing strategies out there, and you can create your own and stick to it to get more clients on your chair. 

14. Leadership skills

In every barbershop team, there’s a leader. And I say leader because it’s essential to be a leader for your staff, not a boss. 

Being a leader means working with your team for common goals, being more than just workmates, and respecting and treating everyone equally. 

15. Knowledge of foreign languages

Speaking languages other than your native one is a great plus for you as a professional. No, it’s not an excuse not to learn new languages if you’re a native English speaker! 

Primarily if you work in a tourist area, it’s most likely that someone speaking another language will come into your barbershop at a certain point, and you need to welcome them and understand their needs.

Therefore, languages like French, Spanish, German, or even Chinese, could be a real advantage to your barbershop portfolio. 

So, what essential barber skills are you planning to have in 2024? Let us know in the comments section below.