A Teesside barber has joined forces with Stockton Riverside College to help tackle a growing skills shortage. Here Matthew Salvin tells Marie Turbill how they plan to get to the root of the problem.

MATTHEW Salvin knows that there are no shortcuts when it comes to tackling the barbering skills shortage.

Business might be booming for traditional barbers, and let’s face it male grooming has never been so popular, but according to those in the trade, the industry is crying out for more skilled staff.

The shortfall is leaving thriving businesses like Salvin’s Barbers unable to expand as quickly as they would like.

But Matthew, who has four shops in Teesside and is keen to open more, hopes to make a change by cultivating his own home grown workforce.

Working alongside Stockton Riverside College, the firm plans to deliver a series of traineeships and apprenticeships, drawing more young people into the trade.

He also hopes to establish the chain as a leading body when it comes to quality standards of barbering training in the region, equipping members of his existing team to become training assessors.

Starting out as a 16-year-old trainee himself Matthew knows the value of learning on the job. He says: “It wasn’t a career I had considered before but it was the first chance that I was given and I jumped at it.”

Finding he had a flair for barbering, just two years later, at 18, he was branching out and offering his boss the opportunity to go into partnership with him.

Matthew opened his first shop in Middlesbrough and “worked his socks off” to establish the Salvin’s Barbers brand.

Some 17 years later, it seems only right that the former Nunthorpe Academy student is playing his part in helping to cultivate fresh talent and at the same time support his existing staff to gain qualifications.

With barber’s shops in Middlesbrough town centre, Berwick Hills, Ormesby and Norton, as well as the tattoo studio, Skins & Needles, in Middlesbrough, he plans to further expand the business. He already has his eye on several potential locations, the only thing holding him back is a shortage of additional staff with the right skills to fill the new shops.

It’s an unusual position to be in, especially during what have been undeniably testing times for the high street. But Matthew says: “Traditional barbers shops were probably one of the few businesses to do well when the recession hit.”

He explains: “When I first started out there were hardly any barber’s shops and it felt very much like a dying trade.

“A growth in popularity of men’s grooming had previously seen men turning away from the traditional back street barber’s in favour of the larger (and often more expensive) salons.

“For a time traditional barbering just wasn’t seen as a trendy business to be in.”

Then the recession struck and all that changed.

“Men started coming back to the barbers looking for more budget haircuts,” he says.

Today Matthew says the trade has firmly re-established its position in the male grooming industry.

Its image has undergone something of a transformation with the ever popular short back and sides now accompanied by a wide range of contemporary styles and techniques and even the wet shave is seeing its own resurgence.

But that temporary lull, which saw fewer people entering and more people exiting the barbering industry, has clearly had a longer term impact.

The industry now faces an ongoing struggle to find additional experienced staff to meet growing demand.

Adding to this, Matthew says, many barbers are reluctant to train people up in case they go on to leave and become the competition. Then there are those who do just that, leaping into setting up on their own, only to find it’s a lot easier said than done and ultimately leaving the trade.

“Just opening the doors doesn’t make clients walk in,” says Matthew, who relies on his firm’s established reputation to retain its staff and clients, while also offering exciting opportunities for progression.

Looking to the future of the industry along with the growth of his own business Salvin’s has already taken on three apprentices through Stockton Riverside College with more in the pipeline.

Matthew says: “It has got to a point where something has to be done. Without more skilled people available we can’t grow the business. By offering apprenticeships and traineeships we hope we can create our own future talent.”