AMERICAN BARBERS. OBJECTIONS TO SAFETY RAZORS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 25, 31 January 1911, Page 10

AMERICAN BARBERS. OBJECTIONS TO SAFETY RAZORS.

The conference adjourned without adopting a final plan for defeating the enemy, but, belore postponing, they thoughtfully increased the price of Christmas shavea m New York. They said that the increased price of soap warranted the increased charge. So fax as the correspondent's investigation goes, there is no warranty for the statement about the decreased business in tho . studios of the tonsoxial artists. Many of them in New York, and elsewhere m big American cities, arc marble halls, with a fountain in the centre, dispersing scented antiseptic spray. The littings are luxurious. A negro cleans one's boots, and a girl, usually good-looking, manicures. Shave, shoos, and nail-paring proceed simultaneously, and all the profit goes to tho boss . barber. The regulation price for a shave in New York to-day is 7gd, with 5d as a tip to the barter, and a '2|B "srratnity to the boy who brashes the coats. Without an astounding exhibition of meanness, it is impossible to escape a

r>^j."—»'»r'T».m'ii.j'»j..»»'"V».».-iiii'i»jmg|B«" ■"■"< shave by paying lees than Is, and tha pc ph; v. lio do not give t~pb are not w eieomed.

American barbers are complaining ! that the sate of safety razors of various | brands, largely aided by ingenious and aggressive advertising and the increased cost of living, is tending to reduce tho ! profits of what New Yorkers call "ten- I sorial artists." They have met in conference lately, and various schemes for rpf.tormg tT>e equilibrium were proposed i (writes a New I'ork correspondent). . Among tho plans suggested was increased charges for hair-cuts to customers who shave themselves. Men who eiiaved themselves were to pay Ss instead of 7£d as usual. One alternative proposal was to boycott self-shavers completely, and refuse- to cut tho hair of such miscreants. Over 1000 infuriated tonscrial artisis conferred, and they spoke, by reason of •their alien origin, m divers 'tongues. The president of the conference adopted a loff.y attitude, declaring that safety razors " fostered da3s hatred." He pointed out with emphasis a remedy largely within the reach of the barber j practitioners themselves, because the faces of the men who shaved themselves, he declared, " usually resembled tho business side of a curry-comb." I m ' IMM^MIIIBIII IMIJ