HAIRDRESSERS' CHARGES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15307, 21 May 1913, Page 11

HAIRDRESSERS' CHARGES.

Sir, —There have beon during the last week one or two letters in your correspondence column bitterly complaining against the rise in the price of haircuttmg from 6d to 9d. Tho position has never been stated with fairness or justice to tho master hairdressers. Two of your correspondents have stated that our charges have been raised 50 per cent. Let mo disprove the statement.. Of all the customers who com© into a barber's shop only about one in, 10 has his hair cut, tho rest requiring shaves or , some other service, for which the taxiff remains the same. At tho old prioes the total receipts from the 10 would be ss, and at the new ss. 3d. Thus it will be seen that the rise in price is not 50 per cent., but merely 5 per cent. What have hi« expenses risen? Firstly, his assistants have had a riso in wages of 5s on 50s, or' 10 per cent., against the 5 per cent, rise which he is asking the public to pay. And, secondly, what is. more important than the rise in wages, and what so far has not been mentioned in conQption herewith, is tho several hundred per cent, rise in rents that has taken place during the last few years. Thirty years ago; when rents were a mere nothing, the price of a haircut was 6d, and to-day surely it is not exorbitant with rents increased by at least 1000 per cent, to raise our charges 5 per cent.? For a man is not a machine in the sense that rapidity of motion can be v increased at will. " There is a limit to the number of customers that a man can wait on, and if a saloon were filled with hundreds of patrons clamouring for attention it would not increase the possible number . which could bo put through by a single one. But, sir, I do not think further argument necessary, the great majority of customers cheerfully paying the 9d. To the few grumblers I would tender the advice that thov go to Wellington and there be charged Is. MASTEB JtxAIBDBESBEB.