The Salon Chair Guys
We met The Salon Chair Guys at an event in San Diego, Ca and found their story to be one of authenticity and pure love of this industry on a level we never even thought about. How often to we buy salon chairs and don’t put 100% thought into “why that chair”, probably not too often. Hair Nerd Annie bought a chair from our friend Carleen Sanchez a few years back just because of the character and feel and stories behind it. These guys have taken those stories to a whole new level and we want all of you to know about it too.
The Salon Chair Guys, originally known as Affordable Salon Equipment Repair (ASER) began as a small salon equipment repair business in San Diego, CA. My father (Danny Sr) and I wanted to fulfill a need he saw in the industry. Growing up, when a chair would break down he would lug it to the back and together we would see what we could do to fix it. He always complained how no one was around to help salon owners maintain equipment after it was sold. So in 97, after 20 years of hairdressing, he decided to quit hair and focus on salon equipment repair. It was my freshman year in college at SDSU so this was a great time to still work with my dad and do something completely new. After school, I left San Diego and my father continued the business till 2008 when he retired.
Hair had always been in my life, Growing up in the south I used to see my grandmother doing our neighbors hair in the kitchen. Another neighbor down the street, Mrs. Otha May, owned a beauty parlor and her and her husband Mr. Willie used to let me sweep up and listen to them chat. I heard lots of interesting conversations as a kid and these are some of my best memories. My Dad was also a hairstylist, but during the 80s in San Diego when it was all about big hair and big parties. He and my stepmother were the owners of West Coast Beauty Salon. They hosted the West Coast Beauty Trade Show in San Diego and owned a beauty supply store. They were in my eyes the coolest parents ever, they were fun, stylish, and every day was a party in the salon. With their Miami Vice outfits and shoulder pads they were living the 80’s hair dream.
After my dad retired and after several long discussions with my father, I along with my best friend and business partner Brian Moses returned to San Diego and began the process of reviving Affordable Salon Equipment Repair. One by one we contacted our old customers and rebuilt our presence in San Diego. Doing our best to provide affordable salon equipment repair under a new name; The Salon cHair Guys.
So now as it stands we, The Salon Chair Guys, sell, service, restore, and repair salon and barber equipment in the southern California area and we also sell the industry’s first salon chair cleaner. The cool thing about what we do is there is only a handful of us in the country. it’s funny that what started as basically hairkid chores, all cosmobrats know what I’m talking about! (lol), has turned into a career.
If any of you outside of San Diego have heard of us, it’s probably because of our Instagram account. We started it because we believe we have a unique perspective in the industry. We get to see the action from, wait for it…#underthechair . Anyways, thinking that looking at two guys get oily wasn’t going to be enough to build a successful Instagram account we decided to start featuring some of our followers best photos mixed our work and some motivational memes that spoke to us. That’s when the connection happened and we realized the best way to interact with our followers was to share our truth, so we post what personally inspires us mixed with awesome hair and some of our favorite cHairs.
We have gained a great respect for the chairs of our industry. The salon/barber chair is one of the most important and iconic items in hair. It’s a tool just like your shears and razor and it can help you provide for your family, loved ones, and introduce you to lifelong friends.
Stylist and Barbers are in my opinion like daytime bartenders. They listen daily to the problems and progress of their clients and give their best advice. You guys are a powerful part of the collective conscious of our industry and touch more people’s lives than almost any other profession. It’s through your chair you get to work your craft. And if you’re interested, save the world.
I know that part sounds a bit grandiose but a little inspiration goes a long way. Our inspiration came when we attended the Beauty Gives Back event here in San Diego benefiting the Thirst Project. We had a chance to watch some of the industries best dedicate their time to end the need for clean drinking water in the country of Swaziland. Before the event began Eden Sassoon, the events host and BGB founder, spoke with the audience about intention and her experiences giving to others. As I listened, released my intentions, and opened to the moment I was gifted with a new direction. Surly if they can end thirst in an entire country we could do our part to make San Diego a little better. After the event we reached out to Eden for guidance and she has been and continues to be invaluably helpful. We made the decision as a company to become consciously involved and so we founded our nonprofit |Love your cHair|™
|Love your cHair|™ originally began as just a way of expressing our respect for salon/barber chairs and their story. It has quickly evolved into our mantra and has taken a life of its own. Our goal is to bring cosmetologists and barbers together through service as a community in an effort to help inspire, empower and create possibilities in the lives of others.
Also Belvedere USA, the largest, most successful salon furnishings manufacturer in North America. (and our personal cHair heroes) have partnered with us to support our future |Love your cHair|™ events and to help us inspire others in their local area to give back! We are ecstatic as they share our commitment to quality as well as our dedication to being of service to others. We aim to build a coalition of industry giants to help up take the mantra of |Love your cHair|™ nationwide and make a difference.
As far as who we are as a company, the possibilities keep expanding. We recently started our YouTube channel, The Salon Chair Guys TV, where we hope to provide informative and enjoyable videos about our craft and journey. We have expanded our product line to include a Salon Chair Chrome Cleaner with a Tattoo Chair Cleaner on the way. Our new website is launching soon where we aim to highlight the awesome work done by our local Stylist and Barbers along with ours, plus around the country people are contacting us about hosting their own |Love your cHair|™ charity events. This is an exciting time for us and we look forward to our future and hopefully meeting some of you.
If you have taken the time to read this we humbly thank you for your interest in us and in our journey.
Daniel
The Salon Chair Guys
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Instagram: @thesalonchairguys @loveyourchair