Can’t find workers? Train them yourself
By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
In the wake of a worker shortage, Anthony Nappa found a creative solution: train workers to man his barbershop empire.
At age 19, Anthony Nappa founded Saving Face Barbershop in Camillus in 2009. His business has grown to four locations, Manlius (2019), Saratoga Springs (2019) and Baldwinsville (2022).
But his most recent venture is Saving Face Barber Academy, a freestanding organization launched Jan. 8.
Nappa’s business partner, Taylor Horsman, who co-owns the school and three of Nappa’s barbershops, heads the school. The academy is a state-accredited private trade school which prepares students to take the New York state practical exam and issue a New York state master barber license.
Nappa said that the closest barber’s school is in Rochester. That makes it tough to recruit new barbers. The site ourworldisbeauty.com lists two schools in Rochester, one in Albany and three Downstate. Nappa’s school is the seventh barber school statewide.
“We’ve apprenticed a lot of people, but we wanted to take a deep dive into how difficult it would be to open a school,” Nappa said. “It was challenging, but the need was there. We want to train these students up and keep some of the good ones and put some into the community. It’s been great so far.”
It takes apprentices about two years to complete their education and that’s at the mercy of a busy barber’s schedule. At the academy, students train for five months and 540 credit hours before they can take the state exam.
“The driver is that we want to be able to streamline the process of getting licensed barbers,” Nappa said. “There’s not a ton of barbers coming out of schools but many move to other areas. We can offer job placement to them as well, which is attractive. There’s a demand for it. The scarcity of schools is not reflective of the demand.”
At a recent career fair at a high school, Nappa showed the students that there are opportunities to earn a good living that don’t have to do with going to college and ending up “with a mountain of debt,” he said.
Saving Face Barber Academy charges $12,400 tuition and nearly immediate placement after licensure.
According to state regulations, Saving Face Barber Academy has the capacity to train seven per square feet available at the school. Five graduated in the first group (two men and three women, interestingly) and the next cohort started in June and another will start in October. Each of those slots is filled.
Nappa and Horsman dealt with “a lot of red tape with the state” to begin the school. It involved paying fees, assembling a business plan, filling out a plethora of forms and taking courses through the state to become certified as a training school.
Horsman acts as its full-time director and instructor and Nappa teaches part-time. A good portion of the early part of the schooling involves book work and theory. Next, students move on to applying their knowledge to mannequins and eventually friends and family. For the second half of the class, they offer $5 haircuts to passersby with an instructor overseeing their work “so people leave looking good, but they know they have students working on their haircuts.”
Applicants are required to have a high school diploma or GED. The state requires barbers to be at least 17 years of age.
To modify his North Syracuse school’s location into what he needed, Nappa spent about $60,000 and another $25,000 to pay for fees and other administrative expenses to get the school going. He doesn’t view many other barbershops launching their own schools, especially since they cannot do so from their existing shop, according to state regulations.
“Getting into this was a headache and cost a lot more than starting a barbershop,” Nappa admitted. “The barrier of entry is a lot harder.”
Nevertheless, he sees plenty of opportunity for his graduates.
“There are a lot of barber shops out there. Hair keeps growing,” he said.
