This post was last updated on October 11th, 2020 at 09:11 pm
I’m proof that cutting your kids’ hair requires little more than a desire to save money and a willingness to make mistakes. For the past year, I’ve been cutting my son’s hair. As a preschooler, he’s still too young to know the difference between a good cut and a bad one. For that matter, I’ve struggled at times to recognize the difference, though I’m getting better with each trim (at least that’s what I tell myself).
Cutting kids’ hair has turned into a sought-after skill during the coronavirus pandemic. Many people are opting for home haircuts under the rationale that “a bad coif is better than a bad cough.” Retailers sold out of electric hair clippers in April, at the height of government lockdowns, as millions of Americans realized their hair was getting out of control.
My wife cuts my hair, and she cuts our daughter’s hair. In turn, I cut my wife’s and son’s hair. It’s become a once-a-month, weekend ritual at our house. I dare say I look forward to haircut day.
Until the coronavirus, saving money was the main motivation for home haircuts. If your child gets a haircut once a month at $15 per cut, you’ll save $180 every year.
Let YouTube be your guide
The internet has been a boon to this cottage industry because there’s a wealth of YouTube videos on the subject. Make sure to watch multiple videos, preferably created by parents who know what they’re doing, before embarking on your first cut. You want to be as well informed as possible to minimize the learning curve.
While I’ve honed my technique over time, I’m no professional. I’ll defer to the online experts, such as the one in the embedded video above.
However, I will share some tips to help improve your experience. As with any activity with a small child, how you set up the activity matters as much as the activity itself. It would be easy for a hair-cutting session to go haywire without proper planning. Hopefully, my tips learned through YouTube and some mistakes will spare you some headaches.
Buy these four items for cutting your child’s hair
You’ll want to get electric hair clippers, a set of quality shears, a fine-tooth comb and a salon cape. You can rig a cape from a garbage bag, towel or sheet, but I find the salon cape creates a tight seal around the neck to prevent hair pieces from getting all over your kid’s body. The cape isn’t that expensive and makes cleaning up easier.
Also, use a counter stool to position your child’s head as close as possible to your eye level. I’m tall, so even a counter stool isn’t quite high enough for me. I take breaks between snips to stretch my back.
Whatever setup you purchase, it should pay for itself through the savings you reap by not taking your kids to a barber or stylist.
Set up a video to watch
I’m not a fan of using screens to control little kids, but sometimes it’s necessary. A home haircut is one of those times because learning to cut hair is tricky enough with your subject sitting still. Setting up a video on a laptop or tablet will reduce the squirm factor and allow you to focus on the job at hand. When I cut my son’s hair, he typically makes it through two episodes of “Pokemon: Indigo League.” As I’ve gotten more efficient, I finish the cut at about one-and-a-half episodes.
Set low expectations
Remember, you’re not a professional hairstylist, and neither am I. You’ll get better over time, and so don’t obsess about mistakes. Remember, too, if you really botch the cut, you can always take your child to a professional stylist to fix it. Not a big deal. It’s hair and will grow back.
Put that human hair to good use (if you can)
OK, using human hair might sound weird, but it can be frugalmatic. If you sprinkle human hair around your garden, the scent can deter rabbits. From my experience, raccoons don’t like it either. Some organic gardeners swear by this solution. The hair will decompose and serve as a fertilizer, too.
There are other uses for human hair, none of which I’ve ever tried, but perhaps you’re willing to give them a shot. Or, maybe not.
The biggest barrier to cutting your child’s hair is the fear of making a mistake. But as I noted, hair grows back, and your mistakes won’t be permanent. Over time, you’ll refine your techniques, especially as you incorporate lessons from online tutorials. The prospect of saving hundreds of dollars over several years makes cutting a hair a skill worth learning.
These are definitely good tips. My husband is the family barber and stylist, I take a seat every couple months to get my elbow length hair trimmed and my two teen boys get their haircuts every three weeks. Hubby invested in a good quality set of Wahl Designer clippers, peanut clippers, pro grade Japanese steel hair shears, combs, hair clips and hair capes. The right tools and supplies pay for themselves, many times over. He started giving me haircuts when we were dating and giving my young boys their haircuts shortly after. He has given hundreds of haircuts to me and my boys. It was definitely good that he started when they were quite young, as his skills improved with experience. He has told me that cutting my long hair is far easier than giving my boys their short haircuts. There is less room for error. It takes him about ten minutes each to give my boys their haircuts, mine takes about twenty minutes for him to do. I get compliments on my hair and asked where I take my boys for their haircuts, plus being asked if he takes appointments. My boys both like his work. He gives my best friend regular trims on her long hair, and when the salons were closed, a couple other friends visited to grill on the deck, both asked hubby for haircuts. My friend with the grown out pixie cut was hating her hair that was the longest it had ever grown, said to cut it really short! So we kept on our regular schedule, getting great looking versus wonky “covid cuts”. To get a decent haircut for my boys, it would be $25 each visit, mine with the “long hair extra “ charge would be $100. So I figure I am saving over $1400 a year. I am saving even more money when I consider my time and transportation costs. Home haircuts are definitely a staple of frugalness. I am definitely glad that we had been doing them for years, versus trying to start last spring without the proper tools and supplies.
Kudos to your wife for being so smart financially to have you cut her hair, and to you for being willing to cut hers. My best friend’s husband is not willing to learn and she said she would not trust him to just be able to put her hair in a ponytail, and not screw It up.
Wow, Carolyn. That’s great for you and your family. Sounds like your husband could qualify as a professional stylist. I agree with him that cutting short hair is trickier than cutting long hair. The mistakes do stand out more on a short cut (which is why it’s important to start cutting hair when the kids are young.) I hope your comments inspire others to give the home haircut a try. There is indeed a lot of money to be saved.
The other benefits of doing haircuts at home is the time saved and that it is so convenient to not have make an appointment, drive there and wait for your turn. It takes my husband about ten minutes to give each of my boys their haircuts. It takes him about twenty minutes to trim my hair, due to the length as I have a lot of hair. Less time than it would be to drive one way. So you can do them more often and keep your hairstyles looking their best, versus procrastinating as you dread wasting a whole Saturday morning. Hubby gives my boys haircuts after dinner, and then each heads to the shower. Once you get into the routine of doing your haircuts at home, you will wonder why you didn’t start sooner.