Haircut 5 celebrates a half-million customers with fanfare for
loyal client
Sal Valentino had a certain fondness for the number
”
5
”
more than two decades ago when he opened his haircut
business.
His son was 5 years old at the time. He was opening five stores,
including the location in Hollister off Tres Pinos Road. And he
planned to charge a modest fee, of five bucks. The regional chain’s
name, consequently, came naturally.
Haircut 5 was born.
Haircut 5 celebrates a half-million customers with fanfare for loyal client
Sal Valentino had a certain fondness for the number “5” more than two decades ago when he opened his haircut business.
His son was 5 years old at the time. He was opening five stores, including the location in Hollister off Tres Pinos Road. And he planned to charge a modest fee, of five bucks. The regional chain’s name, consequently, came naturally.
Haircut 5 was born.
Valentino’s fascination with the number came full circle last Saturday, when the business celebrated its 500,000th haircut. That’s nearly 23,000 cuts a year, or more than 60 per day. It’s enough excess hair – considering the average trim is one inch – to circle the world about 90 times, according to Valentino’s proud estimate.
He explained how he started using a numbered ticket system days after opening the Hollister store 22 years ago. Valentino has celebrated every 100,000 customers by awarding each winner with a card for a lifetime supply of free cuts, and showed a half-cylindrical glass encasing that displays each of the fortune-baring cards. He held up the golden ticket for Saturday’s winner. It read, “500,000th Customer” and under that “Free Haircuts for Life.”
“I didn’t know if I was going to live that long,” said Valentino, age 67, welling up on the emotional day, “but I did.”
Hollister has become his focus over the years after he sold the other four Haircut 5 stores. The 500,000 cuts, meanwhile, apply just to the local location, he said. As the milestone approached last weekend, Valentino, dressed casually in a long-sleeve shirt, sweat pants and webbed sandal shoes, commented on the incoming customers who were arriving just before the big giveaway. He showed off the ticket stack as it approached the number.
“There’s a twist on every event,” he said, seated at the storefront. “Next one in the door. It could be an infant. It could be an old man.”
Finally, the unknowing winner walked through the door. As she casually strolled in and toward the front desk to sign her ticket, he asked the usual, “How are you doing?”
“Fine, thanks,” she replied. At that point, the business’ phone rang. Valentino picked it up and had a brief conversation as the customer turned and walked to the waiting area.
He got off and turned to her.
“I wanted to tell you – you’re our 500,000th haircut,” he announced.
“No way, really?” said the resident, Ronna Gilani. “That’s the coolest thing that’s happened.”
After Valentino proclaimed “We have a winner!”, the employees who were working many of the nine swivel-bound stations cheered.
There was, of course, another twist to the fifth “event,” as Valentino called it. In conversation with Valentino, Gilani pointed out that she had been a customer at the shop since she and her family moved to Hollister, around the same time Haircut 5 opened here. She said she customarily brought her kids there – three daughters and a son – when they were growing up.
“I don’t go anywhere else,” she said.
Replied Valentino, “We’ve had enough of your money.”
As Haircut 5 employee Lola Arreola did Gilani’s hair – the stylist also performed the duties for the first two 100,000 haircut milestones – Valentino reflected on his long career, which began at age 18 for the Brooklyn-born transplant. Before opening Haircut 5 – which peaked at one time with a total of 58 employees, he said – he was most known as a stylist to the stars. A framed “Salinas Californian” article hanging on the wall notes his past years cutting hair for the likes of Elvis Presley, Steven Spielberg, Don Johnson, Diana Ross and Dean Martin. Customarily, he’d travel to Beverly Hills every two weeks, four days at a time, to cut celebrities’ hair.
Holding his schnauzer “Tripper” – who goes “everywhere” with Valentino – he beamed once more about Saturday’s winner, that she’s been a regular customer.
“That’s the perfect winner as far as I’m concerned,” he said.
And he looked ahead.
“Now we’re going for a million.”
