How Royal Allure barber shop juggles long hours, pandemic restrictions
It wasn’t until Rome Nkurunziza’s previous barber was busy that he let Darren Morgan cut his hair. He remembers that when he first met Morgan he was still “learning his way around this whole barber thing.”
“I asked (what he thought) would look good on me,” Nkurunziza said. “Thirty minutes go by… I got up, and I’ve never felt so fresh in my life.”
Now, Morgan has been Nkurunziza’s barber for the past seven years.
Morgan and Syracuse University junior Rolando Cabral informally operate Royal Allure Barbershop in a house on Euclid Avenue but are currently hoping to find a more formal space.
Royal Allure is currently operating with three barbers aside from Morgan, which is in part due to a lack of space. Right now, the business is mostly taking house calls and appointment-based services until they hire more barbers, Cabral said.
Morgan stressed the exclusivity of his haircuts, averaging a little more than an hour per appointment. He does women’s hair as well and budgets his time according to the hairstyle he is being asked to do.
He currently alternates between a two-day and five-day workweek as a barber and his position at the post office. Morgan would like to log more hours into cutting hair, but the pandemic has affected his ability to come and go at will.
“COVID has put me in a bad position because I’m here (at home) from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. every day with my kids,” he said. “The schooling and stuff knocks out a significant portion of my day.”
Cabral first came up with the idea for Royal Allure Barbershop when Darren Morgan was cutting his hair. While watching an NBA basketball game, Morgan said he wanted to open his own barbershop.
“I was like ‘let’s do that,’” Cabral said.
During Cabral’s freshman year, he referred Morgan to his friends with houses off-campus. Cabral remembered times when Morgan would cut 10 students’ hair in a day, which he considered a big deal for Morgan.
Then the first weeks of officially working together saw the business’ client base grow from eight people to 20. Then 40. And before the end of their first year in 2019, Royal Allure had 60 consistent clients. Morgan’s busy schedule meant he could only cut hair once or twice a week, but on those days he was occupied with cutting from the start of the day until the end of it.
Morgan’s services offer convenience to people other than college students. He also does hair for people who have special needs. One client is a woman currently on bed rest who cannot tend to her own hair. Morgan detangles her hair, which is matted in one single dread while making sure she does not lose too much of it in the process.
Morgan’s ultimate goal is to open a barber school in Syracuse. The Detroit native’s father was a popular hairstylist as well, and Morgan hoped to find a community in Syracuse similar to the one in his hometown. He describes Syracuse’s barbers as “talented” but lacking in the formal training needed to improve their skills. He also hopes that years from now, the shop will be “iconic” amongst SU students and locals.
Cabral describes the entirety of the business as a learning process.
“The most difficult part was the beginning. It was just kind of everywhere and we didn’t really understand what we were doing,” Cabral said. “We kind of were just learning on the go.”
This story was written by Folabomi Olujimi and originally published in the Daily Orange on February 8, 2021. Original article can be found here.