When a family from Ethiopia opened the doors to a specialty hair salon in Vancouver nearly 25 years ago, they didn’t know if the business would survive.
Now, Afro Hair Studio is celebrating a quarter of a century in operation — and like the hair they cut, the business just keeps growing.
The studio is marking the milestone with the grand opening of a second salon on Granville Street, something twins Jacob and Isaac Abraham said was 12 years in the making.
“Seeing our mom and dad working 12-hour days, sometimes it’s a lot of work (to) do — our initial reaction was just to want to help them, and then later on it became a passion of ours,” Jacob told Global News.
“It’s a big adjustment for them, right. Our entire lives we were always under their wing,” Isaac added.
The family’s story started on Commercial Drive in 1998, where Abraham Berhe set up what he says was, at the time, only the second Black hair salon in the city.
After immigrating to Canada from Ethiopia, Berhe and Emy Belay began doing all styles, while specializing in textured hair.
“Right now, braiding, all other ethnic styles, that’s become like really big — it’s not like before,” Emy Belay said.
Soon, the salon was attracting clients from across Canada, including pro athletes.
“We had a lot of Vancouver Grizzlies players come in, and they’d shoot hoops with us, that made us fall in love with the game,” Isaac said.
“It also made us fall in love with the salon.”
Chance Gray, one of the salon’s clients, said the family and their attitude are a major part of what keeps people coming back.
“It’s home. Abraham, Emy make the place feel comfortable, warm,” Gray said. “And beyond all that you get a great haircut.”
Success sparked expansion plans, but the dream for a second afro hair studio was delayed in 2011.
That’s when a new landlord imposed what they described as an untenable lease term, prompted by competition concerns from another nearby barbershop.
“We was demoralized like what happened to us 12 years ago,” Berhe said.
“He say no white men haircut, no advertise white people and just only Black people.”
Berhe and his wife walked away from the property, $70,000 out of pocket.
A year later, a B.C. Supreme Court judge sided with them, ruling the landlord breached their contract by demanding they not cut white men’s hair.
“We won the case, and after that little bit we are tired,” Berhe said.
Belay said her children never forgot that experience, but they didn’t forget about the dream of growing the business either.
“They just keep saying, ‘We have to open, you have to open,'” she said. “And then it’s happened — I’m really happy with that.”
The twins, who are also pro basketball players, are now the CEOs of Afro Hair Studio, along with a retail store selling wigs.
“They’re my boss I guess,” laughed Belay.
“Twenty-five years is around the corner but the goal is for that 50-year mark,” added Jacob.