Beach male-oriented hair salon is all about looks - hers

VIRGINIA BEACH

Her resume didn't worry Alex Lockerby as she interviewed at the new Knockouts hair salon; she's a state-accredited cosmetologist. However, she did worry whether she was good-looking enough.

"It was like, if I don't get hired here, does that mean I'm ugly?" the 19-year-old said.

She got the job.

Knockouts' advertising and recruitment videos make the qualifications clear: "The hottest hair stylists in Hampton Roads," says the radio ad, pitching male customers with the promise of hands massaging their scalps. "A parlor full of beauties," says an online video.

Knockouts opened across from Town Center on Virginia Beach Boulevard four weeks ago. Another, owned separately, opened on North Lynnhaven Road a month earlier.

Knockouts' top-shelf offering includes two shampoos - one before the cut, one after - a scalp massage and a hot-towel-on-the-face treatment for $27. There also are pedicures, manicures, waxing and massages. And sports on TV. And, when the store gets its ABC license in a few weeks, beer.

Nonetheless...

"Yeah, they come in because there are cute girls working here, and every guy likes to look at cute girls," said stylist Jenna Baker, 22.

Knockouts has been called "the Hooters of haircuts."

Franchise owner Jeremy Churchill doesn't like the comparison. "They're trashy, we're not," he said.

Churchill, a vice president at Bank of the Commonwealth, said he and his wife - also a banker - looked at about 20 different franchises but wanted "to get in on something at the ground level."

The business is selling "a much-needed service guys want," he said. "Men want to be pampered as much as women do. But they don't want to be pampered by a guy. They want to be pampered by a pretty girl."

Of his hiring practices, Churchill said everyone gets an application. But, he noted, "You do have a right, as an American, to be picky and choosy."

Labor lawyer Dean Buckius said hiring pretty young women is legal if a business can prove it's a "bona fide occupational qualification."

"You have to have something like a Playboy Club or a Hooters," said Buckius, with the Norfolk firm of Vandeventer Black. "They could argue they're selling the experience, that the haircut is secondary to the experience."

Carla Graham, owner of Another Level College of Cosmetology at the Oceanfront, said the state monitors conduct, but not uniforms (other than requiring rubber-soled shoes).

"It's marketing. It's a sign of the times," said Graham, 29. "But, morally, it bothers me. And we try to push professionalism, so as a businesswoman it bothers me."

Customer Thomas Brock gets the Hooters-Knockouts connection.

"Any guy can go to Hometown Heroes or A.J. Gators," he said of local sports bars. "But they go to Hooters because they have attractive women."

The stylists acknowledge that they walk a fine line - flirting without encouraging. Most customers walk the line with them, the stylists say. Some cross it.

"There are definitely the times when you get the man who makes the vulgar comment," said stylist Mandy Cote, 20.

It's a daily routine to politely decline when men ask for her phone number, Baker said, or when they ask her out.

Lockerby was on her MySpace account one night when a man messaged her, saying he had been one of her customers.

She blocked his messages.

The tips are great, the stylists say. Lockerby said she got $40 from one man.

In his first month, Churchill said, he'll achieve a rarity among startups: He'll break even.

Can he thank the service, or the short shorts?

"Sex sells," he said. "There is a level of that."

John Warren, (757) 222-5114, john.warren@pilotonline.com