The Art of Shaving

Do not go here. Do not even consider going here. And, most importantly, do not get anyone you love even a tiny bit a shave here.
I purchased a shave for my boyfriend as a birthday gift, and he was thrilled. We drove up from Torrance, and after a long drive in traffic, we were coldly greeted by the staff. My boyfriend was pointed to a barber’s chair, and the staff offered me a seat in the opposing chair to watch. What I saw was absolutely awful. My boyfriend was supposed to receive a shave along with advice from the barber; instead, within minutes, the barber had his entire neck covered in blood. The number of nicks and cuts was astonishing — and I was trying to hide my horrified facial expression. But that didn’t matter to the barber; in fact, while he wrapped my boyfriend’s face in a towel (at least four times), he turned away from the chair, picked up his phone, and spent minutes texting/​browsing/​Snapchatting/​doing anything but his job. It was as though he forgot I was there, watching his total inattention and butchery. After the shave was over, my boyfriend rose from the chair with a brightly red neck, still marked with dried blood. I asked the barber if that was typical and his response was, «Yeah. It’s fine.» I then asked if he had any suggestions as to how to calm the redness and the burn, and he replied with, «It’s normal. It’s just his skin.»
My boyfriend and I left, and within five minutes he was scratching, rubbing, and tugging at his face. Forget the nicks and cuts — he was now riddled with the worst razor burn of his life. We ended up having to cancel our dinner reservation because he was in so much discomfort. Razor burn happens, sure. Nicks and cuts happen, sure. But this razor burn lasted for days, leaving my boyfriend unable to shave again until his beard grew back in and his skin was finally calmed. My boyfriend has never forgotten that birthday gift thanks to the incredible discomfort he was in due to that barber.
Despite my emails and attempts to contact customer service regarding this awful experience, my complaints were met with silence. I highly regret paying an «experienced» barber for any of the shoddy work he did, and we certainly won’t ever return.

I own just about everything in this store. Their stuff is über quality and long lasting. People think this store is expensive, but before I had a beard… A jar of cream lasted me a year… For $ 25??? You can’t beat that!!! How is that expensive? Now these things last me forever. Store is clean and employees are very knowledgable. I’ve gotten a shave here before and the barber did an excellent job on my haircut and straightening out my then long beard. He really is gifted and I tip my hat to him. Rest of the staff is very helpful when I would ask about new products and they really take the time. All that said, I’m unfortunately have to take a star from them because they are horrible at answering the phone so I can find out if the barber is free or not or ??? I have found calling repeatedly helps, but that’s just a pain that shouldn’t occur at a place of this stature.

Worst customer service!
Worst return policy!
Not friendly !
Will not comeback
Not good!
Will not recommend this plAce!
Small place
Products limited
Not worth it
Very disappointed
Not worth buying
Deserved less than 1 star!!!

I went here a total 5 times 3 of 5 times being a bad experience;
–Two of those times they rescheduled me for a different day.
–Every time they call; to either remind me or reschedule, they call around 830−9pm on a work week. This is unacceptable.
–4 of the five times, the barber had me waiting outside. One of those times was over a half hour!
–I would have let that go, except that day the barber completely butchered my hair to which its taking over 2 months to fix.
–I would have still let that go, but on my 6^th appointment, I was literally going to be late by 10 minutes (on the freeway coming from Marina Del Rey). Except when I called out of courtesy to let them know, the barber said I should not come in as ten minute delay is too late.
The fact that I got this kind of treatment, in addition to the price of the haircut (over $ 40+tip). This place does not deserve a two star rating.
Products are great however!

I have had a shave at the Las Vegas and New York City branches of this chain. Both were excellent experiences. I have been trying to call and make an appointment at the Glendale outlet (at the Americana) for a few days now but no one answers. You leave a message and they say they will get back to you — but so far, they have not. I tried looking online to see if there was another way to make an appointment — nope.
I think it is silly that I have to drive there to make an appointment and talk to someone. I am sure business is fine, but they really should have someone answering the phone during business hours — or at least give us an option to make an appointment online somehow.

Got my husband an appointment for a shave. For his Christmas present then took the time to drive out to Glendale from Whittier all to find out that the person who made us our appointment got the barbers working dates mixed up. Very disappointing to hear after we took the drive out and got him all excited about getting an old fashioned shave. Christmas present ruined.

I purchased a bone-​handled razor from this store at least a year ago, and when the handle cracked and faded (even though it had sat away from water sources) and when the razor head dislocated, I took the razor back to the store, hoping to purchase another one but at a reduced cost.
To my surprise, the store replaced the razor! I was not expecting this kind of service (although I am always afforded great service each time I shop). In fact, I was prepared to pay for another razor (one without the bone handle) and hoped to receive a discount on another model.
I have recommended this store and The Art of Shaving to friends, students and colleagues because of my past experience with its staff and its products. Believe me, I am certainly a fan of this store now! You will get my business from now on.

Great shaving materials offered and great customer service! What more can you ask for. Love how they opened one up here in Glendale, saves me a trip form visiting DTLA

I wish I can give a ZERO star. Took the day off work, I made an appointment two weeks in advance. I booked two hours for me and my brother. I wanted to see if they are good to use for my wedding. While on the freeway driving to their location, 45 min before my appointment I get a call from them telling me JOSE is not coming in. Who the F is JOSE? The retard on the phone wasn’t even sorry. What if this was my wedding day? I would not go to this place ever again no wonder they are a 3 star.
The icing on the cake — after a min of ending the conversation, I get a call back from him again, this time he wants to cancel the appointment for my brother. Lol are you kidding me? You don’t have enough IQ to see you are dialing the same number? You can’t see in your book that it’s two brothers coming in ?
Stay away stay away stay away from this place.

I’ve purchased their products at the topanga mall location but figured I was in Glendale yesterday visiting a client and I needed another birthday present for friend and went to pick something up, but the staff looked like the last place they wanted to be is work. I usually sympathize with people working retail but this was to another extent.

Way way way Overpriced. Don’t get suckered by these guys. Relax, do research and you will buy a quality set up at less than half of what you would spend here at The Art of Shaving. Check out YouTube or
The Art of Shaving stores are like spiders waiting to catch an uninformed fly, opportunist hunters of the uninformed.

Thanks Jose! You know how to cut 4 sho!
Gents if you’re going to make an appointment here do yourself a favor and come on a weekday. Weekends book up to 2 weeks ahead. Valet your car off of Brand and you’re literally at the front door. Finish your cut and head over to Bourbon for happy hour. Enjoy! It gets better, but not much better than this place.

Great experience. Grant was amazing. Gave me all the details on everything I had questions on. he gave me great suggestions and made buying an anniversary gift easy ! Thanks again for your help ! Will definitely be back

Highly recommend the Royal to anyone looking for a great shave and experience. Ask for Jose, he’ll take excellent care of you.

Jose is a master — a real barber who pays attention to detail like no other barber I’ve ever been to. I recently had a horrible experience at 18|8 barber shop in Pasadena and Jose was able to fix the mistakes of the very inexperienced «barber» who screwed up my whole vibe. I highly recommend Jose, don’t be put off if he is not available right away, just be patient and take the first appointment that works for you — you will not regret it!

Don’t come to this location! Horrible customer services! The barber Mir Mangi is terrible! Customer service sucks! Drove all the way from Calabasas just to be told no he couldn’t help us and even made an appointment! Go to other locations you will probably get better service!

Tried calling 5 times today to schedule a cut.
Couldn’t answer the phone once. Came in and they’re empty looking bored. Asked for a haircut and they magically don’t have time. I won’t bother coming back.

I stopped in last night and was very impressed. This actually makes me want to grow a big full beard just so I can be papered here.
Of course — walking into a pot store makes me want to start smoking pot, so I guess I’m an impulse buyer.
Anyway — the services are a little pricey (40 bucks for a shave) but they appear to be high-​quality. The products are great but also pricey. For instance: an excellent set of top quality Gillette razors costs around 90 bucks. And then the custom handles, which are heavy and beautiful, cost well over one hundred for the cheapest.
If I were rich… and hairy… I’d come here every day,

I’ve been in here a few times, and always been served by male employees. Today was the first time ever that I’d seen this particular employee. She described herself as a manager, but not thee manager. Before, it’s always been pleasant to visit this store, but if she’s there, then I’ll never go there again.
I’be bought various items from other Art of Shaving stores, and have always been told that if I’m not completely satisfied, then it’s OK to return items to any of its stores. The item costs $ 25.00 retail, so let’s say about $ 12.50 wholesale. Any returned items are normally offered for sale again, but sometimes returned to the original manufacturer for a wholesale credit. Either way, Art of Shaving doesn’t actually lose money, but it might not gain as much as it would like to have done. Heck, that’s business, and as I know only too well, if you break even every now and then, it’s not a big deal. You have to look at the big picture. The employee didn’t do that, which might be a reflection of her own personality, or simply bad training.
Today, I wanted to return, exchange or even receive a credit for an item that had been purchased for $ 25.00 plus tax. I guess that the employee that I encountered and whom I’d never seen before, didn’t read the memo about customer satisfaction. Not only that, but she was rude, condescending, aloof and doesn’t even know what ammonia is. It occurred by me that perhaps it’s the staff training that’s wrong, but I’ve never received this sort of employee attitude before. My girlfriend claims that maybe this employee may have been on her «time of the month». Sure, we all have off days, but in a customer service situation, that’s not acceptable.
I don’t mind so much that mistakes happen, or that employees sometimes make verbal mistakes, or that sometimes the products are defective. It’s what happens after such incidents that the bad guys are separated from the good guys.
I’m now going to dispute the payment through the credit card company that had been used for the purchase. That will cause inconvenience all around.
Art of Shaving won’t have lost any money if the product had been returned, but the only thing it has lost is a customer. They, and in particular the Glendale store, need to shape up, or ship out.

Brought Paul here for his birthday a couple of years back. Thought he needed a bit of pampering. I had the older gentlemen give him a shave, old school. With that knife thing-​a-​majig. Reminded me of the movie «Gangs of New York» for some reason.
So there he was reclining with the man applying lather to his face with a brush and then proceeding to shave him. Next thing I noticed was blood trickling down Paul’s face.
…Uhh. Should I say something? Paul doesn’t seem to notice. I guess he’s not in any pain. I’ll just show him the video later so he can see for himself what happened and when it happened.
The man looked at me when he saw the blood, saw me sitting not saying anything and proceeded to finish the job. Poor Paul. He said it was fun (until I showed him the video) but not worth $ 180+. I agree.
I went back to the place to buy him a set of fancy schmancy shaving kit for about $ 300+ and he still uses it… once a year maybe. LOL. This is okay but for the price, get your guy a GoPro instead. He’ll have more fun with it.
*****
Thanks to Bryan Y. for notifying me the older barber hasn’t work there for years since I last visited.
*****
Oprah «Sea Jack» N.
For your review of: The Art of Shaving
So many things about this review don’t make sense for the Art of Shaving in Glendale.
Barber is young. Nobody bleeds and services are not that expensive.
*****
I didn’t get just one service or product from them. I added up all the value + tips that’s how I got my high prices. :) Please see uploaded pics screen captured from the video I took. Thank you for reading my review, boo.