BATH, Maine — For hairdressers Tiffany Dauphin and Kelley Keenan, using their gifts and talents to give back to the community is important. This is what drove them to launch Haircuts for the Homeless on Monday, hosted at Kelley’s Salon in Bath.
Keenan, the owner of the salon since 2013, and Dauphin got together and thought of the idea of giving out free haircuts to those at local homeless shelters.
“We were sitting here thinking what we could do to give back,” Dauphin said. “I feel like we have the gift of hair, so why not give it back — it’s only some time.”
They called several homeless shelters in the area and invited them to the salon. About eight women and children from the Knox County Homeless Coalition in Rockport were at the event on Monday.
Karen Rolerson, a resident of the Knox County Homeless Coalition, brought her two daughters, Emma and Cheyenne, and expressed her appreciation for the program.
“We think it’s awesome. It helps and it gets us out, let’s us see what’s around,” said Rolerson. “It was really nice of them to reach out and help us out.”
Keenan and Dauphin are hoping to expand the program and contact other local homeless shelters to host more future events.
“We want to do this every other month for different areas — why not?” said Keenan.
They also hoped that other hair salons would be encouraged to host an event like this as well.
“I would love to see other hair shops do the same thing, because if we all teamed up and got together, we could get this going all over Maine,” Dauphin said. “We’re hoping that people will see our program and want to do the same thing.”
She was also surprised, but thankful for the number of community members who came to the salon to donate food and drinks in support of Monday’s program.
“I feel like we’re not just cutting hair here today — we’re really trying to help people feel better about themselves, and inspire them,” Dauphin added.