M Room hits the global hair business

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Being the biggest in Finland doesn’t quite cut it for barbershop chain M Room: its aim is to be the biggest on the planet. Now it has shops in Europe and the US, and new doors are knocked on all the time.

A decade ago all barbershops were so similar to each other that it started to bore Toni Kylätasku and Petri Sipiläinen. The two men were travelling around the world competing in hairdressing and started pondering over ideas as to how to disrupt the industry.

”Petri was longing for the old times’ style barbershops, the kind his grandmother used to run. I’m more business-oriented, so I wondered how to the change the whole concept,” Kylätasku says.

Thoughts were coming and going, and the focus was on the potential of men as a customer group. The first time there was an opportunity to actually follow through with the idea came about when both Kylätasku and Sipiläinen were on a lengthy sick leave. Now Kylätasku is the CEO of M Company, which own the largest barbershop chain in Finland called M Room, and Sipiläinen is its chairman.

The core idea lies in membership, which is offered on three levels. All include unlimited visits, but extra euros bring extra benefits such as getting past queues, which can exist: there’s no reservation system, and according to Kylätasku there never will be.

”For a woman a trip to a hairdresser’s can be the highlight of the month and a moment for herself when she has a special coffee and reads women’s magazines. A lot of men want to pop into the barbershop when they happen to have a spare moment.”

”Always in shape”

Almost 40 per cent of M Room’s customers have a membership. According to Kylätasku, not all members are those who are looking for something quick and convenient.

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”Our barbers are extremely professional. When the staff focuses on a narrow sector, in our case in men’s hair and beards, and they don’t do perms and hair extensions in between, their skills develop inevitably.”

So in addition to the ones searching for fast and easy, M Room attracts those who look after themselves more than the average man.

”A monthly fee makes us a sensible choice financially, too. It’s possible to visit us every two weeks and be in shape all the time,” Kylätasku describes.

Handcraft aside, M Room’s strength is a Finnish line of products. All shops use M Room’s own selection beginning from hair dyes, and for the Christmas season the company will release a range of men’s cosmetics.

Kylätasku says they’re looking into expanding the selection of services further.

“Taking care of hands and nails, and grooming in general, are becoming increasingly popular. There’s plenty more things we can do.”

Aiming for the top

Kylätasku and Sipiläinen opened the first M Room in Tampere in 2008. At the time Kylätasku had two barbershops and Sipiläinen had four, and they owned a hairdressing school together.

In the beginning the concept was a test, and the owners didn’t receive any salary out of M Company for the first couple of years. Kylätasku points out that all profits went directly into R&D.

Development came at speed: according to Kylätasku, the chain is now the biggest in the country, no matter how you measure it. It has 50 shops in Finland, two in Germany and one each in Spain, the US and Estonia. All are taken care of by franchisees. The amount of owners has tripled from two to six, and the German subsidiary is called M Room Germany.

10–15 new shops are opened annually, and each one means four to five new employees. The total number of employees is now around 300.

The next steps of conquering the world are taken in Sweden and Morocco, both of which will see their own branch opened before the end of the year. Poland and Luxembourg are on the list, too, and a contract has been signed in the UK.

“We’re constantly on the lookout for new country partners. From the word go we’ve wanted to go not only national, but also international,” Kylätasku says.

The goal has remained the same: M Room will be the biggest in the world. No date has been set in stone as of yet, Kylätasku adds laughingly.

”I believe that in a few years’ time we’ll be bigger in North America than we are in Europe. The experiences we have from there so far are very encouraging, and although there’s more of both supply and demand over there in comparison to here, both business and the financial market are more developed as well.”

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Text: Anne Salomäki

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