We recently connected with James Shields and have shared our conversation below.

James, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?

“True Believers Barber Shop” is a callback to my favorite band, “The Bouncing Souls” from Asbury Park, NJ, & their song, “True Believers” off of their fifth studio album, “How I Spent My Summer Vacation”. This song explodes right out of the gate with an anthemic, almost-a-cappella chant from lead singer Greg Attonito: “I’ve met some people along the way. Some of them split. Some of them stay. Some of them walk. Some walk on by. I’ve got a few friends I’ll love till I die. From all of these people I try to learn. Some of them shine. Some of them burn. Some of them rise. Some of them fall. For good or bad, I’ve known them all.” I feel like everyone can relate to this in some capacity. Then, the chorus, comprised of band members, Bryan Kienlen, Pete Steinkopf, & Michael McDermott at the time (since replaced by George Rebelo), kicks in & really drives home the emphasis of why I felt this song choice was perfect for our shop name, “We live our life in our own way. Never really listened to what they say. The kind of faith that doesn’t fade away. We are the true believers.”

A true believer is someone who whole-heartedly believes in & supports a particular cause, & our cause is delivering authentic barbering services while respecting the classics on our own terms. Ideally, I’d like to think I live my life in synchrony with those lyrics. I always say that a good song is like a good cup of coffee & “True Believers” evokes positivity, puts that pep in my step & motivates me every time I hear it. In that way, I believe everyone can connect with it in some form or fashion. Music can be so empowering & I love getting lost in it.

That “kind of faith that doesn’t fade away” is the faith I keep in myself & my loved ones. At least, that’s how I perceive it. I’m proud of my tonsorial story, the authentic old-school apprenticeship I undertook, being tossed to the wolves, my craft, the steps I had to walk in order to get to where I am today, the path I paved & the unwritten journey ahead. Having said that, it for damn sure would not be that way without my incredible wife, best friends, family & my barber brethren. “Grateful” doesn’t begin to cut it when expressing my appreciation for their support in me chasing & achieving my dreams. If I’m a true believer, then it’s all thanks to them, & I happily carry that badge of honor with me everyday.

On one hand, I chose this business name because of my admiration for the song & band, but also because I wanted to make a unique selection that wouldn’t get lost or diluted amidst countless other barber-centric shop names. There are so many shops in the world. I wanted our historic New Hope, PA based haunt to stand out & for me to feel like this entrepreneurial endeavor was truly mine alone & not some commercially produced barber franchise. Make no mistake: this is a small-business barber shop & I’m so proud of that. Out of respect to The Bouncing Souls, I reached out to their bassist, Bryan, to ask for the band’s permission to use their song as our shop name. He praised the idea & responded with, “We’ll just have to come out & get some haircuts & shaves from you guys eventually!” Definitely turned out to be one of the coolest interactions I’ve ever had, because it ultimately provided us with our shop logo as well. Bryan set me up with a good friend of the band & fellow tattoo artist, Christian Minick, & he knocked our skull/laurel/handshake design way out of the park. The Souls’ singer, Greg, even painted us a storefront portrait of our shop that we now have on display behind our cash wrap. How cool is that!

An idea can become something so much more than we often give it credit for. You just have to think of it, communicate, create & take action. At this point, we’d become completely sanctioned by the Bouncing Souls, a band we’d listened to, looked up to & loved since we were kids, & ultimately had their blessing moving forward with starting the business. I’ve never let go of how good that moment felt.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My name is James Shields AKA “Straight Blade Jimmy”. I’m a state-licensed barber manager & the sole owner of “True Believers Barber Shop” at 19 W. Bridge St. in historic New Hope, Pennsylvania. Our appointment-based, small-business barbershop offers classic haircuts, authentic straight-razor shaves, precise beard trims, complimentary craft-draft beer & spirits to our patrons who provide proper identification. As New Hope’s grooming emporium, we also sell various types of grooming products from some of our favorite brands in the industry. We officially opened our doors for business on November 01, 2020.

I feel like I haven’t worked a single day since becoming a barber, ten years ago. It’s a pretty wild feeling & sometimes I need to pinch myself as a reminder that this is my reality. I sincerely love what I do & I wouldn’t change a thing at this point. With opening up shop, I feel like I finally took control of my life & its narrative. Gone are the two-decade spanning hierarchies, chains of command or proverbial ladders to climb at past retail businesses, I once experienced & managed. In my opinion, my barbers & I are one and the same. I’m no better than any one of them, as a person & as a practitioner. That’s a transparently fair & honest way to display myself & ourselves to the public. It speaks mountains to how we perceive our regulars. The freedom & power I granted myself by cutting away & opening my own business, to make decisions like that, was so refreshing & rewarding. In hindsight, it’s wild to think that all I had to do was truly believe in myself & what I’d envisioned for my future.

All walks of life enter & are welcome through our shop doors on the daily. My barbers & I want these people to be taken aback when they realize just how much heart, passion & dedication goes into the shop & our craft. A huge shout out to my brothers Mickey, Nick & Credence. Without my team I’d be lost & without our patrons we’d be SOL! I know they’ve grown tired of hearing me say it, but I’ll always be modest about that sort of thing. They’ve been my best friends & coworkers for over fifteen years now. We’re a very, well-oiled machine, in that respect, & completely understand how one another operates. The shop chemistry is paramount to providing an overall enjoyable ambiance, & one of the most important factors above all else. With that knowledge, we consistently strive to be ourselves in order to better create an authentic & memorable experience for our regulars & prospective patrons.

I had my old-school apprenticeship at & ultimately managed another barber shop for a little over six years, prior to opening True Believers, & couldn’t be more grateful for the many friends I made along the way. Every single one contributing to my tonsorial fundamentals. There, I learned & honed in how to administer classic haircuts, authentic straight-razor shaves, precise beard trims & also learned about the utmost importance of communicating your consultations clearly. Your product is only as good as the foundation it’s built upon. My mentors & coworkers gave me such a solid basis to grow my craft from. In my opinion you should never stop learning, as old dogs often choose not to learn new tricks & tend to sell themselves short. I didn’t want to fall into that trap. It’s important to be able to have humility, to criticize your own work & to adapt to circumstantial situations. I strive to do all of those things daily. Whether it’s in the barber chair, booking or behind the veil of the business; each variable matters. I wanted to take my own shot at entrepreneurship & to start a business that didn’t require me to sacrifice my integrity, character & interests for anyone or anything. I finally gathered up enough willpower to prove to myself that it is, in fact, feasible.

The “by thirty goal” became my long-running mantra when I was about twenty five years old. At first, it was just a throwaway phrase I never really thought too much about. Bringing it up from time to time somehow made it greater than some farfetched daydream. From speaking it into existence enough, my idea had blossomed into this grand, alluring prospect. Eventually, the full-fledged realization that this was what I was meant to do, hit me like a ton of a bricks. If so many other people could do it, why couldn’t I? Why can’t I create a business of my own? Why would I discount or discredit my ability? I was better than that, so I made the conscious decision to write it all down. This became my business plan & blueprint moving forward. My foundation. If I’ve any advice for aspiring entrepreneurs, it’s that you should constantly be writing down your ideas. Make lists. Recite them out loud. Even if they’re silly & nonsensical. They could turn out to be your big break. In the famous words of The Bouncing Souls from their song “Kids & Heroes”, “There are only a few things that really belong to me: who I am, who I was & who I want to be.” Another fantastic, daily mantra to live by. As a fitting form of reflection, jotting down these ideas gave me an idea of where I was in the past, what I was doing in the now & where I wanted to be in the future.

Reaching the finish line of my by-30 would mean that I’d be ready to file the official paperwork to open up my own small business. I was so ecstatic to have followed through & succeeded with accomplishing said goal. It damn near came down to the wire but, a month prior to turning thirty, I set into motion the organization of my sole-member LLC & the appropriate federal/state filings. My wife came home one evening in November of 2019, & I told her, “That’s it! We’re gonna open up a barber shop. The paperwork’s been submitted!” She couldn’t have been more supportive. My rock & constant through it all! After putting in the submission, I was immediately overwhelmed but knew not to mix up my excitement for anxiety. I was so stoked to take that first step. Trusting my ambition & my emotions in this moment was symbolic to me, because I knew even if I wound up failing, this was what I truly wanted in life, & as long as I gave it my best shot, the attempt would be good enough. That I, too, would have been good enough to have just tried. The rest would figure itself out & fall into place, as it should be. Good, bad or indifferent. “Just make the jump & take that first step”, I remember repeatedly telling myself.

As for our storefront, we’re somewhat enigmatic at a glance, & that’s exactly how I wanted us to be perceived. This is where the fun really resonates for me. We’ve our famous Universal Studios classic monsters made by Erik Erickson lining & facing out our front window display, alongside antique barbering implements from an unnamed barber of yesteryear, authentic gilding on our doors by my friend Christian Cantiello of Keystone Sign & Co., tattoo flash done by our friends Quyen Dinh/Bryan Kienlen of the Souls, magazine/newspaper articles we’ve been showcased in, & more. Our outdoor hanging sign has our shop name & logo of a large, 3D skull complete with styled pompadour, mustache, laurel wreath & handshake, nestled within a barber pole globe. It was sculpted by my buddy, Bob Shaw of Bob Shaw Signs in Doylestown, PA & he managed to create it out of recycled plastic. Gently swaying with every breeze coming to & from the Delaware river, this beacon always catches the eye of people passing by. That is, if our massive, classic Marvy barber pole posted out front doesn’t get the job done first.

You’ll feel that same creative energy throughout the inside of our shop. Classic, hard-oak barber chairs from the 1890s, porcelain/cast iron chairs from the 1920s-1960s (man, if these chairs could only talk), porcelain lamp heads from the 1950s, rare barber poles, the giant ash wood straight-razor by my friend Marko at Rusty Anchor Trading, a life-size resin wolf guarding our shop from above, a custom tololoche/double bass that’s been hacked up & barbered out, Lon Chaney Sr.’s Phantom, Karloff’s Frankenstein monster with his monster’s barber Jack Pierce built & painted by our pal George Ganzer, or the infamous Woogy/Basil Gogos “Crimson Ghost” haunting our shelves. Actual Basil Gogos, hand signed lithographs gathered from his own estate, line our walls, all thanks to our friends Cortlandt Hull & Argyle Goolsby. We most recently had an incredible piece done by our friend Quyen, of Parlor Tattoo Workshop, for the shop. What was once an antique clock, has now been converted into a beautiful, illuminated, barber-shop diorama showcasing a sculpture of an olde-time barber straight-razor shaving his client. This barber shop is on its way to becoming a museum of sorts, to say the least. Even then, there is still so much more to marvel at when our guests stop in!

The list of relics & oddities has become endless, as I have a tendency to go a little mad myself when it comes to the shop decor. It’s such an awesome addiction, to love our shop as much as I do & to endlessly adorn it with these works of art. There are tons of grooming products for purchase from some of the best brands we know & trust (Reuzel/Shiner Gold/Baxter of California/Layrite/Prospectors), complimentary craft draft-beer from the exclusive & coveted Warwick Farms Brewing, bourbon, scotch, whiskey, & more spirits. Twilight Zone, The Munsters or classic Universal Studios monster flicks are a constant on the shop television, as my team & I’d grown up in love with all of these shows & movies. The in-house music genres bounce around from time to time, in order to greatly reflect our vast catalog of musical tastes & interests. It was so important to me that our business felt like the very barbers occupying it, & I’m confident in saying that we’ve done exactly that.

When you step into True Believers Barber Shop, you’ll find comfort in knowing everyone’s perceived as equals here. Whether you’re a barber, a patron or simply stopping through to say hi & check out the shop, there’s no difference in how we will greet you. True Believers is a haven for all walks of life, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, skin color, tattoos, piercings or beliefs. My team & I want our patrons to leave feeling refreshed, refined & confident in themselves. That feeling of unity, combined with our shops celebration of art, curiosity, music & creativity, makes for an exceptional grooming experience they won’t soon forget. Though you may arrive as a stranger, you’ll most certainly leave as a friend!

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

My wife & I had spent a few years going to up to New Hope, PA, here & there, hoping that we would come across the perfect vacancy to house our prospective business, True Believers. When February of 2020 came, we were presented with an opportunity to check out a property ahead of its official real estate listing. In such a memorable moment that came & went, in what seems like a flash, I signed the property lease. Looking at the pictures from that day still leaves me speechless. Overcome with joy, I’d just secured the SBA loan I was actively pursuing as well, by solidifying the most ideal of lease terms. Nothing could’ve brought me down!

Then, complete & utter chaos ensues. One month later, the covid pandemic overtook the world by storm. This forced us to a halt, before we even really got to begin, for about seven months prior to our official storefront opening of November 01st, 2020.

Out of control & unsure of what the months ahead would mean for this endeavor, I wound up thinking I was either crazy or brilliant to stay so insistent & persistent. I chose to be optimistic, hopeful, to keep my positive mental attitude; pushing forth to seek out my own resiliency in an otherwise adverse & dark time. Now, suddenly thinking constructively, I had a few, full months of extra time to focus solely on perfecting my dream barber shop during the stay-at-home order. Arranging in-person barber chair acquisitions from multiple states like Virginia, New Jersey, Delaware, & even Maine; getting the chairs one by one, tearing them apart & making sure they were operable, plotting the shop layout, actually outfitting the property, setting up product vendor accounts, getting local permits for zoning/signage/plumbing/etc. through the New Hope borough HARB & council meetings when they finally became active again.

The list goes on & on, & looking back on it I’m amazed at what we managed to pull off. There are instances where I force myself to take a step back, now, & try to appreciate just what we created, exactly when we did so, & the massive undertaking it took. Determination steered the whole ship & due to that hard work, it’s made my life so much less stressful & more enjoyable in the long run. We persevered, & thrive to this day because of it.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

When I eventually migrated over to my own shop, I was hoping that at least half my regulars would make the jump to the new location. I’d have been incredibly lucky if that were the case because I think the average is generally around fifty to sixty percent. About ninety percent of my book followed me. Ninety! That’s insane! I had such an overwhelming amount of loyalty from my clientele, that it made me realize I’d underestimated the importance & the genuine nature of that barber-client relationship. Just what it means to have a confidant, barber & friend that you can always rely on to converse with & listen while they keep you in tip-top shape. I’m now booked out, personally, three months in advance. That’s with little to no wiggle room. Some barbers hate that kind of set up, but I for one love the financial security that comes with that arrangement.

The kind of recognition & praise I’ve received is invaluable. It’s easy for barbers to become jaded over time. I see it a lot, & I think that’s a testament to how easy it is to get in your own head, psychologically. That jump start, in opening my business, with having the luxury of a solid book of clients who saw the value in my craft as much as I do, is what helped build my reputation into what it has become. That’s such a heavy weight of trust & responsibility to lug around, & having one hell of a team of barbers, both in character & the consistent quality of their work, is resoundingly important. Not to mention, my team already has all of their own loyal clientele as well.

Blessed is an understatement, when describing how I lucky I am to have my buddies, both in my barbers & our collective following, alongside me at the shop. All of these people have been or have become true believers in this barber shop. If I have any enduring advice to offer up in reference to growing your own solid reputation, or business, it’s to always remind yourself to focus on what matters most of all: your teams’ well being, your health, the quality of your craft/product & those that support & root for you through the highs & lows. Selflessness & a lack of selfishness will take you far in life & evidently helps your workplace flourish.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.TrueBelieversBarberShop.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/TrueBelieversBarberShop
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TrueBelieversBarberShop
• Other: “Bucks County Herald” Newspaper Article About Shop by Beth Zarrett : https://buckscountyherald.com/stories/an-old-school-barber-shop-for-true-believers-new-hope-pennsylvania,19812

Image Credits
Jason Madara Studio Britt & Bean Photography