Newcastle fans target barber over red and white décor

Jul 26 2009 Sunday Sun

A TYNESIDE barber has been forced to ditch her salon’s renovation plans after numerous close shaves with Toon fans over her traditional red and white décor.

Gwen Burton, who owns Gwen’s Barber’s Shop in South Shields, says she suffers daily abuse from Newcastle supporters who assume she is a Sunderland fanatic because of her shop’s colour scheme.

But, as Gwen explains, the classic red and white stripes of the barber’s shop have nothing to do with football.

Now fed-up Gwen has posted a sign in her window, stating: “The colours on this shop are not football colours. They are barber shop colours.”

She said: “The red and white stripes symbolise blood and bandages from the days when barbers doubled-up as amateur surgeons.

“I couldn’t care less about football and it didn’t enter my head that the colour scheme on the front of my shop would offend anyone.”

Gwen spent £2500 to transform her new premises into a classic barber shop with red and white-striped poles and a painting of an old-fashioned barber in her window.

But after months of abuse she is starting to regret her efforts and has shelved plans to complete her project.

Gwen had planned to erect a symbolic rotating pole at a cost of £2000, but has ditched her plans for fear of it getting smashed-up on match nights.

She said: “I’d been at my previous premises on Horsley Hill Road for 11 years, but since I moved to East Stainton Street in December last year and made an effort to make the place look like a proper, traditional barber’s shop, I’ve had nothing but trouble.