Dempsey Alipia, 34, owns Cutting Crew barbers on Lincoln Rd and lives in Te Atatu South with his wife Sia, and children Joseph, 5, Jeasinah, 3, and Julianah, 2. He talks with reporter Julian Raethel.

I'm up and out of bed at 6.30am during the week and have breakfast with the kids.

Once I've tidied up I drop Joseph at school and Jeasinah and Julianah at daycare.

I arrive at work before we open Cutting Crew at 9am and I'm ready for the day.

I've been a barber for 11 years now and I bought this place four years ago.

I still cut hair and spend most of the day with customers as it's always been my passion.

I really like the challenge of keeping the shop running and giving people a great hair cut.

I prefer cutting men's hair, that's why I'm a barber, but we do get a couple of ladies with short hair who prefer the hair clippers which is cool with me.

I've got two part-time and two fulltime staff members and we usually see on average around 20 to 25 clients on the weekdays.

We're open on Saturdays which is a lot busier, with at least 60 clients on average.

But the summer months are when we are really busy.

This is because people are going out more, want to change their look, or their hair is growing a lot faster due to the heat and moisture the season brings.

We've had a few of the New Zealand Breakers players in.

I've given them fairly normal haircuts but I'm sure they're the best they'll ever get.

I also like shaving certain designs into clients' hair. It's not as popular as it used to be but we still do get people who want to give it a go.

Usually clients will have a design in mind but a lot of the time they let me shave whatever I think will look cool.

I like doing that because I can be creative and I just go by whatever I can think of at the time.

We get men coming in asking for colour, mainly to hide their grey hairs, but we don't cater for that, we're simply barbers who are good at what we do.

Our closing times vary but when I do finally get home my wife and kids are there waiting to greet me.

Joseph likes coming and visiting his dad at work.

- © Fairfax NZ News