Working with Rob’s Barbershop Community Foundation can become a platform for measurable impact

For Derel Owens, barbering has never been limited to cutting hair. Owens, owner of Top Notch Barbershop in Southwest Baltimore, has spent nearly two decades recognizing the unique relationship that can develop between a barber and the person sitting in the chair. Since 2023, that experience has become part of his work with Rob's Barbershop Community Foundation (RBCF), where professional grooming, community outreach, and behavioral-health support have intersected in measurable ways.

Owens joined an innovative partnership between RBCF and T.I.M.E. Organization, a Baltimore behavioral-health provider. RBCF helped establish an on-site barber and beauty salon at the agency. At the same time, Owens obtained the training needed to serve as a Psychiatric Rehabilitation Program coordinator in addition to working as a licensed barber. The model allowed clients to receive grooming services in an environment where conversations about mental health, substance use, personal goals, and everyday challenges could also take place. (The Baltimore Times)

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The concept received attention from The Baltimore Banner, CBS Baltimore, WBAL-TV, and The Baltimore Times. Media reports described the barbering environment as a safe and relatable space for clients, with T.I.M.E. leadership reporting improvements in client motivation, self-esteem, and dignity when self-care services were incorporated alongside traditional behavioral-health services. (The Baltimore Times).

But several years later, Owens' work can also be examined through the numbers.

The Numbers Behind the Work

RBCF's project records show that during 2023 and 2024, Owens' work through the T.I.M.E. Organization and Ravens Back-to-School projects generated 527 documented grooming outputs:

• 481 haircuts
• 32 hairstyles
• 14 additional grooming services
• 214 unduplicated individuals served
• 490 participants identified as having incomes below U.S. poverty guidelines

The data also show continued participation in RBCF outreach activities through 2026.

Those numbers illustrate something often lost when community service is described only through photographs or individual events: repeated outreach creates measurable work.

At T.I.M.E. alone, Owens provided hundreds of grooming services while working with about 3,000 clients. RBCF's records indicate measurable reductions in the identified grooming-access problem during both 2023 and 2024.

More Than an Occasional Free Haircut

Owens' work represents a different model from the traditional one-day haircut event.

He has described barbershops as community hubs where people naturally share what is happening in their lives. At T.I.M.E., that informal relationship became part of a more structured support system. Owens completed 60 hours of training to become a PRP coordinator and worked alongside behavioral-health professionals while continuing to provide grooming services. (The Baltimore Times).

One T.I.M.E. client interviewed by The Baltimore Banner described what he experienced during his appointments with Owens in one word: "Peace." (The Banner)

Owens has said that the quality of a client's mental and emotional experience matters alongside the quality of the haircut. That philosophy reflects the larger principle behind RBCF's work: grooming can be an entry point to dignity, confidence, relationships, and other forms of support.

From Outreach to Partnership

Derel Owens' experience also demonstrates the direction RBCF is now expanding through its Hair Pair Project.

Hair Pair connects grooming professionals with schools, nonprofits, and agencies serving populations that face barriers to regular grooming services. Rather than treating community outreach as isolated volunteer events, the project encourages professionals and organizations to build relationships that can become recurring, volunteer, sponsored, or contractual partnerships.

Owens' work provides a practical example of what that progression can look like.

A professional brings an existing skill.

An organization identifies a need.

A partnership connects the two.

The activity is documented.

And over time, the resulting data begins to show not simply that someone volunteered, but how much was accomplished and who benefited from the work.

For Owens, hundreds of documented services now sit alongside the individual stories that first attracted media attention to his work.

That combination—story plus data—provides a fuller picture of community impact.

For Rob's Barbershop Community Foundation, that is also the larger lesson: a barber chair can be much more than a place to get a haircut when the right professional, community partner, and measurable need come together.

Rob's Barbershop Community Foundation works to make hair care accessible to populations facing barriers to regular grooming services through partnerships with grooming professionals, schools, and community organizations.

www.rbcf.org