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Six months ago, Greg McCotter ducked into for a haircut. He came for a trim, but it’s the barbershop’s mission that keeps him coming back.

The 33-year-old resident of Denver’s Capitol Hill neighborhood stumbled across the shop at the corner of East Colfax Avenue and York Street when he was looking for a new barber and liked the job they did. But what made him a regular customer had more to do with who was doing the cutting, and why.

On a recent weekday afternoon, the man shaping McCotter’s style with comb and scissors is Mike Montoya, a skilled apprentice who is on the cusp of earning his barber’s license. Since his release a little more than a year ago after 30 years of incarceration, he’s been working this job with the stability and flexibility to pursue a productive future. 

That’s half of . The other half aims to sharpen customers’ perceptions about the potential of an often dismissed population. 

“There’s a lot of problems in America, but I think our prison system in particular is one that a lot of people are comfortable turning a blind eye to,” McCotter says over the hum of Montoya’s clippers. “So seeing somebody take the initiative and help people actually rehabilitate, rather than perpetuating the cycle of incarceration, is exciting.”

That somebody behind the operation is founder and CEO James Repenning — known as Jamie among the staff — a 50-year-old Chicago native who first migrated to Colorado to attend Colorado College. After working in his family’s recycling company for two decades, he discovered the haircutting business while first doing consulting work and then serving as president of Denver-based Floyd’s 99 Barbershop.

When that association ended, a chance connection with a Hollywood producer — and the memory of a formerly incarcerated employee many years earlier — sparked Repenning’s interest in creating a barbershop built around the idea of helping people regain and sustain their footing as they reintegrate into society. 

He opened the shop on East Colfax last February. Currently, he employs eight barbers with an eventual goal of 15 to 20, depending on the mix of full- and part-time workers. Things are going well, he says, estimating that the shop will hit the break-even point in the next few months.

“Pretty darn good for an unknown brand starting off from zero,” he says, adding that R&R Head Labs already has signed a lease for a second location, scheduled to open in August at Alameda Avenue and Pennsylvania Street in the Washington Park West neighborhood.

Repenning first poured his own money into the concept, and then brought in his mom, brother, cousins and eventually investors who share his vision.

“In every case,” he says, “it’s the mission that they’re signing up for.” 

A barbering learning curve

It has long been said that barber experience gained either in the military or in prison carries the innate advantage of familiarity with virtually every type and texture and style of hair.

For Montoya, who grew tired of getting shut out during the first-come, first-served rush for haircuts at his correctional facility, the learning curve began when, out of frustration, he decided to start cutting his own hair. He obtained the equipment, began experimenting, and gradually improved. 

It wasn’t uncommon for his facility to be on lockdown for weeks or even months at a time, he says. Coming out of lockdown, other people in Montoya’s pod noticed that he was the only one to emerge with a nice haircut. After that, his services were in high demand, and the prison staff ultimately offered him work in a more official capacity. 

That’s where his education really took off.

“I’ve learned how to cut every kind of hair, just based on trial and error,” Montoya says. “People just sitting in the chair and me figuring it out by having conversations with them, and just doing whatever makes them comfortable with the haircut that they wanted.”

When Repenning started looking for potential barbers, Montoya — who was approaching his release date — came highly recommended. They connected and Montoya came on board as an apprentice. Now, at 48, he’s finishing up classes for his barber’s license.

Working for a company with an understanding of the requirements often placed on the recently released, he says, has contributed to his ability to build a new life.

“Most jobs aren’t gonna allow you to miss two, three days at a time because you have to go take the drug and alcohol class that’s mandatory for parole,” Montoya explains. “Most jobs aren’t gonna deal with the fact that I’m in the middle of work and I get a phone call from my parole officer, and he says, ‘Hey, I need you to come down here and drop a (urine sample).’ 

“So the compassion that they have for an individual coming out and being as flexible as they are to allow us to do what we’re doing, it’s the greatest thing. Because it establishes relationships, because it builds your self confidence, because it allows you to become part of society again.”

Second chances, loyal workers

Broadly speaking, Repenning looks to hire 75% of his staff from “returning community members.” That includes individuals who were formerly incarcerated, “justice impacted” — a catchall term for anyone affected in a variety of ways by the criminal justice system — and returning veterans. Among those, he wants at least half to be formerly incarcerated people serious about keeping their lives on track. 

Repenning says studies have shown formerly incarcerated individuals tend to be more loyal employees to the business that gives them a second chance. Of four workers who left early on, he notes, three departures were related to addiction and one to a change in career path. 

Low employee turnover leads to less customer turnover, he adds. 

Repenning also is trying something a little different that he hopes will further bolster a workforce that is both loyal and skilled. While all the barbers start out charging the basic shop rate for services, as they build their clientele they can determine prices commensurate with their skill and demand.

“If you’re a $100-a-haircut barber, that’s great,” Repenning says. “You treat it like your own business. It’s gonna be you that takes the risk. If you raise it too high, and nobody comes in, that was your choice. I just don’t like the idea of our most experienced barbers having to leave and go somewhere else to maximize how much they make. That doesn’t make sense to me.”

He maintains that when it comes to customer loyalty, the company generally supersedes an individual barber or cosmetologist because customers come to the brand for a reason — often, in this case, the mission. He adds that despite losing four barbers, their clients remained loyal to the shop.

And as for that mission, a barbershop provides another inherent plus. The public-facing nature of the business creates customer interaction and, he says, hundreds of opportunities to change the way they view people trying to rebuild their lives after emerging from the criminal justice system.

“It’s the perfect place to introduce people to amazing formerly incarcerated people, because barbers have really in-depth conversations,” Repenning says. “They really get to know their clients. So we have a really big opportunity to make a difference.”

Origins of compassion

After growing up in what he describes as a sheltered Chicago environment, Repenning decided to pursue his education at Colorado College, which one of his brothers also attended. 

Family has often figured prominently in his decisions — he followed the same brother to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for his MBA. And in between degrees he went to work for his parents’ recycling business, rather than the corporate Wall Street behemoth he initially envisioned. Their company expanded to Indiana and eventually to Connecticut, where Repenning moved to help out after graduating from CC. 

It was supposed to be a summer job, but he ended up staying for 20 years, met his wife and built a successful operation. While the recycling company was first and foremost a business, Repenning also appreciated that it came attached to a higher purpose of sustaining the environment. That mission-centered element remained in the back of his mind once he left for other jobs.

And though he could hardly have known at the time, his work with the recycling company yielded an experience that would help shape his later venture. Charged with hiring an equipment operator, he interviewed several candidates and found that one stood out. A man named Angelo had come from a halfway house, but that didn’t really register with Repenning beyond the understanding that he must have gotten into trouble at some point in his life.

After an outstanding interview, Repenning felt the choice was easy. The next day he called Angelo to offer him the job.

“And his response was, ‘Well, hang on. I feel like there’s something you need to know about me. I’ve been in prison for the last 28 years. I murdered my best friend in a drug deal when I was 18,’” Repenning recalls. “Never heard that before. That was kind of shocking.”

In the moment, he admits, he could have gone either way. But ultimately he came down in favor of following his initial instinct, and trusted that Angelo’s honesty and insistence on full disclosure spoke more about the man than his criminal past. His new employee rewarded that faith.

“That was the beginning, really, of this journey,” Repenning says. “It didn’t immediately turn into a passion, but it helped me understand the potential of people.”

Inspiration from Hollywood

In 2019, after he’d worked for a year as a consultant for Floyd’s 99 Barbershops, the Denver-based company hired him as president. The fact it was founded by brothers resonated with Repenning’s enduring connection to family. Although he knew little about the business of cutting hair, he did know how to put structure to the process.

When Repenning left Floyd’s in 2021, in what he described as “amicable” firing, he wasn’t sure he would even stay in the industry. But later that year, he happened to look at his Facebook Messenger inbox — an app he virtually never uses — and found that a Hollywood producer had reached out for his assistance. 

Scott Budnick, whose film credits include “The Hangover” and “Old School,” had contacted major national haircutting brands for guidance on getting barbers in the California prison system licensed. He noticed Floyd’s at that time had 23 shops in the Los Angeles area, so he reached out to Repenning.

The message was six months old by the time Repenning saw it, but he got in touch and learned that Budnick and others had conceived the concept of a barbershop that would put newly released individuals to work — and they wanted to see if Repenning would be interested in running the operation. That triggered his memory of hiring Angelo all those years ago at the recycling business. 

And he was open to trying something new.

Budnick’s concept never came to fruition, he says, but it provided inspiration. The plan had been to open the first shop in L.A., but once the star-studded venture collapsed, Repenning shifted gears and prepared to launch his own business, R&R Head Labs, in Denver.

One of his early calls was to Deborah Ramirez, a woman who had found her bearings after serving 15 years in prison and then working at Floyd’s for 13 years, eventually rising to a management position. 

He offered her a job as R&R Head Labs’ operations manager.

“He told me the whole (R&R) concept and what the shop was going to be about,” says Ramirez, 55, “and he was like, ‘It’s got to be you, Deb, because you can support the team because you’ve been there. There’s only so much I can do, but there’s so much more you can do, because you can relate to them. You can have those conversations. You can understand.’ And he wasn’t wrong.”

Repenning gave her the space to do her job while he focused on fundraising and launching the second shop. Ramirez took a pay cut to join the startup because the company’s mission and values more than made up for the money. 

“This is where my heart is,” she says.

A culture of support 

Melinda Gonzalez has never served time in prison, but she became well acquainted with the criminal justice system — and multiple county jails — as she battled addiction. She’d gone to cosmetology school as a teen after having her first child and earned licenses as a cosmetologist and a barber.

She was working literally across the street at Floyd’s, but first heard about the R&R concept during a presentation at a faith-based, career readiness and antipoverty program called . She loved working at Floyd’s, but the R&R mission spoke to her, and she fell in love with the place. 

“And then I just finally took the plunge,” she says of her start in June. “I took a little bit of a pay hit, but my soul feels good about it. It pays me in a different way, much more valuable than money.”

At 37, Gonzalez has been in active and sustained recovery for more than five years. The passion that drives her as she cuts hair centers on destigmatizing addiction, which often goes hand in hand with incarceration. 

The man in her chair, 38-year-old Jason Guevara, a designer of mobile apps, was intentional in the search for a new barber when he and his family moved to Denver from Atlanta, and stumbled upon the mission-driven model on the His wife booked the appointment — it’s his first visit — and after hearing Gonzalez explain her background, he suggests it could be the first of many.

“We’re also looking for a barber for my son,” he says. “I learned a lot about the shop.”

Dominique Murphy, a 41-year-old Navy veteran who teaches at the , sees some of her R&R colleagues in class, but also mentors them here on the floor. She has worked at several shops in the metro area, but heard about R&R’s mission in her role as a teacher, and then was invited to join the company by Ramirez, who worked with her at Floyd’s.

Murphy has faced homelessness and family addiction, and lost a cousin to murder. So her well of empathy runs deep, and she helps anchor a work culture that extends beyond the shop to community efforts giving free haircuts to the underprivileged.

“I do this work for the community and for those that need that extra push in life,” she says. “I would describe it as a cohesive team effort. I mean, if they show up here every day, that’s already showing that they want to be here. Giving back, that’s a sense of purpose which kind of ties into our mission. 

“It’s unconventional, but we’re personalizing these services based on the physical conversation, based on just asking, Did you have a great week?  What are you encountering? Sometimes I feel like we’re giving hair-apy, you know?”

Often that spirit of support is evident among the employees themselves. A shared understanding of their challenges, the pitfalls of societal reentry, can ease the transition in ways they might not find in a traditional workplace. Repenning has noticed that empathy doesn’t end at the front door.

“We had a guy leave who eventually became homeless,” he says, “and when you tell the team that story, everybody’s heart is broken. He was someone that we all liked, but he wasn’t ready to be here, and he’s not far enough in his recovery. They were all happy to hear he got into a program. So even the people that aren’t here anymore, they still care about them.”

“There’s most definitely a camaraderie,” Ramirez adds. “We’re all very close. We call each other. We might not go out and hang out together and all that, but we most definitely have a connection, and we build off of that connection. 

“If somebody’s having a rough day, we can tell.”

Shaping the customer experience

As compassionate an undertaking as R&R Head Labs might be, it necessarily imposed some hiring boundaries. From early on, Repenning said no to sex offenders — not because they’re incapable of change, but because a business simply can’t afford to make its customers uncomfortable.

“It breaks my heart to even say there’s a group of people that we cannot employ,” he says, “but ultimately, it’s a business and a customer experience, and you can’t put that risk. So the only addition we’ve made since then was crimes against children and people that express no remorse for what they’ve done.”

Within those parameters, how much does a barber tell a customer? And how does a customer respond if they’re initially unaware of the shop’s mission?

Montoya, who’s quick to share the business’s backstory with clients, has seen a variety of reactions. Mostly, they tend to be supportive, he says. But he also once had someone physically recoil when he explained his background.

“And I was like, ‘It’s not a disease, bro,’” Montoya recounts. “And he was like, ‘No, it’s just shocking, because we’ve been sitting here for about 15 minutes having a conversation, and I would have never guessed that you were locked up.’”

Customers reveal varying levels of curiosity.

“I’ve had people ask me, ‘If you don’t mind, what caused it or what happened?’” Montoya says. “My question to them is always, do you want the details or just the choices? Sometimes it elicits another conversation. I take full responsibility for my actions. I know what I did. I know the harm that I caused.”

Repenning counsels employees away from what he calls “trauma porn,” or excessively disturbing details of their life experience. Employees shouldn’t shy away from explaining the basics — sharing their offense is fine, if they’re comfortable with that — but he points out that the heart of the story is redemption, what changed the course of their lives and helped them overcome their past.

In terms of the business model, Repenning frames the question like this: “How many teaspoons of ‘formerly incarcerated’ are we putting in our marketing?” And then he answers by leading with a quality product and a great customer experience, but also including the mission — often the difference-making element of the whole equation.

That said, a survey done before R&R Head Labs opened its doors yielded a disappointing result. Seeking to determine the types of customers who would be receptive to the shop’s hiring concept, the survey simply asked 2,000 men from all races, backgrounds and income levels if they would get their hair cut by formerly incarcerated barbers. 

Those who indicated they would be open to that tended to be highly paid, highly educated men. Where, Repenning wondered, is the diversity?

The company chose the Colfax location in Capitol Hill and, later, the Washington Park West spot in part for their proximity to that relatively affluent socioeconomic sample — though Repenning also liked the idea of locating in a “gritty neighborhood that’s still accessible to that demographic, but a neighborhood that could use a boost. And Colfax can use a boost.”

In the year they’ve been open, the street level reality has looked different from that initial survey.

“The diversity of our clients is awesome, like nothing I’ve ever seen,” Repenning says. “I think we’re going to find there’s a variety of places we can go and be successful — much broader than our initial definition.”

Once satisfied with the quality of their experience, he adds, customers find the mission-driven nature of R&R Head Labs “a pretty cool sweetener.”

“It is unique to us,” he says, “and so we’ve given people a reason why they should choose us beyond the quality and customer experience that everybody’s going to say they have.”

Behind the name

Initially, Repenning entertained the idea of calling the company Rabbit, Rabbit, a reference to , first thing in the morning on the first day of the month, brings good luck. And given the often heartbreaking stories of how some of his barbers grew up, he figured it was appropriate to keep that positive vibe in the branding.

“I like a name that there’s more to learn about what it means and why it exists,” he says, noting the mild mystique of the initials. “We decided that Rabbit, Rabbit was a little too weird, but we still liked the idea, because I like that there’s this undertone of luck and good fortune.” 

And so they settled on the shorthand. The rest of the name came from conversations with the branding agency, which pointed out that in explaining the concept, the founders’ descriptions never really talked about the haircut itself.

Repenning: “They said, ‘Every time you guys tell us about this place, you never talk about the haircut, you talk about everything you’re doing. You’re, like, taking care of the whole head. This is a head lab!’

“And I’m like, ‘Yeah!’” 

Besides, it’s important to differentiate, especially from its location on East Colfax where four shops are visible from the corner and construction on promises to impede traffic for the next couple years.

“The aura that we give off, it’s just completely different than any barbershop I’ve ever worked at,” Ramirez says. “You know, in this industry, barbering is very competitive. It’s very cutthroat. But you don’t get that here.”

Type of Story: News

Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.