If you’re a barber, stylist, or service provider working long hours but still struggling to build real wealth and freedom, you’re likely caught in the time-for-money trap that keeps most professionals stuck. In this article, we’re breaking down a proven framework that can help you reach six figures while working just four days a week—creating the freedom you deserve without sacrificing the craft you love.
This approach comes from someone who’s lived it, tested it, and now teaches it to service professionals who are ready to break free from trading every hour for a dollar.
In my video with Bradford Kelly, the Business Minded Barber and Founder of Another Level of Barbering, we dive deep into exactly how service providers can escape this trap and build a business that serves their life instead of consuming it.
The Service Industry Trap That’s Stealing Your Freedom
One of the biggest industries we know of in the world is the service industry. Now we have many companies that provide products, but what would we do without services? The challenge is when we think about service, it’s always an issue of how we exchange our time to make money.
If you are a service provider, you always are trying to give your service in the capsule of time. This trap has caused so many people to struggle and never be able to create true freedom and wealth. When you’re behind the chair as a barber or providing any service, everything you do is tied to your physical presence. You know how we make money is all due to us providing the service and how fast you can do the service or how well you can do the service all depends on the time that you give to do it.
As we are trying to grow in the industry and get more money, that means we are going to take more clients. More clients we take, that means we have to give more time. The more time that we give, the more money we make. But then we can’t live the life that we want because we don’t have no time to do it right.
Bradford’s Journey: From Struggling to Find Purpose to Building Freedom
Bradford Kelly was born and raised in the Bay Area, California. His mother was a single mom and he grew up without a father. His mom put him in the best opportunities to get around good male figures, and that type of environment focused him on giving back to people. As he got older, he wanted to make sure that he was in some type of profession that gave back to people.
When he graduated high school in 2004, his mom told him he was going to go to college. They had a few discussions where he told her he wasn’t going to go to college. She didn’t like that, and it was a battle, but he ended up going into barber college instead.
Why Bradford Chose Barbering Over Traditional College
When Bradford was in high school, he knew he didn’t want to go to college because he didn’t like being told what to learn. He was young and really smart—he could get past classes pretty easy. But when he got older, he didn’t want to learn just anything. The concept of college was you have to do all of these prerequisites before you can even get into whatever it is that you really want to do, right? He knew that he wasn’t going to go to college. That’s what was just grounded in him.
There were a few things Bradford knew about himself that he didn’t want to have to do on a daily basis. He didn’t want to have to deal with a computer. He didn’t want to have to see the same exact people every single day. He didn’t want to be in a system that would cap his income. He didn’t want anyone to tell him he couldn’t work overtime if he wanted to or that he couldn’t have a raise because he felt like he needed it.
Bradford’s cousin happened to be in barber college, and he asked if he could go with him. That’s really how he got into the barbering space—it was kind of on a fluke, but it matched everything that he saw that he wanted out of anything that he was going to do on a daily basis.
The Reality of the Barbering Industry
When Bradford got into barber college and got his license in 2007, barbering was not as popular as it is right now. Back in 2005, barbering was a job for people that didn’t have nothing else to do. You didn’t get out of high school and say you wanted to be a barber. It wasn’t that kind of profession. It was more like if you got in prison and couldn’t get another job, you should probably be a barber.
That’s why his mom didn’t look at it in a positive light. Different people that he even respected and loved didn’t look at it in a positive light, and he kind of had to press past that because he knew it was something he was going to enjoy. At that time, barbering was just a hardworking industry—you just go in there and you grind it out. You focus on doing as much as you can so that you could get paid, and the faster you are, the better money you’re going to make.
Finding Professional Environment and Growth
Bradford eventually got into a better establishment, but the environment started to destroy his appreciation for barbering. It was very base, and it started to make him not want to go to work. Even in the better environments, the way that people would treat you or talk about clients behind their back, or the way they would talk about him because he went to church—they called him church boy. He would want to get off work so he could be at service on time and they’d be like, “Oh, you don’t care about us.”
Bradford got really disappointed with the industry and was even considering leaving the industry altogether, suffering, and going back to college like his mom wanted him to. Environment matters so much because the circle that you put yourself in can suffocate you or it can cause you to grow.
The Turning Point at Javant
When Bradford joined the Javant team, it became one of the most precious moments in his history. Working at Javant showed him the difference and why he should be customer centered, client centered versus himself centered and what he wanted. Even though he got into the industry where he felt like he was going to be the boss and do what he wanted to do, he learned that he wanted to be able to get to that space, but it was going to first start with being able to care about who he was serving.
That environment allowed Bradford to see what it feels like to work with professionals that actually care about you and to be in an environment where the clients can feel the appreciation of the service provider. This was lost even now in today’s industry where the service provider feels like they are the blessing to the client, where the client should be the most important person to you.
Personal Challenges That Forced Growth
Bradford’s mindset and the way that he thinks, the pattern of thought that he has, is built over the things that he’s experienced in the past. He wasn’t taught to be a very forward thinker by his mom. She was comfortable in certain ways—they just wanted to pay rent, pay bills, different things of that nature. As long as you could pay your bills, you’re good. Bradford had that logic.
It was even hard for him to raise prices because he felt like raising prices was going to lose clientele. He felt like trying to grow was going to lose who he had. It wasn’t until certain things happened in life where he was forced to grow that made it very apparent that if he didn’t grow, he was dying. He didn’t even know it. He just thought surviving was life, but it’s not—it’s a slow death.
The Year Everything Changed
When Bradford met his wife in 2013, they dated and got married in 2014. His thought process was that when he got married, two incomes meant less bills for some reason. That was his logic. But when he got married, the bills doubled. He was used to everything split in half because he had roommates, and then when he got married everything doubled.
On top of that, his aunt got diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and couldn’t take care of herself, so Bradford had to start
