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Fact: It's easier to tell the president of the United States you're not happy than to tell your hairdresser you're not happy. It's easier to fight nuclear waste dumps than stand up to your stylist.

Let's say you've been going to the same hairdresser or barber for years because you like what they do with your hair. And let's face it, when it comes to personal identity, it's all about hair.

"Women become emotionally attached to their hair," says University of Utah law student Elizabeth Whipp. "And you enter into personal relationships with your hairdresser."

- When you go to the beauty salon, in other words, you cross over into a more intimate, less politically sensitive world than at home or work. You relax, knowing you'll be spending an hour discussing your new Manolo Blahniks or whether you should leave your husband or just move his Barcalounger to the basement. For one blissful hour, or three, you won't have to worry about firing an employee or sending a kid to time-out.

But then, out of the blue, something goes wrong and you look awful. Was your stylist having a bad day - in which case, you should give them a chance to remedy it - or is this a permanent condition? In either case, you feel betrayed, because you've not only come to rely on the hairdresser to give you a good cut and color but to relieve you of the more difficult aspects of life. Before you know it, your hairdresser, your friend, has gone and put you between the devil - telling them you don't like their work and possibly hurting their feelings - and the deep blue sea - finding another stylist without telling them. Either way, you feel like a jerk.

Ask Whipp what she does when she gets a bad haircut and her big blue eyes get bigger. You'd think that, as a future attorney, Whipp would take an assertive tack. But no, she says, "You just disappear."

No! No! No! says Ken Doll, a stylist at Mid City Salon in Salt Lake City. "You need to tell your hairdresser why you're not coming back. If you don't, we wonder if it was something we said or what. We want to know the reason so we won't keep doing it."

Jozette Wallop, Mid City's cosmetologist, worries that a disgruntled client will run around town bad-mouthing them. "Our clients are our walking billboards," she says, which is to say, you owe it to your stylist to give them a chance to fix what's wrong.

For Wallop, it comes down to trust. A beauty salon is more than a service, she says, it's an intimate relationship. "People tell us everything. More than they tell their spouses or their closest friends."

Likewise, says Doll, "We need your business. It's a codependent relationship."

The dynamics of client-stylist relationships are so complex that Taylor Andrews Academy of Hair Design offers classes on the subject. "Most of our students are young and not seasoned in such experiences," says Allison Price, creative director at Taylor Andrews. "So we tell them that most problems come from poor communication. Either we didn't listen to what the client's telling us or the client doesn't really know what they want. Our solution is that if they complain, we agree with them, tell them we're sorry, and ask what we can do to make it right. It's about clarification rather than confrontation, and feeling like your stylist really cares about you."

That's all well and good if the client is honest and forthright. "Sometimes, clients lie," says Price. "They'll tell a student they love it and then tell me they hate it. So I just say 'Then let's talk about this and try to fix this today.' "

And sometimes, says Whipp, customers blame themselves. "We think we didn't convey what we wanted, or we've told the hairdresser to go ahead and do what they want. Or if we go to one of those chain shops and get a $10 haircut, we figure we got what we paid for."

Men, it turns out, break up with their barbers much the same way women do. "We just find someone else," says West Valley resident Bob Kelleher who followed his barber from shop to shop until the man retired a few years ago. Now Kelleher goes to Red's Barber and Shave Shop in Murray. Red's owner, Beth Bertsch, knows some stylists who call and ask a client they haven't seen for awhile what's up. "It's only fair to let us know what we're doing wrong so we can correct it," she says.

Kelleher suggests a third option that lies somewhere between honesty and abandonment. "I'd just say, 'Hey, you cut it wrong,' and then have them cut it all off and wait a month. But I've been in the military, I'm used to buzz cuts."

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* JANE GRAU can be contacted at jgrau@sltrib.com or 801-257-8694. Send comments about this story to livingeditor@sltrib.com.

*The razor slices both ways

Occasionally, hairdressers have to end relationships, too. The worst customer is one they can't please no matter what they do. "We have to be honest, too," says stylist Ken Doll. "I tell them, 'I like you as a person, but this relationship is not working and you need to try someone else.' " Allison Price will actually refer a client to another stylist. "I tell them there's someone who can solve this challenge, or who has more expertise in the area they need." What if you call your regular stylist and he or she is "booked for the next three months"? If he or she calls back and indicates no interest in having you as a client, get a referral, say thanks for the advice, then find another salon. - Jane Grau