MENSPIRE and Fresha Reveal 2027 Barbering Trends: Spikes, Shine, and Gender-Neutral Styling

Beauty and wellness booking platform Fresha has released a 2027 trend forecast in collaboration with MENSPIRE Netherlands, highlighting a significant shift in consumer styling preferences. For fintech professionals, this represents the growing role of vertical SaaS providers in delivering predictive market intelligence that helps SMEs manage inventory, staff training, and service-based revenue streams more effectively.

What was announced

Analysis from Fresha indicates a sharp rise in specific consumer interests, with Google searches for “hair spikes” increasing by 112% year-on-year. This data, which shows approximately 22,000 monthly searches in the latest period, suggests a move toward sharper, high-shine aesthetics. Creative Directors at MENSPIRE Netherlands, Alex Galiropoulos and Alexantro Kotsi, unveiled these insights following the debut of their "Riza" collection at HAIRFEST 2026 in Thessaloniki.

The forecast outlines two primary client priorities for 2027: a return to edgy, glossy finishes and a parallel demand for styles that require minimal daily effort. For salon and barbershop owners, these trends necessitate a review of staff development and product retail strategies. The experts also noted a continuing breakdown of traditional gender distinctions within the industry, suggesting that businesses should focus on universal hair shaping and finishing techniques rather than gender-specific services.

By identifying these shifts early, business owners can plan for 2027 by assessing team skills in scissor work and short-hair shaping. The data suggests that while clients are looking for more dramatic visual results, they remain sensitive to the time and product volume required for home maintenance, creating a specific niche for professional guidance during the appointment. For owners, this raises practical questions about how well a haircut fits a client’s everyday routine and the specific finishing skills required by staff.

"From next year, I think people are going to be wearing edgier styles. We’re going to go back to having spikes and glossy, shiny hair."

Alexantro Kotsi at MENSPIRE Netherlands

The companies involved

Fresha is a global beauty and wellness booking platform that provides a comprehensive suite of business management tools for salons, spas, and barbershops. The platform facilitates appointment scheduling, point-of-sale transactions, and marketing automation, positioning itself as a central operating system for the beauty industry. By integrating consumer search data with booking trends, Fresha enables service providers to make informed decisions about their business operations and service menus.

MENSPIRE Netherlands is a creative force within the professional hair industry, led by Creative Directors Alexantro Kotsi and Alex Galiropoulos. The organization focuses on high-level education and trend-setting collections, such as the recently launched Riza collection. MENSPIRE operates at the intersection of traditional barbering and modern hairdressing, advocating for a skill-based approach that transcends gendered service models. Their collaboration with Fresha highlights the synergy between creative industry leadership and the data-driven infrastructure provided by modern fintech and booking platforms, helping to bridge the gap between artistic vision and commercial viability for independent business owners.

What FF News has reported before

FF News has closely tracked Fresha’s evolution from a booking tool into a sophisticated financial services provider for the beauty sector. In early 2026, the publication covered how Adyen and Fresha Hit £4M Milestone in Global Embedded Finance Push for Beauty Sector, demonstrating the platform's success in integrating payment processing and financial products directly into its ecosystem.

Further expanding its utility for SMEs, the platform also introduced integrated financial management tools. FF News reported on how Fresha Transforms Beauty Industry with New Embedded Accounting for Xero and QuickBooks. This move allowed salon owners to sync their booking and sales data directly with major accounting software, reducing administrative overhead and improving financial transparency for small businesses in the wellness space.

What this means

The integration of consumer search data into business forecasting marks a maturation of the vertical SaaS model in the beauty industry. For years, salons relied on anecdotal evidence to adjust their services; now, Fresha is leveraging its position to provide the kind of predictive analytics usually reserved for large-scale retailers. This puts significant pressure on legacy booking systems that lack the data depth to offer similar insights. As the line between barbering and hairdressing blurs, the financial winners will be those who use this data to diversify their service menus and optimize their retail inventory for the high-shine, low-maintenance products the market is currently demanding.