After 33 Years, Hair Core Still Growing Strong

Alex and Bonnie Giordano have been passionately devoted for 33 years, not to each other (their record as a couple stretches back much further than that) but to their small family-owned business, the Hair Core Family Salon.

The two North Jersey natives, who have been together since Alex was 15 and Bonnie was 13, opened up their Route 10 location in East Hanover in June 1980. Since then they have expanded to four locations and dozens of members of their extended family in the form of their employees and repeat customers.  

“It used to be a thing that women would come in once a week and get their hair done and set for the week,” Bonnie said. “But because of how reasonable we are, people would come in two or three times a week.

Hair Core opened after Alex and a real estate partner decided to open another business venture. “He had a salon back in about 1970,” Alex said. “We were in the building business and we got tired of that, and he said, ‘Let’s open a salon.’”

The two try to stay involved in the community by participating in local school and church fundraisers. They also create what they say is an environment where the stylists are valued and comfortable.

“Here, if you leave to have a baby, you never lose your seniority,” Alex said. “You just call and say, ‘Alex, I’m coming back into work.’”

And that’s part of why “our stylists stay with us longer than anywhere else. We have people who have been here for 25 years,” Alex said.

All four Hair Core branches—in East Hanover, Union, Eatontown and West New York—are open seven days a week and offer competitive prices.