South Korea’s Double Pole Barbershops

For people of a certain age Korea is perhaps best known for the war that split the country in two. These days it is probably better known for the Korean wave that has made K-Pop groups some of the most popular performers on earth.

Lesser known is the fact that South Korea is home to one of the largest commercial sex industries in the world. It is estimated that prostitution creates up to 5 percent of national GDP! The country is filled with sex shops ranging from adult oriented coffee shops to ANMA massage parlors and kissing rooms. Even more common still though arguably even lesser known are the double barber pole shops.

These two pole barbershops double as places for guys to purchase sexual services in relative anonymity. They exist in plain sight all over the country from tiny towns to Seoul. And they mark their presence simply by placing two spinning barber poles outside of their shops.

Two pole barber shops in Korea

In South Korea, two pole barbershops that double as brothels are referred to as ibalso. They are differentiated from actual barbershops in several ways. The sexual shops will often have two red white and blue poles spinning fast. Or if they have a single pole, it will have something like “massage” on the pole in Korean and perhaps English too. The places that actually cut hair will have a single pole. Often they will have an illustration a woman with hair. Sometimes their poles will have a word like “salon” written in Korean, English or both.

Those real hair salons are not to be confused with the pink salons of Japan. If this isn’t all muddled enough there is the fact that some sexual shops have just one single pole. Though no sexually oriented stores have any signage referring to hair salon or with drawings of women with nice hair styles.

The truth is that some of these places are so under the radar that they can only be sussed out by actually walking inside. Obviously I haven’t been in every one of these places. There are perhaps thousands of them across Korea. But I have been in enough to know how they work and how to find them. There are also times when things are plainly obvious. What kind of barbershop is open 24 hours? Does anyone actually need a trim around the ears at 2:43 in the morning? Similarly a “barbershop” with no barber or even cutting implements inside is surely offering something other than hair cuts.

While I do know how these places work I won’t pretend to know the origins of these operations. Suffice it to say that barbershop type stores offering sexual services are quite common in parts of Asia. I have already reported on numerous places that follow this mold from the famous Benny’s in Saigon to the barbershop that offered blowjobs in Bangkok International Airport.

The various sorts of sexual barber shops

To make matters more confusing there are various sorts of sexual barber shops in South Korea. Most are pretty straight forward places staffed by one or two women. Though the services they offer can vary quite a bit.

The first sort of shop will have one or two women inside who give either handjobs or blowjobs to customers. These places are often dingy little shops with single barber chairs located in the basement of small buildings. Once a guy comes in the women will look the door and go to work. In some places a more attractive woman will start the proceedings by seating the customer and maybe putting a hot towel on their face. Or they might even get their tits out to get the guys going. Then an older woman will come out and do the hard work of the happy ending. So it’s sort of like the procedure at Jinju Massage in Seoul only in reverse. More common is for the older woman to be the only gal in the shop. Prices can range from 50,000 to 100,000 Won ($25-85 USD).

The next kind of shop is the full sex facility. Sometimes these will be set up in the same way with just a single chair in a small room. In other places there will be a mattress or even a small private room where the deed is done. These are not ANMA or Korean massage parlors that so many know and love. They are more like hole-in-the-wall shops with special services. The places where full service is the norm are most likely to have just one older woman working. Though I’ve also heard stories about these kinds of shops being run by a husband and wife team! Surprisingly the full service shops can charge even less than the happy ending places. Some older women ask as little as 25,000 Won for a quicky. Others might ask for double or triple that. The few shops staffed by more attractive women in their twenties and thirties tend to charge higher rates.

Finally there are the rare but existent in between places. These are barbershops that actually do have a guy who can cut hair inside. Though customers can also ask for a lady and have one miraculously appear from some other part of the facility. Other than the presence of a guy with a pair of scissors these places operate like the other shops mentioned above. These may even be the “mom and pop” shops I mentioned earlier.

Doubke pole barbershops are common across South Korea. They are little discussed but most adult Koreans know exactly what they are. Although prostitution is technically illegal in South Korea it is widespread. The world’s oldest profession is alive and well all around the world. In some places it takes on more creative shapes and forms than in others. Though there are few spots on this earth where there are no people exchanging sex with money, good or services. This is the reality. I simply report on it.