NATCHEZ &045; Maurice Bachus is used to traveling the southeast to attend hair shows and hone his trade, but this year he decided it was time the show came to him.

Bachus, owner of Ferriday’s Hair Plus Beauty Salon, has been working since last September to organize the first ever Back to the Roots Hair and Trade Show.

The hair show will be this weekend at the Natchez Convention Center and Natchez Community Center.

&uot;This is just an new idea I came up with,&uot; Bachus said. &uot;This area here has never had a hair show and I just decided to use the contacts I’ve made over the years to bring it here.&uot;

Bachus said years of networking in the hair business made this weekend’s show possible. The Natchez show is modeled after a much larger version held in Atlanta each year, he said.

Between 20 and 25 vendors will display their products, ranging from hair care to purses and T-shirts, hair students will give instructional demonstrations and competitions will be held Sunday.

Vendors will include Millennium Hair, Amprol Bronner Brothers, Visions 200, organic Root and many others.

The weekend will also include a comedy show featuring Prescott, a comedian who has appeared on Black Entertainment Television.

&uot;If you love to laugh, come to the comedy show,&uot; Bachus said. &uot;It’s real comedians, not the brother that lives next door. It’s people you’ve seen on TV.&uot;

The hair show will start Saturday at 10 a.m. and run until 7 p.m. The comedy show will start at 8:30 p.m.

Sunday will start with a church service at the Convention Center with the show opening at 11 a.m. and running until 6 p.m.

Bachus said he was expecting around 1,500 people to come from the Miss-Lou and surrounding areas.

&uot;With us being in the middle of Baton Rouge, Jackson and Monroe and all those places being an hour and a half away, we are going to try to draw from those hair schools too,&uot; he said. &uot;It’s going to be an unexpected hair and trade show.

&uot;People in the hair business would love it. People who’ve never been to one, would be like a child in a candy store. It’s more than just hair.&uot;

Bachus said the show wasn’t just for those who work in hair, saying there was something for everyone.

Tickets are $15 in advance and $20 at the door. Student tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the door.

The comedy show costs $10.

Bachus is giving away two tickets to five people each day at a drawing in his Ferriday store. Anyone can come by and register for the drawing. Hair Plus is on E.E. Wallace Boulevard in Ferriday.

Tickets can be purchased at Hair Plus, from The Crawfish Man in Natchez and from New Look Beauty in Winnsboro, La.