THIEVES took everything – even the kitchen sink – in the latest back-door break-in on Cricklade Road as thousands of pounds in cash and stock were raided from a hair salon.

Staff at The Den Hair and Beauty Salon, on Clive Parade, were devastated when they arrived at work on Wednesday morning to find every penny missing from the store, even down to the workers’ tip jars.

Expensive industrial stock, including tubes of hair colour and tanning lotion, were also raided as the burglars crammed their ill-gotten gains into bins and linen baskets.

Forensics teams from Wiltshire Police have been scouring the store and discovered footprints towards the back of the shop as the losses counted up to more than £7,500.

Denis La Touche, 63, owner of The Den, said they had to close for two days while the police investigate, and are currently finding what products they can to enable them to reopen.

“When the girls came in on Wednesday morning to open up they noticed the back door was hanging open,” he said.

“We thought perhaps someone had got in early, but just inside the back door there are some shelves where we store about 400 tubes of colour.

“It was obvious some were missing, and they have taken 208 of them.

“They also removed the kitchen sink completely. I used to have a safe bolted to the wall under the sink, so they have turned the water off, undone the pipes from the walls and took the sink and prised the safe off the wall.

“Inside was four days’ takings, along with £330 of our lottery winnings from our syndicate, so about £1,900 altogether.

“They emptied the rubbish bins and linen basket, and they used those to fill with stuff they wanted to take.

“They went through the salon systematically and took 10 bottles of tanning lotion which are about £50 a bottle.

“They also took a spray gun and compressor, and went into the back room and took a big tool box which had been filled with make-up, along with two titanium plated ear-piercing guns.”

Denis said much of the missing stock would have to be sold to rivals or on the black market.

“It is strange because the colours cannot be used by the average person, they have to be mixed with peroxide,” he said. “It would have to be sold to a professional or another hairdresser.

“They took the laptop and entered the till, taking probably around £20 in change. They emptied the jars full of tips on the girl’s work stations, and one even took the entire pig.

On top of that there was a cash box with £200 in £1 coins.

“At a rough estimate of cash and products taken it is about £7,500. We have not been able to trade for two days because the police and forensics have been all over the place.

“We opened for an hour on Thursday afternoon, and we are cleaning up now and getting together a few bits of stock we can so that we can trade.

“The police have found a couple of footprints at the back where they probably stood on the safe to get it off the wall.”

The burglars had attempted to enter two neighbouring shops, and the incident comes after the Buteco restaurant further down Cricklade Road was hit twice last month.