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Severe Salon Growth

Severe salon growth. Believe it or not, it’s a thing. The difference between boom or bust is all in how you handle it. Establishing your salon business is one thing. It’s slow, steady, and the patience that goes with the daily grind. Then one day you wake up and it’s like running around like a crazy person; too many clients and not enough time. Welcome to the growing pains! Now this is a different beast entirely. The best example, we’ve come across is Evee and Shaun Owens, a salon power couple from Orlando, Florida. Evee started the business as a licensed triple threat - Nail Tech, Aesthetician, and Massage Therapist. Shaun joined Evee, on the customer service side. One year later, business is out of control good. This is the kind of problem, the YN team loves to sink its teeth into and we’re here to help.

JUMP RIGHT IN. THE WATER’S FINE.
Evee’s been licensed for four years. She’s an old pro. Shaun’s a natural creative and a real people person with a background in photography and graphic design. He also did a stint as a pharmacist before joining Evee in the salon suite six month ago. Their business is growing; in fact it’s literally doubled and now full service. They just added another 500 sq ft of treatment space. Shaun’s caught the nail bug and sees how he can satisfy his creative streak with becoming a nail artist in his own right. This would be a true game changer. Now all he has to do is jump right in. One thing we know, clients love to get their nails done by a guy. There’s definitely a clientele for it.

AN APPOINTMENT ONLY SALON PHILOSOPHY.
Appointment only is a different game than walk-in salons. Contrary to popular belief. Walk-in salons are not necessarily the only way. Evee is booking solid as a full service salon but nails are her passion. So where to send all her overflow clients? When looking for a new nail pro to hire, she felt that the private salon suite was a tough concept for some techs. We don’t have a dog in this fight. What we do think is worth the fight is creating a unique salon culture and hiring someone who fits with the culture. If you believe in an appointment only salon business. Go after it whole-heartedly. Evee already has a proven track record here. She built her salon suite based on clients looking for me-time. This is coveted special one-on-one time made possible through her appointment only set up with repeat clients. She just needs to hire someone who shares the same philosophy, whatever that is. It’s ok if you turn away clients that are looking for something different and who don’t understand why you don’t have same day availability.

A HUSBAND AND WIFE COLLABO
Clients love a husband and wife team in the salon. Check out the previous podcast/post with Melissa and Eric De La Cruz. We know this is a profitable slam dunk for Evee and Shaun, as a team they could seriously slay in the salon. Husbands starting out if you want to market your work, just do you wife’s nails if you don’t wear nails yourself. Wives send all your waitlist clients over to your newbie nail tech husbands. There is something very assuring to know that you partnered up and that she trained you in the profession. They already like the work. They are going to trust your referral. There’s no better seal of approval or five star rating.

MORE FIRES THAN HIRES.
A small business manual doesn’t exist to teach you to trust your gut when it comes to hiring someone new. When your business is booming, you reach a critical point where a new hire becomes necessary. Evee and Shaun are booked pretty solid, seven days a week with an averaging of 64 hours in the salon. The time to bring someone on board is now. In this instance, Shaun wants to be the guy. He plans to get his aesthetics and nail license and that requires 250 hours (the equivalent of 3 months). In this instance, you don’t want to lose any momentum. It would be like giving away good money. We recommend bringing another pro in ASAP. As an owner, it’s going to be hard to find someone who’d going to go at it as hard as you do. Good news, you’re not looking for another you! You’re looking for people who fit your salon culture. Bad news, there is no way to know if it’s a good fit unless you start working with them. Ask a lot of questions to get a feel for the new person. The interview might be great but the reality is very different. Hiring is a numbers game. You will most likely go through a few people before you find that someone who fits the bill. Don’t be afraid to end a professional relationship when you feel like it’s not working for the team. Don’t waste each other’s time.


CONTROL & BURN OUT
When your business is growing at a fast pace and you can’t keep up; that’s a problem. And every problem has a solution. You want to move just as fast to capitalize on the growth opportunity before burn out happens. There is a burn out point for everyone no matter how much you love your job and what you do. Don’t let your fear of turnover get in the way. Sometimes that’s a control issue. If you’re already spread out too thin; you need to make a six month plan on how to bring someone in to relieve your workload. Even if your shop is not situated in the most ideal location for example limited parking spots or zero walk-ins; there is no such thing as the perfect nail storefront. You can always find a way to make money with the right marketing and team in place.

**This is an adaption from our YN Biz Talk playlist, “Growing Your Nail Business” on YouTube. Follow our YN YouTube Channel and click here to watch the full interview here: