Hello Apprentices & The Busy Season [EP:142]

Navigating Apprenticeships and Maximizing Busy Times at the Salon

In this episode, we discuss the complexities of managing apprenticeships and preparing for busy periods at our salon and barbershop, Hello! 

We discuss Jen's apprentice's current status, detailing her progress through her 3,000-hour requirement, and the structure and uniqueness of our apprenticeship program. 

We also share experiences from previous apprenticeships and emphasize the importance of having a strong educational system to ensure the success of apprentices, both for the individuals and the business. 

Additionally, they provide insights on preparing for high-demand periods by managing inventory, staffing, and systems to maximize productivity and efficiency.

00:00 Welcome and Introduction
00:09 Deep Dive into Apprenticeships
03:36 Personal Experiences with Apprenticeships
10:09 The Future of Apprenticeships and Building Relationships
17:33 Preparing for Busy Times at the Salon
22:40 Closing Thoughts and How to Stay Connected

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Transcript

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Todd: [00:00:00] Alright, what's up, everyone? How's how's it going, Jen?

Jen: It's

Todd: Stumbling there. What are we talking about today? We are talking about Planning for busy times. I know we've, we've talked a bunch about planning for slow times in the past, and we can get into that. And we're going to talk about apprenticeship a little bit

Jen: Yes.

Todd: what the future of that looks like at you have so many beeps and stuff going on.

Finished. So we're going to talk about apprenticeship and what that looks like. Your apprentice now. Is, do you know exactly where she's at hours wise or about?

Jen: a little over 2, 000.

Todd: All right. So home stretch.

Jen: to 2, 300. Yes. Because she has to do 000. And let me clarify. An apprenticeship. That we're talking about is not an assistant at a school assisting an apprenticeship at Hello in New [00:01:00] Hampshire is Hello is the school and we register through the state of New Hampshire and we submit her hours every month with a test every month and The state requires 3, 000 hours and then at the end she will take the state board just like anyone else coming out of a New Hampshire cosmetology school, but the apprenticeship is a program that develops somebody not out of school.

We are the school and then they get their license.

Todd: Correct. Thanks for clarifying that, I guess.

Jen: A lot of people call assistants out of school apprenticeships.

Todd: Yeah, I,

Jen: to clarify because it's different than that.

Todd: right. I think people call a lot of stuff in this industry. They just make up terms for everything. I've talked about that. I think last episode I was bitching about that, just complaining.

Jen: It happens.

Todd: So she's in the home stretch and what does that look like?

Jen: For this particular apprenticeship, that looks like we sat down actually yesterday with expectations of the next [00:02:00] ish weeks bringing

Todd: Okay,

Jen: every week at least. And if that model is great. And then whatever. That model whatever else she can't get in for models She has to work on mannequins and she needs to be doing a foil every week She needs to be doing some freehand every week.

She needs to be doing certain haircuts every week we would prefer it to be on models, but understand that that can be tricky So if it's not a model Then it has to be on a mannequin and by saturday all of that has to be done every single week And the prep there is to get her ready to be on the floor mid august before back to school starts to Finish her apprenticeship Apprenticeship Really being a stylist at hello and start to take off.

We've already talked to her schedule and all of that, but she has to hit these marks over the next 12 weeks consistently. In order for that to happen,

Todd: cool. And how, so for people listening, How many of those have you done? Do you know?

Jen: I think seven, this is my seventh apprenticeship.

Todd: And it takes [00:03:00] it's 3000 hours.

Jen: Mm

Todd: What is that over months? Is it like two years?

Jen: 18 months to two years. Yeah,

Todd: Okay. Okay.

Jen: they cap it at, it has to be done in that period of time, or it, it

Todd: I know there's a cap. I just wasn't familiar with the, yeah, that's the same.

Jen: about 40 hours a week is where you need to be but I think they give the stretch because obviously realizing you may take a vacation or days off or things like

Todd: Right, right. Right. Do these apprenticeships look different each time?

Jen: Yes, each one is absolutely an individual thing.

Todd: Do you want to talk

Jen: now at

Todd: that a little bit? So like, yeah. Okay, go ahead.

Jen: So my previous salon, I co owned with someone, we ran these apprenticeships. 

Todd: And you guys did them together.

Jen: Pretty much. And then when she fell off, I just took over. So they were all kind of run the same and they were all dragged out way too long. Like the apprenticeship would end at 3000 hours and these apprentices had still so far to go with haircutting.

Cause they pretty much had just been the cleaner in the salon and [00:04:00] assisting while growing, but not haircutting. So there was so much for them to do after with haircutting because it just never So when we opened Hello. Because I partnered with you and you're like information guru. So kind

Todd: What does that mean?

Jen: You're just like an information junkie.

So you'd be like, well, why do you do it this way? I don't know. I just do it that way.

Todd: I asked questions. Okay.

Jen: look like through the state? I'm like, I don't know what the rules are exactly. Like I'll just kind of wing it. So come to find out what I didn't know was at 1500 hours. It's now possible for the apprentice to work in the salon without my I don't have to be under the same roof.

Todd: Presence.

Jen: without my presence, thank you. So, that's mine to decide. Also, understanding the apprenticeship program, yes, is an individual program. There's nothing from the state giving us any guidance of what to do. So, I am able to

Todd: Oh, well, there, there is some.

Jen: on the

Todd: Right.

Jen: side I'm able to run the program however I see fit.

It just really is that the hours get submitted with the test every month. So, the first apprentice that came [00:05:00] on, she had done cosmetology at the high school level. So when she came into Hello! She had a lot of just background, like there was a foundation there. So by 1500 hours, Ava was pretty much on the floor as a stylist.

So the second whole half of her apprenticeship, she was just building a clientele and, and working on her skillset with Emma. Oh, go

Todd: Which is really good for the business and the person because the person is making money, the business is making money and

Jen: drain is way less and way it's for me. It's more fun once they have the skills and the foundation to help them progress. The beginning part is really.

Todd: right. Yeah, for sure. And go ahead. So you were saying with Ava was one way and with Emma,

Jen: So with Emma, she had no background in hair. She had actually reached out to me kind of just career searching and hadn't really found the right path. And I had done Emma's hair since she was first born, pretty much like her first haircut and had

Todd: awesome.

Jen: the whole time. So she [00:06:00] kind of reached out more as a mentor, like, Hey, I am lost.

And, look up to you, so, you know, could I just come shadow for a day or two? And I, maybe I want to do hair, maybe I don't, I have no idea. So I said, yeah, sure. Come on in. And she did a few shadowing under, like in the salon on some days. And she was just kind of like, wow, I would love to do this. And I would love to do it under you if you're taking on an apprentice.

And at that point, I wasn't even really thinking of the next apprenticeship, but it sort of, I feel kind of organically just happened. And so her journey is a lot longer because without that initial foundation, we just, it, it takes longer to, to start from the beginning. So even the fact that we're able, hopefully by August to get her on the floor still before that 3000 hours to me is like a huge success because like I said, the five apprentices at my last salon never, ever reached that mark that quickly.

So you know, that's just, I'm proud of that and it's, it's hard work and it's a lot of like, It's a lot of hard work, for sure. Out [00:07:00] of that, though, I will say, moving forward, my apprentices, I would take out of a high school program. I wouldn't take somebody from scratch. I would want them to have something, some sort of cosmetology in their background, just knowing that they were kind of driven in that direction.

And it would make my job a little bit, I guess, not easier, but more fun for me.

Todd: Is that a hard rule there?

Jen: It's, it's, it's, it's,

Todd: I'm just curious because

Jen: I guess it does, it is the right person too. But I definitely can see the value of somebody coming out of a program and

Todd: of course,

Jen: that can,

Todd: think anybody listening

Jen: with the

Todd: would agree with you and I agree with you a hundred percent, but we had this conversation recently and you were like, I would only take somebody from, from the A program, but some schools aren't going to have a program, right?

Jen: Right now, if your school doesn't have a program, you are able to find, there's a, like, where I went to school in Timberland, they don't have a program, so they outsource with the local school, and I think right now they go to Salem. if you want to be in that [00:08:00] program, you would go to Salem and the school would send you on a bus and stuff.

So you would still have access just may not be at your school.

Todd: Gotcha.

Jen: But again,

Todd: so a little more.

Jen: Those programs only allow so many people so I guess yeah, you may not get in just depending. I don't know

Todd: Okay, so a little initiative. If somebody is listening, because you do, you have a, you have a little list of people that have reached out

Jen: I do

Todd: I know that you've had people that are interested in the apprenticeship. You can only in New Hampshire have one apprentice at a time, which is interesting.

Jen: Because.

Todd: I think it's a little weird, but yeah,

Jen: because can have two, but a cosmetologist can have one. And I don't know why,

Todd: because they, what I heard was that they were trying to get the numbers up on barberships, which is, or.

Barber licenses, which is why they have two levels of barbering is barber one and master barber,

Jen: Gotcha. Gotcha.

Todd: right? And people confuse that. So if you, if you come out, so for example, [00:09:00] because I know people love to write, I'm a master barber. They've never even cut hair before, but they write that, you know, so that if you've gone through cosmetology school and then you take a crossover program, you by default are master barber in New Hampshire because And all that means is you can do color and chemical services.

That's the only difference. So I went to school, and I did the Master Barber program, but when I tested, I just did the Barber 1. I'm never gonna do color. So I don't care to stand there and wrap perm rods, or whatever, for somebody to judge me. I don't care. I'm never gonna do it. 

It doesn't matter to me. So I just did the barber one. Yeah. So I don't think it makes you any less of a, of a barber, but I know people love to, cause I've, we've interviewed people before and I'm, and they're like, I'm a master barber and I'm like, okay,

Jen: I was a master stylist at my first salon with only like two years experience so yeah, that blows my mind.

Todd: that was their that was their system.

Jen: I started as like the junior stylist but I was master by like two or three [00:10:00] years and I was not mastering shit,

Todd: Well, if you're smart, you would just call everybody a master and then people would just get fooled. Yeah. Everyone's a master. All right. So what does, do we talk about what your apprenticeship looks like in the future? Are you going to have. Like an application process. Are you going to have people write a

Jen: So, what I

Todd: fricking paper or something?

Cause you, I know you have several and you can only have one.

Jen: so last year I had reached out, or the year before to all, to like four local high schools that had cosmetology programs, just asking to meet, I wanted to kind of see how their programs worked, I wanted to make connections, I wanted to make relationships, right, because the more relationships I can make, then I can kind of vet this process as I get in their school. And I heard from nobody, crickets, no one gave a shit. So I was like, Oh, okay. That was so successful. I feel awesome about everything I'm doing. And then one of my clients works at Pinkerton, which is

Todd: It's it's, it's their loss. I mean, you have people that want to help. Yeah.[00:11:00] 

Jen: You know, but it's, it, it hurts. It hurts your, it hurt me a little. Like my feelings were hurt.

Like, wow, nobody wants to talk to me. No one, no one wants an opportunity to like sit down and make their program great or help me with mine, but

Todd: I think when it,

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: And I think you don't know what you don't know. So I'm not going to call anybody stupid or dumb, but yeah, if you're just blatantly ignoring people, that is a stupid move. Like you're, because you have no idea the opportunities that you're,

Jen: Yeah. I just want to have a conversation, like no clue, even for

Todd: And I, I don't think we would like, I personally wouldn't like hold it against somebody, but if you have somebody that reaches out from their program, they could have had an easy foot in the door because you're like, Oh, I know so and so that your instructor or whatever, but yeah, you're not setting your students up for success by just.

Being a dick.

Jen: Yeah. But

Todd: Anyways,

Jen: through that, I love when things just happen. I think I used this word earlier, but like organically just kind of out of nowhere. So I had a client, I was just talking about how I had reached out and hadn't heard anything. She works for Pinkerton [00:12:00] and she's like, Oh, why don't I just get you in touch with the Pinkerton? cosmetology instructor. And this was a school I hadn't reached out to. So I was like, I mean, yeah, if you don't mind, I would love that. I just want to talk to somebody and I wanted to make my program better. And if I could help with their program, that would just be even, that would be awesome. Right. If I could give back a little. So Carol, who is the cosmetology instructor at Pinkerton, she got back to me right away. And interestingly enough was like, you should come in on Monday. We're having a meeting. So I was like, Oh, this is so cool. So. I, we had touched base on Friday and Monday was this meeting. So I show up for this meeting I'm lost for two hours.

And Todd's like, what are, what kind of meeting are you at? Happens to be, it was their advisory board for their cosmetology program, and now I'm on it. Like it was kind of just like what I don't, I'm like, Todd, I don't even know what I'm doing, but now I'm on this board, but anyway, through that and the relationship I built with Carol, we have some ideas of, of maybe how we can petition the board for certain things for apprenticeships in the future to help with some hours transferring. also, [00:13:00] I was able now to go into Pinkerton and speak to the students, and speak to them at every level that she teaches, and have some fun and make some relationships. So, through that, I had some of the students that are graduating reach out about the apprenticeship, and there was one that right away.

So the next step will be, she'll come into the salon and I'll have her shadow on a few different occasions to see if the working relationship should progress. And then we will like go from there.

Todd: and this isn't an automatic thing. I'm not gonna say it's, well, it is exclusive because you're only allowed to have one. So by definition, yeah, it's very exclusive. But we have had people in the past that were sort of on the, you know, the waiting list. They were like started to work in our salon. And then through that, we had decided this isn't a good fit.

So it's definitely not going to work for an apprenticeship.

Jen: Right.

Todd: Yeah, it's just, it's, it's something that you want to take [00:14:00] seriously. So if somebody is listening and they're like, I want to be an apprentice somewhere, like, first of all, you've got to find the right spot. That's going to teach you. And that is something that I would put up against any others. I would put our education up against anybody, even a school.

I would put our education up against the school and,

Jen: think we're amazeballs. I can

Todd: and. Well, yeah, we've had, we actually have had issues because we've had people come on with, you know, Three to say five years of experience and your apprentice is better.

Jen: yeah,

Todd: doing things that these people can't do,

Jen: correct. Yeah,

Todd: So those people don't last either at our salon, but either way, here we are.

Jen: here we

Todd: So you, it sounds like you pretty much have at least the next few steps. Organized.

Jen: I wasn't, and honestly the apprenticeships, they can be exhausting. Remember, I'm not only doing an [00:15:00] apprenticeship. I'm still behind the chair. Todd and I are running a business. We do a mentorship. We have a podcast. We have three children a home. So. The fit is really important and it, it really has, I have to have the energy to like it, I don't, very important to me that I give 150%.

Like I want this person, whoever comes under our, our brand and under my education to feel like I gave them everything. And I want the same in return. And I want them to be successful and, and really thrive. I want them at the end of the apprenticeship to feel or look at maybe other people in the industry and be like, wow, I feel like I'm doing Better and more successful really quickly.

Like that's kind of the edge you get. Like a lot of times you're like 3000 hours. Oh my gosh, I could go to school. Like, sure. You could go to school, go for it. Like, I don't, I don't care, but what you get with a one on one mentorship and the culture that we have at Hello and all the help you get from the other stylists, like you really come out with so much experience [00:16:00] all different levels, like it's yes, hair and foiling and cutting and all of that, but get to work. to some very, very talented stylists and barbers.

Todd: Yeah. And. I talk about like education all the time, small education. And this is a, this is a way for somebody, there are 15 of us. So you just mentioned like you get to work alongside.

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: have, Like whoever comes in next has 15 mentors

Jen: Yes.

Todd: that are all willing to help in some way, if they can,

Jen: Yes.

Todd: know, some of the newer people are working on their own stuff, probably shouldn't be instructing people at quite yet, but they'll get there and they'll, they'll want to help.

And that's sort of what we're building where it's just waves of people helping the next wave of people helping, you know, and so on.

Jen: And those people help in a sense of they kind of hype up, right? They're like, you're going to learn so much. More than I did at school. Like I wish I had this opportunity. That's a lot what I hear. And somebody coming in, I, they start to feel [00:17:00] special. Like, wow, this really is an amazing opportunity.

I'm going to be very successful.

Todd: Even 

Jen: it's cool.

Todd: sorry, even just our staff, like I've, we've had owners of other salons that are like, I wish hello existed when I was in school or finishing school

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: because of what we've been able to create and just what it offers like on its own, just, just working at hello offers. Like X, Y, and Z. We get, we can get into it a different episode, but anything else on apprenticeships?

Jen: No, stay tuned.

Todd: So let's talk about prepping. So our busy times are coming up

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: June, August. Those are really busy times at hello for whatever reasons, right? What are some things people can do? Because in the past, and I think I mentioned this in the beginning, in the past we've talked about. Like planning for slow times, like, you know, when you're going to be dead [00:18:00] after the holidays, you get a low, whatever.

And we've talked about how to navigate that, but with busy times, what are some things that people can. Think about or do or whatever so that they're setting themselves up to maximize really

Jen: hmm

Todd: and, and do it with, so you're not freaking out, right? Running around like a chicken with their head cut off.

Jen: So some of the things that we do There are different services in those months like for June That's one of our busy months. There's graduation. There's weddings coming. So I Go through our stock. There's also Smoothing treatments are huge coming into the summer. So I make sure our back stock is full Is higher and we don't have, or we have extras of stuff, so we don't run out.

Right. So keeping whatever supplies we need to do this grad hair and proms and, and weddings, but also make sure we carry stays on as our smoothing treatment. We have backups of that too, so that we're not running out because. going to do more volume of that. So just making sure, knowing where your volume's coming from, and I guess [00:19:00] kind of getting ahead of that, because. Same thing. Some of the stuff that I need right now back ordered in big liters, so I have to order smaller parts of it. So I need to make sure I have more of the smaller ones. It's not ideal because I'm spending more money, but I understand that this is the volume of traffic we're getting, and I want to be able to service those people. The other thing we do is look ahead and You know, we have six styling chairs and two barber chairs, but if the barber chairs aren't being used, we will staff extra people and use those chairs for different things. Like, for these proms and these weddings, we, the last four Saturdays and coming into June, will have all eight chairs operating and the barber area may be filled with prom hair and wedding hair, but we don't care.

And other of our staff, they want to come in and work those days and, you know. Get extra hours and obviously bump their paycheck and we're able to service more clients. So we're able to do more work in that time and that's something that this is the first year we've done that so June has always been our busiest month It's going to be even busier because we're able to [00:20:00] service more people because we have more staff running in certain days We have some weddings coming in during the week.

So we have more staff on to again to to be able to do that So staffing and product is huge for us

Todd: I think a, a busy time is an excellent excuse to look at your systems as well.

Jen: Absolutely

Todd: we have a lot of system. We just had this conversation the other night. We have a lot of systems and things in place that sort of they're easy to let slide. It's easy to overlook until it gets busy. And so I would urge people because we have some corrections to make with our team, as far as booking, where they should be booking, not at the front desk, like things like that, so.

Jen: Just gotta

Todd: And if we If we wait to do that stuff when it's busy, it'll be too late. It will be, it'll be frustrating to the staff. It'll be frustrating or confusing to clients. It'll be all the things that we're trying to avoid by having freaking systems in place in the first place. [00:21:00] So our team, I don't think. I don't think it's a huge deal.

I do think it's just going to take some repetitions before over the next, like, you know, month or so heading into the busiest part of the year. So, and if you have pushback on your team, just get rid of that. Get rid of those people. I guess. I don't know what to tell you. People have to, people have to

Jen: on under your roof.

Todd: buy in.

And at the end of the day, it's a business and it needs to be protected by the. People, whoever's running it, whether you want to call yourself a CEO or just don't call yourself a boss, babe, that is the dumbest expression I've ever heard. 

Jen: That's

Todd: but if you want to be owner, whatever manager, whoever's running that stuff has to I forget where I was going with that before I made that joke, but you have to steer the ship.

You have to make sure that things are going in the direction that they need to go in and that way you're able to maximize the busy times instead of just planning around slow times. You can plan around those busy times too. Like you said, [00:22:00] we use the chairs we're actually considering, we don't have a date, but we've started to talk about when, when, what would we have to hit as far as you know, revenue or sales or whatever bookings in order to justify adding stations.

We had a plan to add stations since before we opened.

Jen: we had a

Todd: So it's

Jen: and knew when the timing was right,

Todd: And so I don't know if that's this year, maybe it is. Yeah. Which would mean that we would be able to bring on X amount of more stylists because we shift our chairs, which means that opens up, you know, a ton of opportunities, so cool stuff.

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: anything else, anything we missed?

Jen: No.

Todd: that's cool. Nice short podcast this week.

Jen: I like it.

Todd: All right. So get on our mailing list. Actually, it's not our mailing list. It's my mailing list. Jen doesn't participate in the mailing list.

Jen: I open and read the things that are emailed to me. That's

Todd: Okay. All right, baby steps.

Jen: Yep.

Todd: So it's funny. [00:23:00] Cause I used to write those emails like from us. And then I'm like, why am I doing this? It's not from us. Then

Jen: it.

Todd: none of these words are gems. They are mine.

Jen: Correct.

Todd: but you can get in there through the link. You can, I did turn on a text option that says, send a text message, send us a text message.

So wherever you're watching, if you're watching or listening rather on Apple or you're listening on Spotify or wherever, There should be a little link right above the show notes that says send us a text message. And I tested it out and it works and it just goes right to my phone. So if anybody has questions or anything quick and then you could keep an eye on our website because I do have some blogs coming.

I have not finished them yet, but I have them coming. So, and we will see you guys next week. Thanks everyone.

Jen: Bye.

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