Rental? Commission? [EP:153]

Workflows in the Hair Industry: Renting & Commission

In this episode, Jen and Todd discuss the differences between renting and commission structures within the hair industry. 

They explore the misconceptions, challenges, and potential benefits of each model, emphasizing the importance of understanding one's own goals and values.

They share personal experiences and anecdotes, including perspectives on a recent whale-watching trip and the family's engagement with the Olympics, to illustrate the broader point of finding what truly matters.

They also offer insights and advice for new professionals entering the industry, encouraging them to make well-informed decisions and to not be swayed by misleading information or titles.

00:00 Introduction and Greetings
00:48 Whale Watching Adventure
03:07 Olympics and Family Time
04:37 Opening Take on Renting vs. Commission
06:03 Challenges of Renting a Chair
10:35 Advice for New Hair Professionals
12:50 The Reality of Running a Business
16:46 The Importance of Finding the Right Salon
20:54 The Reality of Renting in the Salon Industry
21:22 The Value of Team and Community
22:39 The Illusion of Ownership
24:18 Challenges of Running a Business
25:54 Commission vs. Renting: Weighing the Options
37:31 The Importance of Marketing and Retention
39:45 Final Thoughts and Advice

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Transcript

153
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[00:00:00] 

Todd: All right. What's up, everyone? Welcome back. Happy Monday. How's it going? Jennifer.

Jen: Great.

Todd: Good. Good, good, good. So today we are talking about different models, I guess, within the hair industry. So we're going to

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: renting, we can lump that all in together. Renting a suite, renting a chair, renting a booth, whatever you want to call it, I don't care, versus a commission structure. Okay, and I just said verse, but what I want to do is focus on how those things are not, it's not one verse the other, that makes sense.

Jen: It does to me.

Todd: Okay. So anyways, we'll, we'll get there, but let's catch up on some fun stuff. So

Jen: Okay.

Todd: went on, this is totally random, nothing to do with the hair industry, but I think it gave a little perspective.

We recently this past week went on a whale watch and

Jen: hmm.

Todd: these [00:01:00] whales that are, are you laughing at me? So

Jen: I think it's great. I was so excited about the way I watch. So it like made my summer.

Todd: you've been on whale watch as a bunch. I've never been. So I was a little nervous cause I'm like the ocean. I

Jen: Actually, you used the word terrified.

Todd: The ocean can be terrifying.

Jen: You were like, Jen, I'm terrified, but I will go. I

Todd: There's like little to no hope. Anybody's going to find you. That's how vast it is. So we're chugging along and I'm like, wow, that land is really getting further away and further away. And then all of a sudden you can't see land anymore. You're just in the middle of what feels like nothing. It all looks exactly the same. And then you come across these whales, these creatures that are absolutely enormous. We saw,

Jen: was going to say ginormous. So yeah. They're huge. Yeah. Second largest.

Todd: second largest animal to ever live on the planet. Larger than any dinosaur, like these things are so [00:02:00] large and you're in this just vast space that it makes you, at least for me, it made me. Sort of feel like how actually small you are

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: like, we feel like this, we feel these things throughout our days that are like, Oh no, this is the end of the world. It's really not. It's really insignificant in the bigger picture. And we, when I, when we looked at the maps, because they showed us a bunch of maps of where we were out in the ocean, you're

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: far away from land.

Jen: No. Yeah.

Todd: in the middle of

Jen: Even though you can't see it, but it's, it's literally right there. Yeah. Yeah.

Todd: like 12 miles away. That's

Jen: I couldn't swim it for sure, but

Todd: out there could, but yeah, not me, not, not

Jen: yeah.

Todd: three kids on my back. I mean, so anyway, I just thought that was a cool experience. I wanted to share and it just, I don't know, it brought things into perspective. And I think once in a while, it's good to do those things that just sort of ground you, I guess,

Jen: And take new adventures, right? [00:03:00] Something you, the kids, no one had ever been, but me and they just were like, all right, well, we'll go on this thing and see what it's all about.

Todd: for sure. The other thing that I, we've been doing lately with our kids is watching the Olympics. The Olympics are in

Jen: Super fun.

Todd: week. And Watching different events that we don't really get the privilege to see. I don't even, I mean, with the internet, I'm sure you could see stuff, but yeah, you don't always get to see these events, I guess.

Jen: Yeah. At that level too. Yeah.

Todd: at any level, but yes,

Jen: Yeah. Well,

Todd: And I think I was saying before you have the internet, so I'm sure you could access this stuff, but I don't know.

It just, it's cool to see what people take So passionately or what people get passionate about. And so to be able to watch that and share that with our kids that are young and that are just starting to get into sports and those things is really cool. So those are my those are my recent highlights. I just wanted to [00:04:00] share it. Do you have anything?

Jen: the synchronized diving was my favorite. I don't know why,

Todd: That was

Jen: but the Mexicans were amazing to watch. I just loved it.

Todd: should have had it, but I

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: also have no idea what I'm looking at.

Jen: Me either. But it was, that was

Todd: took it. I was rooting for Mexico. I don't know why they just, look like

Jen: they just looked, I don't know, it was just super cool. I think they were underdogs, which I always root for the underdog anyway. And they looked amazing, but I don't know what I was looking at, but they looked like they were doing a great job.

Todd: It's so funny because with our son Marley, who's 11, he was like, that looked perfect. I didn't see any splash and I'm like, I, yeah, I don't know. It looked pretty good to me.

Jen: Sure did.

Todd: Yeah. So anyways, all right. I want to start with opening take. Do you want to go? Do you want me to go first?

Jen: Why don't you go first? Cause this is new and I'm just going to figure out how to follow along.

Todd: All

Jen: Opening take. Let's do this.

Todd: This is my opening take on renting and commission situations, models, whatever. I think that we can all co exist and thrive,[00:05:00] 

Jen: Love it.

Todd: that you choose. There's literally no proof that I've ever found of the opposite. I don't think the proof exists out there that one is necessarily better than the other, or you can only thrive in one over the other. isn't a one versus the other situation. And the final point I want to make on my opening take here is that the model doesn't provide success. You do. So you're not

Jen: Love that.

Todd: to do well simply based on the model you choose. If you can't hang in there at a commission salon, you're probably not going to hang in there in a rental situation. You're not automatically going to become rich and wealthy and the best hairstylist because you rent a chair.

Jen: Correct.

Todd: And you're not automatically going to be held back because you're at a commission salon. Doesn't make sense. We know these things to be true. We have facts to support them. And of, of stuff that we could dig up.

Jen: Wisdom.

Todd: Anyways, [00:06:00] that is my opening take. What do you got?

Jen: Okay. So mine's like short and sweet, but my opening take on the structure of, of where you live in the hair world is I, I guess mine's more of an, I don't understand. I don't understand why people feel that the rush to go rent a chair or be in a suite automatically means they're successful. That. That. Is I guess something that I struggle with for the individuals because I've seen a lot of people go out on their own thinking that as soon as they're on their own, that means they're successful.

And unfortunately, I've seen more often they're less successful or they're literally at a standstill where I've seen people. Even some that are on their own that have come to work for us that are now under our roof and they feel more successful and they feel supported to do certain things that they've never felt they could do on their own while they rented their suite or their chair.

So I just, I guess it's a challenge as to why [00:07:00] coming out of school, the fastest thing is like, as soon as I get on my own, I'm gonna be super successful. And I would challenge you to talk to a lot of people that have gone out on their own and ask them. What their successes are, what they wish they had done differently to really figure out what would be the path for your success.

Todd: I like it. That was a good opening take there.

Jen: Thanks. I was winging it. Cause he just threw that at me.

Todd: let's I do that from time to time for people listening. Sometimes this is planned out. It used to be very planned out. The show has evolved over time and it went to where it wasn't very planned out. And we would just meet up here and be like, what are we talking about?

And then just hit record. now we have a little bit of planning or not planning necessarily, but a little bit of structure coming back into it. Anyways, I would like to

Jen: That one was thrown at me, but I still. There you are. There's my, there's my opening take.

Todd: Yeah, I would like to work off of that, if you're cool with that, [00:08:00] you said coming out of school, people think the fastest way to make it, or however you just worded it, and correct me if

Jen: Yeah. Currently that's what I feel, what I'm seeing right now in today's world.

Todd: there's a big rabbit in our backyard. It's gonna be one of those days. Oh, a butterfly. Oh, a rabbit. Anyways, why is that? So I keep hearing more and more that schools are sort of teaching this in their curriculum. And I don't know if that's true because I'm not in the schools during

Jen: Yeah, I've heard the same and I'm not in there. I don't know either.

Todd: Is there sort of like like if that's true, I, I guess I, I would have an issue with that because as

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: think, regardless of where the schools are coming from, and I would tell you if that's happening, it's probably there's some sort of lobbying happening somewhere with these bigger rental suite companies are probably doing favors or giving money.

That's just how things work. All

Jen: That's how the world works.

Todd: into politics and how it works. If you [00:09:00] look at any of the there's another rabbit. I wonder if I'm going to see a fox next. everything sort of turns into that. And all you have to do is look at the big sort of self acclaimed like. Authorities of the hair world and you'll see all their advertisers.

You can flip through their websites and you'll, you'll see where their money comes from. So eventually you have to make the people that are paying you money happy. So I wonder if that's what's going on. If that's what's going on, there's an issue there because they're setting people up for failure. One, they're students, but also two, they have other students that have come out and open commission. Businesses

Jen: Right.

Todd: that they're now undermining. So if that is true, shame on the schools. If it's not true, then I apologize. But I keep hearing that, like I said, I have no way of fucking knowing cause I'm not in there. But a lot of people, we go to these meetings and I've had people say like, Hey, [00:10:00] in Connecticut, this is what's happening.

Hey, in New Hampshire, I've heard this happen. Hey, here, I've heard this happen. And I just think why, like why, who gives them the right to do that? I guess they can say whatever they want, but I don't think that's very cool of them and yeah, I, I just, I, I would advise people to be careful because things change over time and piss off the wrong people.

And all of a sudden you don't have that funding when, when trends change and trends always change, you know, not nothing is forever. So do you have any other feelings on that? The

Jen: Well, I think

Todd: school.

Jen: the, if we're talking on a school level, I think the school should set that stylist up or hair pro. I know that there's, Estheticians, barbers, whatever it is up for truly, how do you create a mission statement? Your core values, your vision for your future, like set them up with what would start any business.

And that would be, if you work even in a commission salon, you should still know what you stand for. You should [00:11:00] still have a vision for your future because that's going to help you pick the right salon, the right structure of, of, of what that looks like for you. If you don't have that, then you're just going out there and shooting at the stars to be like, I hope I get the right salon, but you don't even know what you're looking for.

So really at a, at any level, when you get started at anything you do, like, what do you want out of it? What's your mission, what's your core values and what's your vision. And then you should be able through that as you're interviewing or deciding what your next steps are. It'll help you define what that looks like for you and really keep you on track.

So you don't get lost in what's shiny and new. Cause it's, it's easy to fall off your track when the shiny and new pulls you in this direction. But if that's pulling you and you're like, okay, you know, what's over here? Well, does it meet the needs of what you want? And I think the school should really focus on having these hair pros, like define that, and then.

Teaching them that that needs to be redeveloped, either Monthly, yearly, because as they grow in their profession or as anyone grows in their [00:12:00] profession, your mission will change. Your vision may change like these things should pivot with you, but if you can't even start there and if those people ever want to open a business, they need a mission and a vision of core value.

So why not just explain to them why that's so important and how that will shape individually each person's future, which then would allow them to become more free thinkers and think for themselves. Right. Rather than being told what to do and then just being like a sheep herded to anything else. You're just following what everyone else tells you to do.

And someone says, Oh, you're going to be really successful. If you do this, like that, I'm going to do that. Well, what's successful for you and the person next to you and the person behind you is they're all very different and you should all have different views of what that looks like for you. So I would challenge a school to start with the very basics of what would help them in their life and actually help them with if they ever wanted to have a business.

Right. Mm hmm.

Todd: objectively and not just focused on one thing like you said, because what happens I think is people are coming out of school thinking I need to rent. That's how I'm successful, [00:13:00] but no one taught them how to rent. It's still, you're talking about a business.

You want to be a boss babe or whatever the fucking stupid hashtag is these days and all this stuff. But you like just writing that hashtag and renting the chair does nothing you. like having a logo made when you're in your first week of hair school. I got a logo. Cool. What did that do for you? It does nothing. And I'm just being blunt because that's my personality. You really need to start. If you want to build a business, you really need to start building a business. are you getting clients? How are you paying for this chair? We've seen people come and go through our salon that are failing.

They're failing. that's not cool. We try to help people, but people succumb to the sort of over glorification of just saying that you're a boss. Like saying that you're a boss does nothing. I can say that I'm an astronaut. It doesn't put me in space. It doesn't make sense. Your words mean so [00:14:00] little the real world.

It's your actions. I also think another point I wanted to bring up. With the schools is that if they're telling people to I've actually heard from a salon owner that heard from the school that they told their students that the only way to make money in the industry was to rent a chair,

Jen: Oof.

Todd: puts you so out or it demonstrates how out of touch you are with the reality of what happens after graduation.

Jen: Right.

Todd: So far out of touch and for that, I think people need to, I don't know, the schools need to figure it out, but also the students need to, to realize to like, don't be, don't be swept up in what people tell you because people are

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: you what benefits them. You know,

Jen: Right.

Todd: do any booth, renter, owner, booth, rental salon owner they're going to tell you that that's the best and that you'll make all your [00:15:00] money.

That's another popular one, right? We see all the time. You keep all your money. There's no business that you keep all your money.

Jen: Ever, ever.

Todd: yeah, never, not, not in this industry, not in any other.

Jen: In any world, it's just not a thing.

Todd: We've been in several other industries. I have, you know, you never keep your money in a restaurant. You can open a restaurant.

You can own the restaurant. You have to pay staff, you have to pay the food, you have to pay for the dishes. There's no, you're not keeping a hundred percent of the money. make sense. Even your profits. When you, so this, this is a point that I want to make too. I think I've made this before that the models do differ, but how you're paid doesn't. Or

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: shouldn't. And when you rent, you should be paying yourself a percentage of services. If you're not, if you're just taking whatever's like left in quotes, whatever's leftover at the end of your week, what are you doing? That's not [00:16:00] like, what is your plan for slow times? If we're being honest, you don't have a plan. Right. And I'm talking to probably, I would argue 90 plus percent of people that go rental. And I've talked to recently, I talked to a woman that opened a salon and she was like, Todd opening a rental space where I just. It was hands off with the people was the right choice for me. And we talked about it and I was like, that's awesome.

Like she had a game plan. She's not

Jen: Right.

Todd: trick anybody. You know, she just wanted to be in charge of her own thing. And she wanted to open it up to other people that wanted to be around that. And I thought that was fantastic. You

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: reason I'm not arguing against it. What I am doing is arguing against it for most people.

Jen: Yeah, or I think, so what I see is, Actually over last year, when I was like out teaching a lot, I, I was in a lot of salons that actually were rental. And what was very interesting is there were a lot of people that were [00:17:00] salty from whatever commission salons they came from. So if you were to be coming out of school and you're trying to figure out what do I want to do?

If you talk to those people and they're salty because of the way they were treated, they're going to tell you commission salons suck, but that's their opinion. And they only really came from one or two salons. Just like anything you have to do your due diligence to figure out the right salon for you.

They were just stuck at one. They didn't want to move. They were comfortable and then realized this sucks. I'm going to go do this on my own. What was interesting was a bunch of them went out into suites because they were just like, I want to be on my own. I want to be around nobody. And then at this point, when I come in and I'm educating, These sweet owners were all getting together to have one class because now they were miserable on their own.

They're like, this sucks being by myself. I'm the only one to talk to my clients. I have no one to bounce ideas off of. I feel so not innovative, so not creative. Like, so they, they did this extreme thing. And now they're like, now what do I do? Like, where do I go from here? And so it's interesting, I think with anything, like you said, you have to be [00:18:00] objective and you have to find your own stance on it.

Like you should interview people, but you shouldn't These people, if you interviewed them last year, they were salty about one thing. Then if you interviewed them this year, they were not happy being in a suite. They're like, I'm miserable in this suite. And now I don't know what to do. Cause I'm not enjoying certain parts about being on my own.

And I'm realizing if I could find the right salon, I might be enjoying now in a commission salon that was run well. We see it firsthand at hello. We have people that work for themselves, but still want to be. Employees in our business because they love the culture, the team, they love what we offer. They love that they can use us.

To help build their business. They love the marketing that we invest in. They love everything that we do, and they can't get that on their own. So they now found a balance between doing a little bit on their own and then being with us too. So it's just, again, they're, they're living the life of both. Right.

They have a really sweet spot. And interestingly enough, when they run into problems now in their business, [00:19:00] they're like, I wish I just was at your business all the time, because I wouldn't have to deal with this. So it. It's really who are you as a person and what can you handle because you're, if you're out on your own and let's say, go back to what Todd just said, you should be paying yourself a percentage and yes, that percentage should be higher than you are in a commission salon because you're doing more jobs.

You're doing the ordering. You're the manager. You're the owner. You're the CEO. You're the SEO. You're doing everything. So if you're not getting paid more than you're doing it wrong, like that doesn't even make sense. But when you're in the commission salon, that's a lawn should be. Now, if yours isn't sorry, you're working for a Dick ass, but most should be doing all of that stuff for you with the ordering.

They're paying part of your taxes. They're, In charge of the marketing. They're in charge of the SEO. They're in charge of where you are on Google. They, they do their Google ads. They do so many things that cost so much money. So the percentage that they can pay their employees is less because of all the jobs that are done behind the scenes.

It's just where it's at. So if you [00:20:00] want to do all the jobs. Go right ahead. I, you best be making more money because you're doing all the jobs and if you don't and you just want to be a hair pro and you just want to be creative, then you should find the right salon so you can go and get your paycheck and be as creative as fucking possible as you want to in this world.

Amen. Both are wonderful. Where do you sit?

Todd: Yeah, I agree with I agree with Percent of what you

Jen: I think I just got heated there. Sorry.

Todd: people, yeah, because I, get

Jen: I want the, I want people to do well. I really do. And I want you to figure out what, like, where do you do well, not what you see on social media. And I want you to be able to be creative in this world. We need you to do that.

Todd: Social media is fake. Those salon places, those big places that you see advertising, keep all your money, all you have to do is show up and whatever that they're lying to you. Social

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: I said, a

Jen: Don't be duped.

Todd: media is fucking fake and these people are fucking liars. And so we've seen it.

We've, like I said, we've seen people come through our salon and go rent and fail [00:21:00] miserably.

Jen: Really sad.

Todd: because we don't. Bring on, we don't bring people on that. We don't like, so

Jen: Right?

Todd: care about the people that enter our business,

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: decides that they're out, they're out. I mean, it is what it

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: that's

Jen: At that point, they don't see the value of what we offer. And unfortunately they, they see it after they leave, but it's, it's too late at that point. We like, you've talked about, we have a wait list. We have people that want to be on our team. So as soon as someone is out, there's the next person gets the call.

Like here we are, like

Todd: Yeah. I

Jen: can bring you on.

Todd: I don't want to say I don't care. Cause that might seem harsh, but when you've decided that I have nothing to offer you, then I like,

Jen: Yeah. It's time to move on.

Todd: but there's also no love loss. Like I. Like peace out.

Jen: Right. It's still a business.

Todd: it in our handbook, peace out. Like there's no, I don't,

Jen: You can peace out when you want to peace out.

Todd: need like some sort of relationship to keep going.

I focus on, I just had this conversation like last week with some of our staff. I focus on the people within our walls. I wish everyone else the [00:22:00] best.

Jen: Yes.

Todd: I don't,

Jen: We focus on the people that want to be there and see the value of being at Hello.

Todd: I have a few people I follow on social media that I either find interesting or I find inspiration in or have become friends over the years. But I don't do a lot of looking out. Unless I'm at a very specific thing like we were at a roundtable recently where I'm there and I want to hear what other people have to say, you know, in that setting because it's face to face and I, can pretty much tell when someone's bullshitting and when someone's not on social media, I have to assume everyone's bullshitting. Cause that's just

Jen: Yes.

Todd: media,

Jen: Most people should follow that.

Todd: I have seen the argument for people that will say, like, I want to own my own business. I want to be an owner when you rent, this is going to seem harsh, but I don't, again, I don't mean it to, when you rent a chair, you don't own anything. Even when you rent a suite, you don't

Jen: Right.

Todd: You own your name. [00:23:00] You don't even own the chair that you're renting. I

Jen: Right. It all comes with it.

Todd: Yeah, so you are renting equipment or space from someone that's renting that equipment or space. You are sub leasing. That is the definition of it. Now you can say I own the business. I started an LLC if you even start an LLC because you

Jen: Right. Because you don't have to.

Todd: doing that. So you really have nothing that you own. You own your scissors. You don't, we've already established a million times that no one owns clients. You can't really own a client list. Those days are gone with social media. If somebody wants to find you and follow you, they're going to, and God bless them.

They can go wherever they want. are free to make their own choices, just like we're saying you're free to go rent or free to work in commission and you can be successful in either. You just have to put the work in an either. But yeah, it's, it always blows my mind when people say that, like, well I want to do this because I want to be an owner. I'm like, okay, it's not all it's cracked up to be for one. There [00:24:00] are very, very rewarding portions of running a business and owning a business, but not all like this glorious thing where I walk in and someone hands me a cappuccino and then hands me a newspaper and you know what I mean? Like, it's not, that's not how it is.

Jen: Right.

Todd: It's like, if you, it's just to me, it's like, if you rented a room in a house that someone rents, like you don't own the house.

Jen: Right.

Todd: You know, it's just,

Jen: And again, what does that title do for you? Just because you have owner on your business card or on your social media platform doesn't really mean anything. It's just a word. I don't even I think I might have owner on mine, but I don't define my success because I'm an owner.

Todd: yeah, but you

Jen: I define my six. I do, but I

Todd: these

Jen: define my success, though, by what we do, who we help, how we grow our staff, like, when we like you're so successful.

They see one way I see success as in the ability [00:25:00] we have to reach people and truly build a foundation and build successful hair pros. But that's my vision for success. Yours Todd's probably different someone else, but I don't have owner to own a business. I don't even generally, I don't even think I tell anybody I own a business.

I don't give a fuck. What I do give a fuck about is that the business we own is able to do so much to help people when it comes to clients, when it comes to staff, like that's the part that like, if we didn't own it, we wouldn't be in charge of the things that we're able to do. And that's what makes me happy.

Todd: point with the word owner was that people are just being seduced by words.

Jen: Yeah, exactly. It's just like they think if they rent a chair, they're now successful. But by what means?

Todd: by having a second and third job to pay for that chair, I guess if that's what you consider successful, then go for it. Who am

Jen: Words.

Todd: define it for you? But

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: seduced. Anybody listening that's like, should I go rent? Should I work in commission? Weigh both sides and [00:26:00] really, really, truly figure it out. would argue that if you looked at any other industry and you looked objectively, okay, you have an honest evaluation here and you don't even have to get crazy, name any, give me an example of a business. That's not hair. We'll do it this way.

Jen: We always say, I say restaurants, gyms, stuff that we've, restaurants,

Todd: in a

Jen: something I can like,

Todd: are most people, managers

Jen: no,

Todd: are most people that are managers even good managers.

Jen: no,

Todd: And how many of those people that aren't really even good at managing are true leaders,

Jen: like a small percentage for sure.

Todd: So if all of a sudden in this industry, you're trying to tell me, or somebody out there is telling me that the majority of people are leaders. That's,

Jen: Right. It's not possible. Mathematically. It's not possible.

Todd: that's what you're arguing.

And then I would just pause and be like, Oh, wait, make your point. Cause it doesn't make sense. people should not be running their [00:27:00] own business. Most people aren't running their own business. They're renting a chair and praying that it works because someone starting in beauty school told them that's the only way to make money.

And then they were seduced by these big companies Are like sort of, I guess,

Jen: advantage.

Todd: taking advantage and screwing people over because they really don't give a shit.

Jen: No,

Todd: your rent. And I'm not talking about, I'm sure there are plenty. And I know some that rent from their business. I'm not knocking them.

I'm talking about these big companies that are just, they don't care.

Jen: right. No, we know some very successful people that are doing very well on their own and, and good for them. They, that's what they were meant to do. Right.

Todd: Yeah. It's, it's like when you have a restaurant and then someone's like, you know what, I should have a food truck. for everyone because you, now you have to do everything.

Jen: Right.

Todd: for some chefs out there, yeah, that's

Jen: It works really [00:28:00] well. Right. Right.

Todd: should look, or they don't want the problem of dealing with the wait staff, or they want to control the own, their own ingredients and how they order their produce and where they get their fish from and whatever, that just doesn't work. In the hair industry, it doesn't happen. You have people that are going out to rent that have no clue. They have no business plan at all. And even you've said this a million times and now I've seen it from being in the industry for five years, almost. But you know, you have people that don't even have product on hand because they don't want to put the money up because they don't know how to manage money because they shouldn't have a business, you know, and it just, people talk about professionalizing the beauty industry. How, how, how.

Jen: Right.

Todd: Like, where does that come from? Everyone's just running around like a chicken with their head cut off.

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: run to know, the beauty supply store every other day. That's insane. That's madness that you would go to [00:29:00] your distributor every other day.

Jen: Right. But that's

Todd: your

Jen: what a lot of, yeah, a lot of people are doing. Or like you said, their stock is so low. And then from a client perspective, you don't even know really what's going on in your head because this person that's doing your hair doesn't want to purchase what they should be in order to be doing the services.

Todd: yeah, yeah, yeah. I know of examples. I'm not going to give it because I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: I know of an example of you were somewhere. This person opened a business and you were asked if you could help the person by clients. were like, this is a

Jen: Oh yeah.

Todd: This is a

Jen: Like help. Yeah.

Todd: They don't fucking know what they're doing.

Jen: Yeah. Yeah. I know.

Todd: times have we had that? I've had people come in, we've had people to go, that leave our salon, that go and rent chairs, that like, after they've left, weeks, I'm getting emails of complaints of clients that are like, you know, hey, my haircut wasn't what I thought it was going to be, or whatever, [00:30:00] and I'm like, that person doesn't work here, but come on in, I'll have somebody else fix it for you.

Like, I

Jen: It just shows you how much work they have to do. And that's it to you. You want to run a business and you think, cause you're maybe either good at doing hair or in some cases, you're still not even know a thing about hair, like running a business and being good at hair are not the same thing. And if you can't even really do hair, and then you think you're going to run a business now you're in an even a whole different world.

So like, Jessica's you're like, I'm really good at hair. I'm just going to do this. Like, those are not. Mutually exclusive, like at all. Like,

Todd: team to help you do the

Jen: right. I'm really good at doing hair too and running a business. I, there are parts of it that I'm really great at, and there's parts of it that I absolutely suck at and I don't want to do

Todd: Not always your jam a business. Not always your jam.

Jen: no,

Todd: Let's talk a little

Jen: but I love doing hair.

Todd: before we wrap because I don't want to be one sided on this. It's just that the whole renting thing is. I think it overwhelms a lot of people [00:31:00] from even the student level.

And I think it can be very confusing. Let's talk a little bit about commission. And this is not a pro and con episode.

Jen: it's just things I think about if you're in this position to be like, what do I want out of my career?

Todd: I think I'm in some online groups of commission salons owners, and I read the stuff that they post and I think no shit commission salons get a bad rap.

Jen: Oh yeah.

Todd: of the stuff is absolute trash from controlling people's lives outside. I keep seeing that one recently. What do you do when a

Jen: I've seen some of those too. Oh my God.

Todd: you suspect a stylist is doing hair outside of work hours? What the fuck do you care what

Jen: Why are you focused on what they're doing outside of your work hours?

Todd: Unless somebody's

Jen: Mind your fucking business.

Todd: Yeah. Unless somebody's committing some sort of like serious crime that you're aware of. Who cares? What, who are

Jen: Yeah,

Todd: You

Jen: there are. So. There's the problem. There's a lot of [00:32:00] owners that think they're in control of someone's whole entire life. You are, you are not, you are not. And that's why people don't want to work for you. It's nothing to do with commission. It has to do with the bad owners. You've got to find a good one

Todd: Yeah,

Jen: speaks truth.

Todd: if you're gonna, so there are just as many commission owner, salon owner shitheads as there are booth rental owner shitheads. Yeah, I,

Jen: Yes.

Todd: probably 50 50. It's probably even. What are some other commission things that people should be wary of?

Jen: I think it's honestly, do they walk the walk and talk the talk? So

Todd: Ah,

Jen: I think you go into these commission salons and they're offering all these things. And I think they wish they could offer all these things, but unfortunately,

Todd: Or

Jen: most salons.

Todd: them, but then the

Jen: Yeah, they,

Todd: there, and they're like,

Jen: and they fall short, right? So it's just whatever the offering is.

I think you really have to ask questions to make sure they're truly offered. Again, I would [00:33:00] sit in that salon for a day and see what's going on. I'd get a service in that salon. Because a lot of people's offerings are not true to what they truly offer. We just had someone that came on board in our salon a couple months ago.

And I was like, oh, so we're going to do this today. They're like, oh, we're actually going to do that. I'm like, oh, we actually do the things that we offer here. And it's very important that we get these things done. And I was being funny.

Todd: remember what it was, the thing?

Jen: It was something for education. Like, I'm like, oh, I'll teach you how.

And like, oh, okay. Like where they came from a lot of, they basically were sold on a lot of things that would be offered and none of it. I think it was like literally none of it was actually real.

Todd: then didn't.

Jen: Yeah. All of these things and none of it was happening. So when I, this first thing approached, like this was like day one or two and they're like, oh, we're really doing this.

I'm like. Yeah, it's like, this is our core value. Like it was something that's really important to us. But they were floored and I'm like, Oh, you mean you're at a salon that actually is going to do the things that they said. So I know it's rare that a salon does that. And, and that's fine. I think knowing it and me sharing that is not all salons, even though they say they offer things are going to offer it.

So then now [00:34:00] it's your job to figure out what things are most important from their offering and really pick at those things to make sure they truly are offered and something that's going to help you get ahead.

Todd: it. I, I

Jen: And then,

Todd: you, As a student coming out of hair school, cosmetology, barber, aesthetics, whatever you do, right? is instead of focusing on like where you're going to end up and like stuff that's in the future, what you should focus on is creating your foundations. You

Jen: hmm.

Todd: your core values.

And we have ways to do that. We've done it with a bunch of people. You should create a mission and a vision statement for yourself as an individual,

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: as a business. But looking at you in the hair industry or in the beauty industry, like where, what do you want to see happen? What do you want to accomplish?

What would you love to influence? [00:35:00] If you could grow to be somebody that's big enough to influence the industry, where, what would that look like? And when you

Jen: Mm hmm.

Todd: about those things, then you can interview salon owners, or you can go in, look into rental situation and you can decide for yourself what's actually best and not just what somebody on the internet is telling you. You

Jen: Right.

Todd: again, somebody in school is telling you yeah, it's, I think people, a lot of what this breaks down to, I think is a lot of people are just being sold on ideas that aren't necessarily true. It's just like with schools. And again, I'm not knocking it. I'm trying to be careful, but schools need to make money.

Right. So what do they do? They sell you in the next program. Cause when you leave, you're no longer a customer. When you're at a school, you're you, they call you a student. You're really a customer. And I had this discussion with the owners of the school that I went to. like, I'm a client or I'm a customer of yours. I'm paying you to

Jen: Mm hmm. Right. Mm

Todd: [00:36:00] other way around. So and I think more people need to understand that. Like when you're in school, you're the customer.

Jen: hmm.

Todd: Be careful of the information that you're getting and be like, I would start to question that stuff. Like, do you need to go from Cosmo to barber to skincare to this to eyelashes to extent?

Do you need to do all of those things? Maybe. I'm not sure what is your mission? What is your

Jen: Right.

Todd: What does the future look like for you or what do you want the future to look like? Because I know a lot of those people that have that come out of school with five or six different, you know, licenses and certificates and all these things and they don't use any of them.

Jen: Right.

Todd: And what they did was they spent a lot of money and a lot of time they could have spent, you know, maybe

Jen: Building their clientele and truly learning.

Todd: Well, I was going to say, if you wanted to get better, like, so do you need an entire barbering program just to say you're a master barber master, you know, you're coming out of school on day one, calling yourself a master barber.

I think that's what people are sold on. It's the title, [00:37:00] you know, but you still don't know how to cut hair. You could have come out of school, worked with someone that's established for like a day learned enough tricks to get you by not tricks in a, in a negative way, but learned enough, techniques to get you by. then start sort of develop your own style and your own, you know, methods. Anyway, we can wrap it is we're getting a little long. So anything else to add? Final

Jen: The only thing I'd like to say, and I'll say it quickly is the day of, I think when you're interviewing salons for where you're looking to work, I think people still come in and like, what does your walk ins look like? I think the day of like, Salons and walk ins are just dying. Like, and I don't think it matters if you have a lot of walk ins.

What I think the question you should be asking is what is your marketing strategy look like? And what do you do with Google? That should be your question because walk ins cool, but if they're marketing and they're getting [00:38:00] on the internet, now you're marketing to the whole entire world that's around your.

Where your salon lives. So rather than like, like I said, I, people still do it here. Like you get a lot of walk ins who the fuck cares what we do get in is daily. All the, all the people that book online because of what we do for our marketing. So I just think again, as a salon owner, if you don't have a marketing strategy.

You need one and you should be focused on that because that's going to help grow your staff. It's not being in the right location with walk ins. It's literally how do you market on the internet in the world? So people know you exist. And if they don't know you exist, they're not coming in and you're not doing enough to get everybody busy under your roof.

I think saying that is if you find a salon that has a great marketing strategy and it's marketing where they need to, to truly get enough business coming in now as a hello, as a. As a hair pro, it's your job to market yourself too. We see the most growth in our business as the people that use their social platforms to market themselves and all the marketing that hello does.

And those people grow [00:39:00] literally like a sprint you're talking months and they are slammed. It's perfect because of what we do and what they want to do. So if you're just looking for a salon that has walk ins, you're talking like back in two thousands, like we're, we're in 2024 now

Todd: I have

Jen: ask what the marketing strategy is.

Todd: a quick closing thought now.

Jen: Yeah. I love it.

Todd: Walk ins are irrelevant if you can't retain the people. So

Jen: Yeah.

Todd: do is if you're someone that's in school or somebody that's new to the industry or looking for a new salon home, I would ask the owners or managers, whoever you're interviewing with, what can you do to help me retain everyone that sits in my seat?

Because that's a much better question than, do

Jen: Love it.

Todd: walk ins? If you can't fucking keep them, it doesn't matter.

Jen: matter. Yeah.

Todd: Anyways, off. I'm going to rent a chair.

Jen: Okay. Bye.

Todd: Bye. Thanks for listening, people. Jokes aside, reach out

Jen: Yeah

Todd: help.

Jen: here to help

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