The Salon Punk

I’m not sure why you’d want to read this book. I can’t make any great claims of taking over the hairdressing world or winning endless hairdressing awards. I never had fifty stylists breaking endless records and I never had a salon that turned over millions in pounds in haircuts or hairdressing services. Yet looking back at my 17-years as a salon owner I feel did do something pretty amazing in my own little world of hairdressing that you as a salon owner can look at and feel inspired by. Before I did that amazing little thing I had to accept this one thing about my life as a hairdresser and salon owner. It was this. Being a great hairdresser was and will never enough to create a successful hairdressing business. It just isn’t. Your great and successful salon business only arrives when you begin letting the public know you are a great hairdresser with a great salon. It’s about knowing; managing, aiming, pushing, directing and marketing your salon in ways that could cost you nothing and give you everything. It’s also about finding and using systems that are actually proven to work and work fast in a salon like yours. And I know that because I’ve done that for many salons as a mentor and also done that for my own salons between 1989 and 2003. I know for an absolute certainty that there are powerful things that must be done daily to make sure you have a hair salon business that is a success and that in turn gives you a much happier life. Happiness comes from doing the things in life you really feel the need to do. Your salon business either supports that or might actually be preventing that because of the lack of results. If you are not making enough money or unable to cover your bills or pay your stylists or even unable to pay yourself – you’ll have a huge problem and that huge problem will make you unhappy with your life. A lack of money when you’re working hard can be a real killer. Yet it is fixable and can be fixed fast. I had to slowly and sometimes painfully learn the art of turning my salon into a real business. A business that could give me the kind of life I wanted. The life I wanted then was really a life built around a young family that needed to be fed, looked after and nourished. I had to create a business that would do just that. That’s exactly what I eventually did. I could not afford for it to fail. Failure for me really meant no food on the table that really was my personal bottom line. Eventual success in my salons gave me the ability to build my own stunning five-bedroomed converted barn on a farm, have around a one acre plot of garden with it’s own orchard and space for my kids to play around and have the time and money to be able to live a more enhanced life as a hairdresser.  I made mistakes, plenty of them. Some mistakes were huge and almost cost me my salon and salons on more than one occasion. I will share those stories with you as you read along. Yet, after 17-years with my salons and the hairdressing business I discovered, learned, uncovered and found some of the most incredible ways to make sure not only did we all stay busy but the phone rang constantly, the appointment book was packed and we even had a long list of clients waiting for a last minute appointment. This was an incredible achievement for a school dropout, ex-landscape gardener and punk rocker to hit the top slot in a town of 35 very established salons. Anyway, be sure of this. Whatever you are going through in your salon right now is pretty normal. Even the salon stars of this world have troubles and issues that would leave you jaw-dropped in total disbelief if you knew them. I know, I’ve worked with some of these guys and seen it first hand in the biggest to the smallest of salons. It is normal. It is fixable and can be fixed faster than you will know right now.