What happens when a color specialist turns to sales and marketing? That's exactly what Carla did and she'll be sharing the nitty-gritty of her career transition. It's not just about the change in job titles - it's about integrating practical skills with a new role and the challenges that come along with it. Discover how she uses her hands-on experience to effectively relay the value of products to clients and how she manages her time in a fast-paced role. All while keeping an unwavering focus on meeting client expectations.
Ever wondered how to pick the right brand to partner with? Carla shares her wisdom on this, having been in a flourishing partnership with Revlon for a decade. Learn about the importance of alignment and support when identifying a potential partner. You'll also get to see the other side of Revlon - their commitment beyond manufacturing beauty products, which includes sponsoring international conferences, salon education and even an online learning portal. So, come along as we express our heartfelt gratitude for Revlon's incredible support and celebrate Carla's wonderful journey with them.
Email Carla: carla.bond@revlon.com
To follow our journey:
Instagram @aheadhair_
@the_conscious_salon
This podcast has been produced and edited by Snappystreet Creative
What happens when a color specialist turns to sales and marketing? That's exactly what Carla did and she'll be sharing the nitty-gritty of her career transition. It's not just about the change in job titles - it's about integrating practical skills with a new role and the challenges that come along with it. Discover how she uses her hands-on experience to effectively relay the value of products to clients and how she manages her time in a fast-paced role. All while keeping an unwavering focus on meeting client expectations.
Ever wondered how to pick the right brand to partner with? Carla shares her wisdom on this, having been in a flourishing partnership with Revlon for a decade. Learn about the importance of alignment and support when identifying a potential partner. You'll also get to see the other side of Revlon - their commitment beyond manufacturing beauty products, which includes sponsoring international conferences, salon education and even an online learning portal. So, come along as we express our heartfelt gratitude for Revlon's incredible support and celebrate Carla's wonderful journey with them.
Email Carla: carla.bond@revlon.com
To follow our journey:
Instagram @aheadhair_
@the_conscious_salon
This podcast has been produced and edited by Snappystreet Creative
Here at the Conscious Salon, we acknowledge the traditional owners of the land in which we stand today, the Boon Rung people of the Kula Nation. We pay our respects to the elders, past and present, and extend their respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Welcome to the Conscious Salon.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I'm in camera here, though. Alright, we started, so that's good.
Speaker 1:It's not me, pat, we were going to go with that. Okay, welcome everyone. Welcome back to another episode of theactually, do you want to introduce our special guest?
Speaker 2:It's you mate, it's not me. No, introduce the podcast.
Speaker 1:No, she doesn't. She's fucked it up already. We've got welcome back to the Conscious Salon everyone.
Speaker 2:Today we are joined with two wonderful I'm sweating because Tess has never done the intro before I know. I was like I'm already stumbling.
Speaker 1:We've got the beautiful. We've got Niki. How are you going, mate? I'm good. Thank you, tess. The beautiful Niki. What are you going to say? I'm going to get my stuster off over there. But we have something very, someone very special sitting in here with us. Thank you so much, niki. We've got our incredible Revlon rep, miss Carla.
Speaker 2:Miss Carla Bond, that's me Right. We run around the applause please.
Speaker 1:If you can be like this lady, that would be amazing.
Speaker 2:At least right, Exactly.
Speaker 1:So, Carla, I'm not going to introduce you. I'm going to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about who you are, what we do and why we love you.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, hi everyone. I am Carla from Revlon and I just actually celebrated my 10 years at Revlon, which, to be honest, I don't even know how that happened, but it was just a flash and here we are. So I've been with the Revlon, and you also celebrated something else recently. I did have a festival for my birthday.
Speaker 1:It was like there's obnoxious birthday parties and then there's what you did, which? Was a tour of Australia with all your friends and family.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I had a festival celebration for my 40th and it was everywhere over social media, because I felt like everyone needs to be part of it.
Speaker 1:That's the way it is.
Speaker 2:A lot of people were right along for the ride.
Speaker 1:Well, I was a bit prickly. I wasn't part of the festival. Yeah that was a fairie. I was like, oh sorry, I kept numbers on this side. I mean, look, it was definitely over the top and we love it, but like we're turning 40, we've got to do it with it. Well, actually I probably won't. I'm really lazy and I can't do it.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no. You totally have to do it because so many people.
Speaker 1:I had one party 21st so I did nothing else ever again.
Speaker 2:Couldn't be bothered after that, yeah but like this is your 40th, like you're going to remember Apparently you 40s like in your 20s now, right, well, I got told that the other day, oh, so every year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can tell the people that have just had their 40s because they've run with that line. I've solved that line, I was like definitely. I was like oh God. I mean, I mean yeah like it's definitely, it's like part of it, like imprint into it. Here's my thing, though we turn the same like we never the same age twice. What? What are you talking about? Because everyone's like, oh, you're in the. You know it's your 40th, I guess your 30th, but I'm like, yeah, you turn like 34 once as well. Like.
Speaker 2:I have a birthday every year, but I get it, I get it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm just like I can't be fucked.
Speaker 2:Look totally right.
Speaker 1:But okay, just for some context, so well no, you're not totally right, because you just complete opposite. You had the festival I'm going to sell it to you.
Speaker 2:Like I'm obviously working sales at Revlon, I'm going to sell you how to have 40th as well.
Speaker 1:Okay, great, but he's on, let's listen, we're going to listen away.
Speaker 2:So first of all, we've had COVID here, which is absolutely a shit show, so, and I've got friends scattered across Australia and we also have little families. So over the last five years we haven't had that connection where we've just been able to be together Like we've had laughs and tears, but most of them over. You know the phone and you know yeah. So it was an opportunity where the 12 of us could get together in our own space, away from our families, and just be our unique organic self.
Speaker 1:It was mom's gone wild. Yeah, it was totally mom's gone wild, and I can't even tell you some stuff that happened like. No, legally she's not allowed to Totally like everyone would be like oh be on her own.
Speaker 2:Brad, would be like having a male down right now, and that's my job.
Speaker 1:I reckon he'll love it.
Speaker 2:I mean, he probably gets it. He's got daughters my age but like nothing. A good surf couldn't fix Totally right Even I was like oh my God, we can't talk about this Like this is. We might have been back in our twenties again. So my circles of friends, we're all hockey players, so we're all on the same vibe.
Speaker 1:So I think when you've got 12 people on the same, it's like a super niche reference to like the hockey players are like oh yeah, Like we get it Totally.
Speaker 2:The hockey players are like oh yeah, we know what that trip was like.
Speaker 1:I guess we'll all just have to imagine what that means.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, from the festival, from the social, media.
Speaker 2:Should we just share the?
Speaker 1:reals that you put up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course, I mean tell us like yeah, get some more likes. Yeah, totally, I'll go viral with no problem. Do I want that? It was amazing, do you?
Speaker 1:know what, though that's yeah, you've sold it. Well, it's not quite.
Speaker 2:It was more that. And then, in the more serious side of it, there was a element of. I feel the girls are like thank you so much, I needed that. So it was just a convenient first reason that it was my birthday, right, so if you had that aside, it was the perfect excuse for us all to come together. We needed that reset. We hadn't been just together in our own spaces for years and we probably didn't know it until on reflection, like wow, we knew we needed it, but we didn't realize how much we needed it. So we were like, yeah, we didn't know it until we got there not being on time constraints, because you know, like the first time we're like oh, you know, it's only six o'clock, we need to get to dinner.
Speaker 1:And then we're like, no, don't do it.
Speaker 2:We do not. Let's just be like. Let's be like cause we can, and piss everyone else off. We're 40 and we'll show up to do it at 6.50. Yeah, Pretty much what happened.
Speaker 1:So, carla, obviously you've just had your 10 year anniversary with Revy, revy P, and I want to know what's kept you at Rev Impression all for 10 years.
Speaker 2:Oh that's a good one. No, it's actually gone past really quickly and I guess probably just to give some context about what that looks like. So initially I was employed by Ozdare, which had distribution rights of Revlon, professional and American crew. So I was part of the sales force team that had Revlon and American crew. So about two years into that, global came in and bought back now brands. So then we went back in-house so, I guess, shifting from a distribution business and then moving into the corporate world. So that had its teething problem and I think for me now it's oh God, is it really silly to say Like it's only a pleasure to go to work because I like seeing my clients.
Speaker 1:I think that's really relatable to a lot of people that will be listening to this, because there's a lot of owners that listen to this and aren't necessarily taking on new clients or they've got their really established clients now, and it does.
Speaker 2:It's like going and seeing friends, yeah that's exactly how I feel and I know we were talking about it before. You know the bloody festival of my birthday, but the amount of clients who genuinely were like happy birthday, have a great trip, like they knew it. They've been along for the ride. When you've been there for 10 years, like you know, people know that when you're pregnant, know what you've had, and they're following along and they like ask how. They're not just like, oh, that's right, you're a mom. They're like, oh, how's Lenny and Stella going? And oh, and we're also mid building a house, obviously as well, you know, oh, I saw your roofs going on, and so people are genuinely in it with you.
Speaker 1:So it's not necessarily. It's not too similar to the relationship that we have when we're in the salon, like obviously it's no different.
Speaker 2:It's no different, like there really is a strong relationship. Yeah, and, like, I came originally from the floor and it is identical. So, regardless if you're hairdresser to client or, you know, rep to business, it's the same. It's the relationship and the investment in the relationship. So I just really like my clients and that's why, you know, I've been offered to go to other companies and, oh yeah, she's sought after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm sought after. It's not just the hockey world. I think we've offered you a job a few times as well. Yeah, we come back on the floor.
Speaker 2:Yeah, job offers aren't you know?
Speaker 1:you know they're around. She's hunted down, like everyone wants a piece of car, like this is the thing. It's not so much like you have all the knowledge, but you have the care and the fact that you have both.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think also, what's also super important is I'm not going to jump to another color house just because, like I genuinely have to believe in it and I feel like you guys will add that you know you self. You sorry. So you educate your clients because you genuinely believe in something. And I genuinely believe Revlon has the best color. Thousand percent, yeah, and oh it's the color.
Speaker 1:Yeah, literally unmatchable.
Speaker 2:There's no point trying to sell something when I genuinely know Revlon has the better color. It doesn't make sense. I can't organically talk about it when I'm like I know that and you know again, it's my job to know the flaws in other competitors. Of course it's my job. I need to know that, not that I'd be like oh hey, well, you know, but it's more like, internally I know that. So why would there be any point working and trying to constantly combat that?
Speaker 2:with a crime when I can be like hey, Revlon's got a beautiful color, Absolutely, and this is the reason why and I again, I'm a colorist by trade, so you can achieve this, you can create this. Have you thought about that? So it's quite a natural conversation and I find, dealing with all my clients, I can talk to owners or staff, or you know I'm often in there. Hey, Carla, can you just help me with this client consultation?
Speaker 1:I love when Carla's in, I'm always like, all right, let's pick your brain, and I got colors over there, let's have a look.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and there's tests mixing, something that I don't recommend. I'm like I'll go Usually.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's breaking the rules and Carla's like stop pushing, I'm just gonna look out the door now, One of the reasons that we have worked with Revlon Professional for 10 years. So funny, fun fact every single supplier that we've ever used has changed, except for two people Revlon Professional and our accountant. They're the two people that we have still continued to use. It's pretty crazy. Like that, you guys are the people who were with us from day one. Craig, our account was with us from day one. Every single other person that we've ever used.
Speaker 1:I just wanna point out as well, because people keep texting us for Greg's details.
Speaker 2:Please don't take my new clients. He liked his clients. He was very flattered to hear what we had said to him, but he sent an email. I think the last time was like guys, I really appreciated it, but please let people know that I'm not able to take any more clients.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry guys.
Speaker 2:He said that people were contacting him a lot.
Speaker 1:But yeah, so you guys have been with us from day one and for Tess and I being 21 and 23 when we opened the salon, we have chopped and changed and adapted so many things, but Revlon is a color that we will be right or die with, but so much of like. Obviously the color performs at an incredible level, but so much of it has come down to our relationship with you and the relationships that we have with people that are actually in Revlon Professional. As we say in our sponsorship from the potty, you guys have the care factor of a small business but you're like a big, global brand. So you've got like so many opportunities that you can give to people like us. And today the reason that we wanted to get you onto the podcast is not to talk and brag about Revlon and convert people over to Revlon. That could potentially be a byproduct of today's potty, but the real reason is we want to give people, whether they're Revlon salons or not, we want to give people really, really clear information and understanding about what they should expect from their relationship with their stockist, because the relationship that we have with Revlon and we've stocked many other companies skin companies, hair companies, body companies, so many different brands that we've worked with, but the relationship that we have with Revlon.
Speaker 1:We would have never known that the potential of what we could have had, support wise, from a stockist, had we not have stocked Revlon before. We would have just gone. Oh, it's like you know this brand and this brand and this brand that have next to no support and they've just got online ordering and we never see anyone. We don't have the opportunities that we have with Revlon. So we really want to highlight what you should be looking for when you're with your stockist, because it's a really, really important relationship. This is like, if you're spending, you know, anywhere between $20,000 to $100,000 plus a year on stock, that relationship and who you're actually working with in terms of being able to produce your color work, produce your skin work, produce the client results, support your clients at home with their home care. If that relationship isn't like absolutely concrete, there's some major red flags there. So we're gonna deep dive on that today. Before we get into it, though, carla, we run a little segment around here. Do you know what it's called? It's called Hot Girl Hubbub. You have to sing it.
Speaker 2:I feel like a friend does this Honestly. When it comes on in my car I'm like, oh God, turn the volume down. This is gonna blare like that. Keep it up. I say that's the thing.
Speaker 1:We've spoken about this, Leah. Don't you dare adjust the volume on that? I absolutely love it.
Speaker 2:You weren't awake, I'd be awake then.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. It's like, yeah, it's a real pump up. I love it. Leah, play that tune. I'm gonna pop your hotline. We are doing it today. All right, I've found one. We've had a shitload of questions, and I love it. Guys, keep them coming. It's so good and there's so many different ones, but I've handpicked this one for you, Carla, because I think this is something that you can really speak on, Definitely better than what I think. Oh, you could probably touch on it a bit. Thanks, Teres.
Speaker 2:I'll probably be better, obviously. Yeah, I'm sorry, I just want to answer the question out now.
Speaker 1:So we'll do it now. Okay, I'm wanting. The question is I'm wanting a career tweak, but don't even know where to start with this, so she's come from the floor.
Speaker 2:So Carla has a Well thinking about it, thinking about leaving the floor Asbestos is a skin therapist.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, I'm not actually a skin therapist. It's a skin therapist, okay. So, Like is it irrelevant if it's hair or beauty or skin or whatever? It could be a DJ for all we know. I mean you'll have less sleep, I don't know or more sleep, I'm not sure, whichever way around, you're doing that, so you're someone that has had a career tweak. Yeah, so you shifted.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I did this. So I was on the floor, I was color specialist, as I said, and I moved over to the dark side of sales and working for a company and I think.
Speaker 1:Can I ask then? So were you interested in, like I know you're passionate about color, but were you passionate about educating clients, you know, like home care, that sort of stuff as?
Speaker 2:well, essentially, that's what got me the job. So, fortunately, the job that came up was for a color house that I'd only been in a salon of those brands Right Of that, sorry of that brand. So in my interview I was able to say hey, I've come from the floor, I'm strong in my technical side and I can talk to clients from an educational background. So I think that's ended up what got me the job, because I was like, hey, I can talk through this and it's not a transaction with just you know dollars and cents. It's like, hey, you need this product and let me tell you all the reasons why I need it. I'm not interested in the business. This is where you're going to see value. This is how your clients will receive it.
Speaker 2:So, at the end of the day, you don't sell products just because you're selling it. Like you're selling it, you're creating the reason and the why they need it in their life or why, agreed, what's how they can't live without it. So that's how I think I made the transition out and, yeah, I was successful straight away because I sold like that, I mean in my job now, like you need to, you might want to get wrap your head around the whole job. So externally my job looks like coffees and chats. There is so much behind the scenes that I cannot stress. That goes on Like you're walking. You're working towards budgets and KPIs and building and planning and reporting. It, just it, never, it never ends.
Speaker 1:And I also feel like the people wouldn't like a lot of people for your type of field of what you're doing right now. People don't understand how accessible you are to clients, like I know, even for us. We pick up the phone and it's like you bend over backwards for us. Now I'm not necessarily saying that that's like great for work-life balance, but there'll be times when I'm like what the fuck are you doing?
Speaker 2:I know, no worries, we need this round and 20 vol. No, but like this truly like again.
Speaker 1:The support that we've had from you guys has been like holy shit, we're out of this. Any chance you're passing by here and I know that you're not going to be passing by here. And the next minute we've got like three bottles of 20 vol.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you have to think on your feet and you have to come up with solutions really quickly Because you can't, like, with the clients that I look after, like I look after a bunch of top line clients and I can't be everything and I can't drop everything straight away.
Speaker 1:Best of the best I've heard. It's exactly right. I can't, I just I don't have the time.
Speaker 2:I don't have the time for anything. I don't have the time for anything. I have to talk to this shit. But it is like that, Like it is hectic all the time and you've got to say compose and make really good calculated decisions and for really good outcomes and at the same time keep the client completely calm that you're going to come up with an outcome.
Speaker 1:Especially when you've got nutty clients like Tessa and Nikki. So you mean like highly emotional ones.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, everyone's fine.
Speaker 1:Hey, don't you just do coffee and jacks? Yeah, it's exactly right, it's for the brand show.
Speaker 2:I think, if you want to work out what you actually want to do, like what is the reason why? Yes, like, are you wanting to go because you don't want to do this anymore, or have you actually got a plan in place, that's great. Well, if you don't have a plan in place and I don't, I don't.
Speaker 1:Chaos in shoes. Yeah, like, are you burnt out or are you? Yeah, that's great, that's fucking helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just like work out truly what it is. Yeah, because you might actually like the job. Like there's so many people again in my field now who have left the floor, turned into technicians. It's quite an easy transition in hair world and then gone. Oh my God, I don't want to do this Like. This is hard. I've got to schedule this, I've got to book appointments. I've got to drive around. I have to educate all the time. I work late nights all the time. So technicians, specifically, they might have to do late night trainings from Monday to Friday. Sure, you get Saturdays off, but you're working until eight o'clock potentially every night and you don't not start early. Like we're on the emails, we're up like the sales team, we are up and moving early.
Speaker 1:Sure, we don't really do late nights.
Speaker 2:Class of a two, though you won't see me on a Friday, I don't know full time. Jokes, fran, yeah, I've got lots of friends like you.
Speaker 1:You've got lots of friends riding in your car like a lot of Friday Call her at three o'clock. I think that's really helpful. But today what I want to do is I want to give some really practical advice to people so that people can listen to this podcast and then go back to their product companies and either reassess who they're with and potentially move companies if they're not getting the support that they desire, or be able to go in and ask for more support. So I would love if you would share some of the ways that you think that, or some of the absolute minimums that you would expect if you were a salon owner. If you open a salon tomorrow, some of the absolute minimums that you would be looking for, support wise from a product company or a stop.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like three essential.
Speaker 2:So, number one, I think, first and foremost, you need to have a reason to have that connection with the company. So their values, what they believe in, their ethos, essentially. So what ticks the box for you, for our brand, or what can Revlon? What do you like about Revlon? Do you know enough about Revlon? Let me tell you about Revlon. So I think you can't try and fight that like you have to feel it. You've got to feel that you're going to have that connection with the brand. Secondly, it's the support, collaboration. So having someone on the other side sit down and be like, hey, what are your goals and what are you doing with your business, what does your business look like? And just sitting down and nutting that out like I don't know how many businesses have actually sat down and being like, hey, yeah, this is my 2024 plan, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 1:Well, we actually like I have to say that one of the reasons that we were so passionate about partnering with you guys from the podcast and I've said this to you a few times is we had other companies that reached out and wanted to sponsor our podcast and there were companies that we work with who we really like and they're hitting like a good mark with us, but they didn't necessarily hit a hundred percent mark. So what I'm saying with a hundred percent mark is like we're right or die for them. We would never move if something better came along, Like we don't believe that there is anything better that could come along, and we feel that way with Revlon. So I think alignment is so important in everything that we do, and Tess and I have this saying in our business that if it's not a fuck, yes, it's a no, and we base everything around that. So the alignment at minimum needs to feel really, really good yeah for sure, and that's the thing it's different for different people.
Speaker 2:So, like you might have a salon that really cares about education and that's you know, that's the connection there. I just want you to help me build my team and grow my staff and I just want my full team firing and, you know, having PD and just you know, just great, great operating staff.
Speaker 2:You might be, hey, we really believe in marketing and you know how can we support, we do events and we like doing this for our clients and having these nights, and you know how can we collaborate there. Or you might be like, hey, I just really want a really great performing color. I just need that to be done. I just I don't care about the bells and whistles, I just need a high performing product that I can rely on it's going to do what it's going to do. Or then you've got the other side. I just want great pricing. You know, I believe in my team. They're fundamentally good colorists. They can use anything, but I just want the best pricing that I can. So you kind of need to step back and work out hey, what are my priorities? What do you need? Of course, I'm biased and think Revlon can do all of those things.
Speaker 2:naturally, I was not so good at doing all of the above, but if you don't have a rep or a business development person coming in and asking you those questions, like if they walk in the door and be like, oh hey, not that I do this, but like, oh hey, I'm from Revlon, this is all the reasons why you should partner with us, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and we're awesome and we do this, and the client's just like but You're not listening to me.
Speaker 1:How does that work for me?
Speaker 2:You don't know what I want, like, if you don't have that straight up, there's no point, because that's about the supply's ego, it's not about supporting the sell-on and it's interesting.
Speaker 1:I didn't even realize, before we started working with other brands that weren't Revlon, that it's not actually normal for a supplier to come in and say, okay, cool, tell me about your business, let's build it together. What is the relationship that we've had with you has been okay, cool. Where are we at team-wise? Who needs what? Let's build this business together. What events do we have? What marketing activations are we working on? Like, you know, everything that's happening in our business and we literally you, me and Tess, and then our leadership team we build the business together and your finger is on the pulse of our business, unlike any other brand that we stock, I think that would be. I just want to say that is, for me, the difference between because I mean, you've been in sell-on when we've had reps coming in to like, try and, you know, convert us.
Speaker 2:I actually look like a staff member. I kind of like bled in. Yeah, I think they think you are.
Speaker 1:I just kind of bled in, yeah, just blodging at the table. But I think this is the thing. We get approached a lot to swap over and you know we ride or die for Revlon, but it always goes back to that thing. If they're just talking about the products and they get it, that's their job. But for why we have never even looked or been open to those conversations is the sense of community and support, because that's what's important to us, because it's never, as Nikki's saying, it's not the performance, the color, all of those things are the byproduct.
Speaker 1:What we get from this is like really great, like I, and especially now with mentoring and with what Nikki and I do with supporting our clients, our one-on-one clients. How many times we've got you know how often you're meeting with reps? People aren't meeting with reps.
Speaker 2:How often are your?
Speaker 1:reps contacting you or they don't unless I contact them.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:What questions are your reps asking when they come in about your business and about growing your business? What plan do you have moving to move the needle forward in this business and scale it? And I think even that, like it was like I've been with Revlon even longer, I've been using Revlon color for I think, 15 years or something like that maybe 16.
Speaker 1:Really majority of my hair career and I think it wasn't until I got into business. But it was always even with my old company and I know that you're that still part of your like under your umbrella, which is an amazing company. I adore my old company. It's got. I just thought this was normal. This is the norm because I'd see the relationships that were within that.
Speaker 2:And ironically, I think it's normal, until I hear externally that it's not and I'm like what do you mean?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and this is where we really want to get Carla on, because I really want to hire, and if this is resonating to you, we're like well, hang on, I don't have these relationships within my whatever it is that you're supplying, you really need to. These relationships are so essential and so crucial for your business to be successful, to be able to educate your clients at the level that you need to, to have your you know skin, hair, whatever it is that you're doing, performing at the level that you need it to be. If you don't have that connection and that trust within each other, I don't know how you can ever get to perform, because if I'm not understanding or I don't have that support, I'm just sort of flying blind. It doesn't make sense to me at all how you can. Well, you won't grow Exactly.
Speaker 2:I essentially are just an extension of your business. Yeah, that's it the way.
Speaker 1:I see it exactly like that. I see that you've come into our team, you're essentially a part of our team, but I will say you are Like we don't have that same levels of support. I'm just gonna go out and say it. We don't have that same levels of support from any other company that we stock, yeah, so we have like nice relationships, yeah, but we don't have the same level of support where you know you're in the business with us, you know building it, I care about who comes and goes, care about the client numbers.
Speaker 2:I can't bring any value if I'm not in it with you. Yeah, I've got to be in the trenches with you, right? So for the great stuff and helping you build and grow, but when shit hits the fan, like, I'm also there. I'm not running and hiding, being like, oh good luck with that, guys, good deal with that. You know, yeah, I'm in it with you, so you really are. Yeah, I need to be like, I need to be part of it, to understand it, to help grow it with you. I need to be part of your vision. So every day is so different for me because all the businesses are very different in what they're doing, right, and I really like that, and I think that's why that's how ten years just like swings on by, because it's so different every day, like I'm here doing this with you guys right now, mm-hmm, like no one else in our team are doing this, so yeah, but it's true, so I
Speaker 2:just, you know, and all the other things are great, and, but you need to think about what. What is your priority? And I think, just again, on a Revlon side, though, what I find great with us is, yes, we're a global you know mega-based, whatever but we are also local. So we're in Australia, we're quite nimble. We can make decisions on the fly. What can we do? This is my views, this is how I think this will work, and often we'll, you know, we'll work together, and that's what a collaboration is like. It's our partnership. It's not just like, you know, you guys, hey, I need this and we're like, okay, or hey, we need you to spend this, and then we'll give you that like. It's not that. It's like what's the what's the bigger picture, what's the plan?
Speaker 1:And that's thing. I think, even with some of the things that we've worked on, like it's always a bigger picture of like you know, we want to come to you for support with this, because this is our vision. That will come from that, that we'll be able to get like x, y and z from that and then how that will kick back for you guys and I think that's the, it's a partnership.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it really is.
Speaker 1:It's not. It becomes less about us and them. You know, and a lot of people view their stock as the relationship is like us and our salon and then them and the stock that they have and their brands, whereas it really needs to be a together experience and it's like how do we work on this to benefit everyone? Yeah, but I think that really is the big thing that sets Revlon apart is the support level and, as you just touched on, like, yes, it's a global brand. The way that we view Revlon professional as a company is you guys have the pool of being a global brand. You're able to have access to way more opportunities for people like us who are like a teeny, tiny Little splash in the ocean in terms of the hair and beauty industry. All these incredible opportunities that you can only get from a global brand. Yeah, but the people who work within the brand make you feel like you're literally talking to a small business the care factor is like yeah, I feel like the relationship that we have with you is like family.
Speaker 1:If you called me up and said, hey, I need this, I would do it for you, and I know you'd do the same for us.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, I'm very mindful of Having clients not feel like account numbers, because I don't want it. I don't want anyone to feel like, oh well, I know they're probably getting more support because they spend more, because they have a bigger team, that's. That's totally irrelevant to what's going on. And I think if you feel, if you currently feel, like you're just an account number, you're with a wrong supplier.
Speaker 1:I totally agree, and I just want to point out as well, because people might be listening to this music, oh yeah, but that's because of, like, where we got at now within our business. We had support from Revlon from day one, when it was just Nikki and I. We had you guys backing us, believing in us, supporting us and helping us start, you know, developing and Moving our business forward. Yeah, it started from the jump. So, carl, I'm sure this will probably maybe make you blush a little bit, but I Took a couple of notes because I, when we're thinking about this podcast episode and I didn't put this in any emails when Revlon were asking what the rundown of the podcast was going to be, but Some support that we've received from you and Revlon in the past 10 years and when I started to take a couple of notes because I wanted to highlight, obviously, some of the stuff that You've done for our business, but also some of the stuff that Revlon's done in in the bigger picture for 10 years with us, and the list got quite extensive.
Speaker 2:A bit of reflection. Yeah, because I sometimes think what have I done over the last 10?
Speaker 1:years. Yeah, totally. And and for. For Brad Raper, who's the uh, what is he like? General manager of Revlon. The general manager of Revlon. He might be like holy shit, we've given these guys way too much.
Speaker 1:We're gonna run this list anyway, because I want to show you guys what's possible, because, if nothing else, if we can have people start to think about who they're you know, quote unquote in bed with With their business and start looking at the people around them and the support that they could potentially have, I think it's a really important question. So we've had 10 years of education, support and training. Revlon took us to Thailand for a conference with speakers that included Margaret Zhang and Lisa messenger. That was incredible. We went to Thailand it was like the second or third year in business and it was absolutely amazing. We did an international conference and that was so nuts.
Speaker 1:Um, we were one of the highlights of my career highlights of my life, highlights of your life, highlight of my life, truly you've had a child Um, so we went to Thailand and had this incredible international conference with Revlon.
Speaker 1:You guys had us as guests for the ahfa Australian hair fashion awards. Sorry, yeah, um. So we were guests there. We had the most beautiful night and meal and that was incredible. Yep, you guys provided us have provided us unlimited salon education that have been that has been specifically customized to the a team, to our team at ahead Coming out, teaching our team, onboarding new team members Um, like that's part of our induction process at ahead that we get team from Revlon to come out and run all of the training so that we don't have to. You've donated over. You donated over $5,000 worth of product for our 2017 fundraiser for the cancer council. You then donated over $6,000 worth of product for goodie bags for our 2018 fundraiser for love your sister. Then you went a step further and donated over $6,000 worth of products for goodie bags for our guests attending our 2019 Acura head charity fundraiser. You guys created an online learning portal to showcase some of the most talented hairdressers globally that our team learned from every single day and our team love the.
Speaker 2:Revlon portal, the new thing too. It's getting so good it's incredible.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just there's new stuff constantly. Um, you guys sponsored our style and sip events all of our style and sip events in 2022 and gifted our guests $120 worth of full-size retail products each for our goodie bags and there was just no hesitation with that.
Speaker 1:It was like absolutely We'll get on board and our gratitude giveaway promo that you guys, that you organized for us Um two years in a row and over 600 products, 600 units of products that you donated for our community to be able to enjoy and for us to be able to Do an activation like this, which gives so many people in our community so much joy, but also for us as a business, it helps us really Boost our our clients home care, which is incredible. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Yep, it's a pretty fucking extensive we missed, we missed one test, the 10 year, the 10 year event in the goodie bag. The 10 year event in the goodie bag this year yeah, for our 10 year anniversary ahead, you guys donated all sides unique ones, oh yeah, so it's a pretty incredible list. When I started making it, I actually I was filled with so much gratitude, but I was also quite overwhelming. I was like, holy shit, in 10 years, these are things that we've been able to do because we work with a brand like Revlon, and that's incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, I think we see it as support, like we don't see it as like a checklist of like. Oh well, you know, we contributed, this, contributed.
Speaker 1:It's not a exchange like that, yeah totally, it's just like, you know. I just, it's just part of what they do Like. This is the thing, guys. It's not, it's not. You know, as Nikki said, we're not some exceptional, you know, but it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:That's the point, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it doesn't matter that the hierarchy I think this is the thing that Revlon believes in us, and because we're supported by them, it makes us feel like we can do more and do better, and our biggest thing is community. It's always, like you know, a majority of that list that Nikki's read out is around giving back community because we also want our clients to fall in love with Revlon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the way that we have and they have, except for Tyler, and that was completely self-indulgent. But I really wanted to highlight that because I think it's super important and I hope this gets people thinking look, this is not to convert people to Revlon. You guys make your decisions that are going to reflect what's important to your business and your values and whatever. But I think it's really important to start that question around who am I working with and what's important to me and my business and are these people helping to propel my business forward? Are these people working with me to grow my business?
Speaker 2:Well, look, I mean essentially you should be doing an annual review anyway. Yeah, do you sit down with your you know your rep and be like hey, can we just do reflection on what the year that was Was. Well, you do that with us every year it's beautiful to do with that.
Speaker 1:Every year, carla comes in and we do a big review. You initiated this with us and we go through everything numbers, levels where we need to improve you know what we're wanting Opportunity, top skews, yeah, all of it.
Speaker 2:What?
Speaker 1:we're wanting out of each other for the year.
Speaker 2:Yeah and like and if. Like the numbers. Yeah, I'm a bit of a numbers girl. I'm a little bit known as like the spreadsheet queen and I'm okay with that title.
Speaker 1:We are too.
Speaker 2:That's why I think that's what we speak so well.
Speaker 1:So like oh, that's your spreadsheet, yeah, that's your tab.
Speaker 2:So I think like if you can't get a basic overview of your business, in a snapshot of that, you can see the behavior of the salon, you can see where the pigs and troughs are, you can see where the opportunity is, you can see the activations throughout the year when the marketing was, you can see the returns on that. So if you're not already reviewing that, you don't know where you're going because you don't know where you started Exactly. I love this.
Speaker 1:That's beautifully summed up, Carla. We end every episode in gratitude. There's plenty of things to be grateful for. I would love to know, right in this moment what are you grateful for?
Speaker 2:Well, I think I've got a two prong here. So personally, I'm grateful for my beautiful friends and family around me, just like I just have a really nice life and you know I have all the love and support there. Improfessionally, I kind of equally have the same thing, but I like going to work and I'm grateful for my clients. I know it and I feel it and I know that everyone's there and it's just nice to work with good people and I like who I work with and it's good, it's easy, it doesn't have to be hard.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:It has to be hard, I should think when you work in alignment, things become really easy, and that's what a lot of people do in the stand. Yeah, it's not a drama.
Speaker 2:Work is not a drama. I don't go to work like, oh God, I mean, I felt like that on Monday coming back for my holiday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she's in a festival. It's called Come Down.
Speaker 2:But you know, a good hour has snapped me out of that and was like, okay, everything's fine, the world's back, I'll count down the minutes to tell you about girls. I think all of you were Wait, I do my customer service. Oh my God, I love customer service. Go deal with this now. I'm like Carla just understands my brain.
Speaker 1:Oh my God when they were asking me like oh, is that this?
Speaker 2:I was like I don't know, honestly, if Monica doesn't scream at me one more time about calling a new color filter a filter it's filter. Yeah, it's a new color cream. I know it's a color ball, it's a color bomb, it's a new color cream, but Monica's going to kill me, I know, if I call it, monica.
Speaker 1:We're all doing it, though let's see the OGs.
Speaker 2:It's really hard to get around, it's the. Ogs, and I'm sorry, I'm one of the OGs so and I'm okay with that, and the other one, antiprosity milk. I don't even know what's new name is. Can people listen to this?
Speaker 1:They're like what the fuck are they talking about, Thor polo?
Speaker 2:Amazing products that we're talking about.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, tess. What about you? I absolutely echo Actually, no, I echo loving my job and loving what I do, but I am so fucking grateful for especially you, matt, and I know that like we muck around and like we have our fun, but I have worked with a lot of different reps over the years and every time when you're talking to them it's like we're still together, right, like it's all these things of like my fear of abandonment.
Speaker 2:Every one day losing you.
Speaker 1:But I think I'm so grateful for, first of all, how much you believe in us and how much, like you really are such an integral part of the business for us. I'm so grateful for that. I'm so grateful for you giving up your time today and being here with us. I'm so fucking grateful for Revlon as a whole and I think, yeah, if this I really hope this is highlighting to people how what's the alert? You got to read it out. I can't read it Great, I think what this, if nothing else, is highlighting like, if you're not having these sort of relationships and like working relationships within your business, it's really important to like have it, have another look, have a refresh, because I truly am so grateful for our partnership, our friendship and, yeah, I think you bring so much light into like, not just the like. I'm so proud of what we do with Revlon and being, you know, part of the Revlon family, but I'm so grateful for you for really being such a key part of that.
Speaker 2:So thank you so much, really grateful. But you go on, I'm really grateful.
Speaker 1:I'm so grateful for you, mate. I just think you make us feel really important and even when we were a party of two but it was just me and Tess, you know, and one team member you made us feel important then and you make us feel important now that we've got a big team and I really, truly believe that it's not about how big the team is or how big the account is. You make us feel like we're running like a global business. You really make us feel important and I really appreciate that.
Speaker 2:We're just in the shadows. That's it.
Speaker 1:It's you guys out there, you know but I really I just so appreciate what you do for our team and you make our team feel special and important, and our relationship is something that I'm really really grateful for.
Speaker 2:And, yeah, beautiful, beautiful, right here.
Speaker 1:How gorgeous. Thank you, guys, so much for listening. It's been an absolute privilege, and thank you, carla. Thank you for coming all this way. Thank you for having me on guys Carla if anyone wants to reach out, how would they reach out? What's the best way to get in touch? I'm sure there are going to be plenty of people that are like right, we're dumping our crew and we're moving in with Revlon. It's like my number.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Do you want people to get in touch with you by email?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean can?
Speaker 1:we yeah Great.
Speaker 2:Read it out. Read it out. So you should, so you should, come on. Oh God, how do I know what to do? Okay, so if anyone wants to find me, my email is Carla, with a C C-A-R-L-A dot bond B-O-N-D Like James.
Speaker 1:Bond, I was going to say I hope you make a reference you do yeah, yeah, all the time Carla dot bond at Revloncom, revloncom, beautiful. We're going to pop it in the show notes as well for a little cheeky link for anyone who wants to get in touch. We're putting your Instagram as well, the Revlon one. We won't.
Speaker 2:Oh, you don't want the party one? Well, the party one will tell you how they go. Well, they don't get access straight away. They've got to work towards that. That's exactly right. Get that second meeting.
Speaker 1:Safe on you guys. Thank you so much. Thank you, Thanks so much for listening to this episode and hanging out with us today To hear more about our journey. Follow us on Instagram at the underscore conscious underscore salon If you're a shit speller, check the spelling of conscious or at a head hair underscore. Thank you so much for joining us today and we'll see you in the next episode.