5 Things We Wish We Knew Before Starting a Salon | Save Time, Money & Stress

Thinking of starting a salon or already running one but feeling stuck? In this episode, Jodie and Adri share the 5 biggest lessons they wish they had known before starting their salon business.

You’ll learn how to:
✅ Separate your profit from your wage (and why it matters)
✅ Shift your mindset for real growth
✅ Find the right people to support your dream
✅ Build salon systems that save you time and stress
✅ Trust yourself and take action sooner

These tips will help you avoid burnout, manage your money better, and grow a salon business you actually love.

Book a FREE demo 

https://focusgdt.com/accelerator/demo-booking/a

Timestamp: 
00:00 Intro 
01:52 Welcome
02:39 Tip 1: Your Profit is Not Your Wage – and Your Wage is Not Your Profit
09:24 Tip 2: Your Mindset Towards Growth is SO Important
12:25 Tip 3: You Don’t Need to Do it Alone – Find the Right People to Support  Your Dream
16:29 Tip 4: Systems Save You – Build Them Early

22:42 Tip 5: Trust Yourself Sooner

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Transcript

Jodie 0:00

Though we had set expectations about what our expectations were and had it very set out by me not following those rules within two meetings. The new team members were not following the rules Because I wasn't. So you have to walk the walk. You can't just talk the talk.

Adri 0:19

I really admire you. You know, like to admit that. You know, know, like what happened in our business, because you know, many times people they don't step back and they don't think it was me I was the one who dropped the ball and this, why now we have this thing, what we need to fix your team going to think it's not that important because Audrey doesn't follow the rules all the time, so I might can try not to follow the rules, so it's very important. You know that you need to show to the team every single time you cannot drop the ball every single time what is the expectation and you're going to be just as strict with yourself or strict you're going to be with your team members people taking business advice from someone that's never owned a business, has or, if they have, it's not been a successful business, or that they don't know anything about the industry of the business that they're talking about.

Lesson 1: Profit Is Not Your Wage

Jodie 1:21

Um, and I know that the person you're getting and, or family member or whatever, it's a good intention, but it's coming from a place that they don't know what they're talking about. So, like I just said, ask the people that know what they're talking about, and just because you don't like the answer, don't be afraid of the answer, because it's the answer you have to hear. Welcome back to the show, today's episode 35. And in today's episode we're getting real and personal. Audrey and I are going to be sharing our five biggest lessons we wish someone had told us when we first started out in our salon.

Jodie 2:09

Welcome back everyone, and if you are in your first few years, or even if you've been it for a while but feel like something still is missing, this episode is definitely for you.

Jodie 2:21

Tip number one. So lesson number one, and it took me a long time I don't think I learned this lesson until you and I started Focus and looking into people's budget and everything, and I still hadn't learned this one your profit is not your wage and your wage is not your profit.

Adri 2:43

Absolutely, and this is a big one, because when you start your business, everything is going into your account and everything is your earning. This is what you think and then you just pay everything out and whatever left is yours if you have anything left. So the biggest mistakes, what we can see when we start to work with the salon owners is that when we are working through the break even, they don't even consider themselves as an employee of their own business and they don't even allocate wages for themselves, which is a really, really big mistake, because if you would work for someone else, then you would get paid for the works that you are doing, and we are not even going down to the rabbit hole. When you are having your own business or running your own business, you're wearing at least two or three or four different hats, because you are not just a stylist or a therapist, but you are a marketing agent, you are a social media agent, you are your own bookkeeper and as you you do, probably you are the cleaner for the salon, so you actually deserve a wage. And when we are working into business, budget and everything, this is normally a really big eye opener for most of the salon owners, because when I asked them, you know, like, so what is the wage, what you are taking out each week from your business, they would say I don't have a wage. And this is when we actually get into details, because you have a wage but you just don't separate things in your business so it's actually not visible, because you're paying for petrol, you're paying for grocery, you're paying for rent, but using the same card, and you don't consider that as a wage.

Adri 4:28

When I used to have my hair salon, I really liked everything separated, because probably by now I'm extremely detail-oriented, I like everything in systems and organized very nicely.

Adri 4:42

So I actually transferred every single week to a separate bank account of wage for myself.

Adri 4:51

And it was so funny because even my accountant told me like that's so strange, like why would you do that? It's all your money, you can just spend it. And it is actually not true, because if I don't have that number in my mind and if I don't separate that, then I go into a spending mode because I would think, oh, money comes in all the time, so I have plenty to spend. And then at the end of every three months I would scream and I would cry and I would not be able to sleep because I don't have enough money to pay my bus, pay my super or pay my suppliers, because seemingly I had lots of money coming in, but then I didn't control what I'm spending. And when it comes to putting your pricing together, this is when we use our breakeven and including your wage, because that's just the running cost of your business. As a business owner, for your hard work, for all the stress and also all the knowledge that you have, you do deserve a profit on the business, and that's on top of your wage.

Jodie 6:03

Yeah, 100%. And I think also, you know, the thing that gets me is that accountants really don't give good business advice, and I had someone yesterday one of our clients I was working with yesterday her accountant had given her okay, well, this is how much money you spend for yourself personally each month and this is what we need to spend for the business. When I took a look at it and we put it up against our business budget, the accountant was off by thousands of dollars for the week and I'm like that is such terrible advice them giving you a budget that the budget doesn't even meet your actual spending or it meets what it's showing in the accounting like in zero, but that's not like everything else that's taken into consideration. That's accounting for tax and they're basing a recommendation on a tax position, not an actual cash flow position. So, yeah, I get really so many accountants out there. Well, I guess it's the same in the coaching industry there's so many coaches that shouldn't be coaching and there's so many accountants and there's a lot of hairdressers that shouldn't be hairdressing. So it doesn't matter which industry it is, you're going to find one in all of them.

Jodie 7:17

But, yeah, really important to make sure that you're you don't settle for. What's left over is what I get to live on, because I use the business to pay for the car, I use the business to pay for my mobile and all these other living costs that you're able to use as a tax deduction. But you're not considering it and you're just thinking whatever's left over is your profit, whereas the profit is the reward, your profit is the cherry on the top. The profit is what you get for, like Adriana said, putting all those hours in doing all the hard work, all the stress you go through. If you don't have a profit portion in your business, then work for someone else If you're not working towards. When I say that we all have to start somewhere and we realize that we're in a position, so we need to work, begin working towards having that profit, yeah, so always the goal. But if that's not your goal to start having profiting your business, if you're just using it for an income, then why take, why have the stress of business other?

Jodie 8:22

than the flexibility of work hours.

Adri 8:24

Well, I would actually question that, because we all know that we go into business to think we're going to have more freedom and we're going to have more money and soon we're going to realize we work more hours and we take less money unless we start to work towards to figuring out how we can make this business really work for us. But in the beginning it's definitely a lot more to actually give than to take, and we all know, you know, like when we get into business, many times when you take on your first team member in the beginning, they might take home more money than you do because you're not set up for profit. And when your business is not set up for profit, then you end up with having very, very little money left over and you're just working, working and working.

Lesson 2: Mindset Towards Growth

Jodie 9:19

We could stay on that topic for like hours, and we do. We have before, so we'll move on to the next thing. Tip number two your mindset towards growth is important. The position of where your mind is at and the perception of what this business is to you and what it is a vehicle for is really important.

Adri 9:39

I totally agree. You know like, the mindset towards growth is probably the most important part, because it is going to lead you to success and whatever you think, it's true for your life and for your business. So it's very important for you to start to switch to thinking positively about the business. Many times business owners they say, oh, but I'm not good with money or marketing is so hard. Those are the stories which keep you really small, because it's one thing you know like if you fight for your limitation, it is there for you to keep it. So you don't want to fight for your limitation, you want to go through growth. This is when you need to be very open-minded and this is when we differentiate between fixed mindset and growth mindset. People with fixed mindset are finding it difficult to grow a profitable business, and people with growth mindset, they always find a way to actually work things out. For themselves.

Jodie 10:49

Can you explain, because a lot of people may not understand, what you mean by fighting for your limitation?

Adri 10:58

yeah. So this is actually a really good quote from Jim Quick. I really like him. He is a mindset and brain coach. So when you fight for your limitation, it means you know, like when you say it cannot be done, this is the economy, I cannot find right people, you know like people these days, they don't spend. These are limitations and if you fight for it because you want to prove you are right, you actually going to keep yourself in that environment and if you able to elevate you out from that mindset, then you're going to find yourself in a completely different environment.

Lesson 3: Find The Right Support

Jodie 11:41

That's a big thing because a lot of the salon owners and clinicians and business owners that I speak to and I'm speaking to them every day 80% of them will be coming in telling me or they will be fighting for their limitations, they will be fighting against me to prove me wrong that there's nothing that they can do to grow their business Not them. It's not that there's things wrong in the business, it's everything outside. It's clients don't spend team. 80% of them will be just adamant that no, not what I'm doing, it's what everyone else is doing. That's putting me in this position. Tip number three Gosh, I wish I had have known this one. You don't need to do it alone. Find the right people to support your dream.

Adri 12:31

Absolutely, and it's just connecting back again Previous podcast episode when we were talking about you know management and who to put into what position, and it's really important for you to find the right people and it's you. You know, like many times when we have a business, we don't even consider our team to be our team, but then in reality, we have so many other people who are working for us. Like you know, we have our accountant who can support us, or we have other people like you can have a VA who can support you with admin work, and you can find other people. If you don't know anything about business, which most of us actually going into having a hair salon, we don't have any idea. You don't need to do it alone, you know, like you don't need to figure it out, because others already did it and others already have a formula. Like we have the formula, we went through everything, we figured it out and we have the blueprint, so you don't have to do it on your own. You don't have to do it alone. It's exactly the same for our business.

Adri 13:40

You know, like since we started our business focus from the very beginning we didn't even have income just yet. We already started with our first coach because we didn't want to figure it out. We didn't want to do it alone, because that investment, which was money and investing our savings, actually took us here where we are right now and we are very proud of where we are because we are a global coaching or mentoring or business development company and we are helping so many salon owners, which is absolutely amazing, but it's very important. So many times people are sitting in their salon stressed, overwhelmed, and they don't understand that you actually can reach out for help. You can actually make this so much easier for yourself.

Jodie 14:35

Exactly and just when you're talking about investing into your business. Salon owners always have a perception of whether they're investing into a good thing for their business or not. A lot of the time they'll go and invest in equipment or a new website, or they'll money on marketing that isn't working the website and that okay, it's a business investment, that's good. But then if they're going and upgrading their car, they can have a fancier car with the logo on the side to give that image. That's not a good investment. That's going to be depreciating that car's not going to make you money. Yes, it might be a tax write-off, um, but it's actually not making your business.

Jodie 15:17

Money makes your business money is investing in knowledge and skill. Yeah, so that you can actually generate income. Can I generate income from that car? No, I can't do I generate. I feel really good as a reward. Yes, you do. Can I use it as a tax deduction? Yes, you can do.

Jodie 15:37

Is your business at a position where you now get to have those luxuries of looking and feeling good, or are we still not able to make enough money? So, okay, yes, I do have to invest in a business and getting knowledge, which is also a tax deduction, but it's also an investment that generates income. So think about when you're investing in your business and in yourself. Is this going to generate income or is it just making me feel good? So now I'll get down off my soapbox and we'll go to Adriana's favorite thing, which is my least favorite thing that I always outsource to anyone. This is why I choose my work wife is because she's the details person. She's the person that I can rely on that will get the job done. If she gives it to me, she has to chase me 10 times and ask me if I've remembered to do it. Systems save you, and if you build them early, it's even better.

Adri 16:33

Absolutely, and you just described my life really well, isn't it Like business partnership? Yes, so everyone has their strength and their weaknesses and we balance each other so really well. But, yeah, I'm the one who loves systems and creating systems and I like to get organized and I did this for my salon also, and I stand by it that systems are give you freedom and and when you create systems, this can be overwhelming and it can be a lot, but then without system, you have chaos and it's everything chaotic your working environment in your salon, and because everyone does what they think is the best for the business, it's not necessarily going to be best for your business and you're going to get upset because they don't think or they don't do things the way you like it. And it's not their fault. It is actually because you don't have systems. You didn't build things in your business that people can follow. So once you have a system, then when you go on a holiday, people are not going to pick up the phone and call you straight away. You know, like maybe someone's car declined. You know, like, what to do, or just Mary is complaining again about the blow dry. What to do, like all those things you can map out in advance and you can train your team.

Adri 17:56

We also have a how to folder, so that was my rule. So I put all I collected, all the important information in a folder, what I call how-to. So my team was trained that if they have any questions, they need to go to the how-to folder first and if they don't find the answer in the how-to folder, before they call me, they need to think about and they need to come up with two possible answers. And I always said I don't need these answers to be the perfect answers, but I do want you to think about it before you call me. What it does, it's actually because they start to think about it.

Adri 18:37

Most of the time they don't even call you because they will find the solution by themselves. So you're buying for yourself freedom. But the thing which is very important when you set rules, you firstly, you as a rule setter you do need to follow up on everything and you do need to follow your own rules, because as soon as you step away from your systems or from your rules, your team going to think it's not that important, because Audrey doesn't follow the rules all the time, so I might can try not to follow the rules. So it's very important you know that you need to show to the team every single time you cannot drop the ball every single time what is the expectation, and you're going to be just as strict with yourself as strict you're going to be with your team members.

Jodie 19:35

Hey, I can attest to this. What was it? A couple of, about a month or so ago, we had new team members hey, I can attest to this. Just what was it? A couple of about a month or so ago? We had new team members join us and they were showing up on time and being very diligent and me being me, I wandered off and, like, made a coffee while I was still talking and thinking out loud or I had to, I think Bryn was at home, so I was kind of juggling Bryn while I was dealing with them. And then the next meeting and things like that, that team member started doing what I'd been doing and I was like whoa, what are you doing? That's not on. Do as I say, not as I do, honey. And unfortunately that old rule doesn't work in business. You you can't say that, especially with the younger generation. They'll tell you where to put it in your pipe and smoke it if you try and pull. That you know, do as I say, not as I do. So it does happen is that, even though we had set expectations about what our expectations were and had it very set out by me not following those rules within two meetings that the new team members were not following the rules, because I wasn't. So you do have to walk the walk. You can't just talk the talk, you've actually got to do it yourself.

Jodie 20:56

There was one other thing I wanted to mention. If you want to see that like systems work and it's just not BS that we're telling you about and it's just something that they all talk about, look at McDonald's. Mcdonald's, it's the perfect systemized business. Everyone from a 13-year-old that's working there through to the 60-year-old that's there, they all follow the same systems. They greet every client in the exact same manner. The service standard universally is generally the same. Everyone comments if it's not so we're programmed to know exactly how we're going to be treated, what the quality of the food is going to be offered. Would you like fries with that? It's systemized and it's the perfect example. It has stood the test of time and everyone wants to hire a kid that's worked at McDonald's because they're already programmed to know how to follow. Know how to follow and respect systems. That's my little again my little soapbox for today. Okay.

Adri 21:58

And it's so true. You know, and I really admire you. You know, like to admit that, you know, like, what happened in our business, because you know, many times people they don't step back and they don't think it was me, I was the one who dropped the ball and this why now we have this thing, what we need to fix aren't you kind, but are you forgetting?

Jodie 22:22

it was you that pointed out that it was my fault when I complained. You could give me a little kudos publicly and it's like no, actually, guys, it's okay, it wasn't me, it was like you pointed out to me. Well, what did I expect?

Adri 22:33

all right, but you had an open mindset about it. I was open to it. I didn't like it.

Jodie 22:37

I didn't like it, but I was open to it. I didn't like it. I didn't like it, but I was open to it. All right, tip number five trust yourself sooner.

Adri 22:46

So trusting yourself is very important because many times you know what happens. You're tiptoeing around for years and years because you don't trust yourself, you don't believe that you can achieve it or you can do it. Or because you don't trust yourself, you don't believe that you can achieve it or you can do it. Or because you don't have the knowledge but you don't have an awareness that knowledge can be purchased, can be invested in. You just stay in the same things and you don't trust yourself. So one thing what you need to understand, and everyone, we always can be better from what we are right now, today.

Adri 23:20

But then one thing which I really like and that's a quote from Jim Rohn, and just let me to read it. I just quickly find on Google. It is that we must all suffer one of two pains the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The pain of discipline or the pain of regret, and the difference is that discipline waits ounces and by regret will wait tons. So what is it?

Adri 23:48

It's actually very important for us to understand that. Don't do something you might going to regret three years down the road that we didn't do that one step or we didn't take the right turn instead of, you know, just staying where we are at. It's very important, even if you just move a little bit, but keep moving, keep processing. Don't stay where you are at just because you are confused.

Adri 24:17

Try to find solution, Look for solution, Look for people who know the answer. And the other thing is what I want to point out Make sure you actually look for solution or you ask your questions in the right place, Because on Facebook, so many times I can see people are asking other people who are struggling with the same mindset and same things and you don't get the answer how you can move out the situation. You get a validation that everyone else is the same and this is normal. So just be careful where you are looking for answers, because you must go above and you need to find people who already done what you want to do or who already figured it out, because they can help you, not people who are struggling with the same things.

Jodie 25:09

Also, this one is a bugbear of mine. I've got a lot of bugbears or buttbears or whatever. It is the things that make me cranky today People taking business advice from someone that's never owned a business or, if they have, it's not been a successful business, or that they don't know anything about the industry of the business that they're talking about. And I know that the person you're getting friend or family member or whatever it's a good intention, but it's coming from a place that they don't know what they're talking about. So, like I just said, ask the people that know what they're talking about and just because you don't like the answer, don't be afraid of the answer, because it's the answer you have to hear.

Jodie 25:51

Yeah, it's the same as Audrey telling me that it was my fault that the team member was off making a coffee while I was sitting there waiting. You know like it's sometimes you don't like hearing the truth, but you need to make and and finding that person. That is, if you're the smartest person in the room, you need to leave the room. Who was it the other day? May have been something on youtube or saying if you're the smartest person in the room, you need to leave the room and go to the next room where you're not the smartest, so that you can elevate yourself because you're just sounds. It sounds maybe harsher than what I mean, but when it comes to business, if you want to grow your business and you actually want to achieve something, you can't be the smartest person in the room talking about your business, unless it's an ego trip.

Adri 26:40

Totally and I totally agree.

Adri 26:43

Yeah, absolutely Don't look for perfection, because being a perfectionist never worked out for anyone and there's never a perfect moment, exactly Once you work too well to be, or to become, a perfectionist, or you are a perfectionist, you are limiting yourself so much. I used to be a perfectionist and it didn't work out too well for me, so I didn't make any steps until I mapped out absolutely everything with certainty. And you know it takes time until you undo all these things when you need to be. You know, perfect all the time and you believe you need to know perfect all the time, and you, you believe you need to be perfect all the time.

Adri 27:22

And it limited me because I missed so many opportunities because by the time I figured out how I'm going to go about it, that boat, that ship is already gone. You know, like I couldn't, couldn't catch it. So now I live by that, I give it a go for everything, and you know, like I put my hand up, yes, and then I'm going to figure out how to do it after, but I'm not going to miss anything anymore because it takes too long for me to figure out you know what to do or how to do it.

Jodie 27:52

There's also never the perfect time to do it. You know like, not only getting into that trap of being a perfectionist which I've never really had a problem with, falling into the trap of going, oh, now it's not the right time, I have to have all my ducks lined up in a row before I can do it. It's the same as when you're having kids. There's no perfect time, or very few people ever. It's never really a perfect time. You can always find an excuse why not? To do something. So I think, stop waiting for the perfect moment as well as stop trying to be perfect absolutely, and I think we had all our five learnings here.

Adri 28:33

That was all five. And I'm really curious about you know, like, if anyone could resonate with any of these things, what we learned, and if you do feel free to comment we read every single comment and we are very, very curious about you. Know other people's experience and maybe you can give us a couple other tips. You know, like, what you were hoping that you would have known before you started your business.

Jodie 29:04

All right guys At FocusGDT is our handle. You can catch us on the website. Backslash our links if you want to book a deep dive with myself, if you want to talk to Audrey about the leadership leadership we spoke about that in one of our other ones. Recap for today is to know your numbers, protect your mindset, get support, build systems and trust yourself. Oh yeah, no, that was five. I was counting. I forgot the thumb on the other people, guys.

Adri 29:33

That's, and we will see you at your next, our next podcast. See you, guys. Bye for now.

Jodie 29:40

Bye, bye.