Salon Success Secrets

Beauty Buddies – Building Bonds and Boosting Your Salon’s Success

• Lindsay Lowe & Jen Booth

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What if your salon could become a hub of empowerment and creativity, where every stylist and client feels truly valued and inspired? Join us as we unveil the transformative power of "Beauty Buddies" with our special guest, Lindsay, who brings firsthand insights into creating a supportive salon environment. Discover how simple changes, like experimenting with makeup techniques or exploring new lipstick shades, can not only elevate a stylist's appearance but also nurture a thriving community of support and collaboration. Learn how our unique approach fosters a culture of partnership beyond technical skills, ultimately enhancing both team morale and client satisfaction.

In this energizing episode, we explore how the "beauty buddy" mindset revolutionizes salon culture by prioritizing client transformation and teamwork. Dive into real-life success stories and practical techniques such as color and face shape analysis that boost confidence and foster informed consultations. We also share how regular beauty buddy sessions and initiatives like team yearbooks can create vibrant spaces of support and inspiration. For salon owners eager to elevate their business, we offer insights from "Think and Grow Rich as a Beauty Pro," including strategies to become a six-figure stylist. Embark on your journey to building beauty buddies and watch as your salon blossoms into a beacon of success.

Do you have a question for Blondes in Business: Luxury Beauty Business Podcast? Send a text or leave a voicemail at 855.650.3445 or send us an email to hello@thephdprogram.com. We would love to hear from you.
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Speaker 1:

Welcome to today's podcast of Beauty Buddies building bonds and boosting your salon success. We've got a really cool concept that Lindsay and I have used in our salons that we really want to share the strategy with you today that really creates a transformation in your space to really help revolutionize your culture and your client experience.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So just think what if your team and your clients felt so connected and supported that your salon became the go-to space for both incredible transformations and lasting relationships? If this sounds like something that piques your interest, stick around. Today we're going to dive in deep to. What does this look like, what does it mean for your team, what does it mean for your guests and you know, ultimately, what does it mean for your salon in the bottom line.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and so you're probably thinking, well, what the heck is a beauty buddy? And so when you think about beauty buddy, a beauty buddy is going to be a system that encourages collaboration, like connection support within your salon team, and extends that same energy to your clients, and so it's going to be about like having that connection point. You know it's going above, beyond those technical services, to create the culture of partnership, empowerment and transformation, because you know, when your team is connected, like, you feel the energy. We know that everything is energy. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. It can just change form, and so when energy is great in your space and people are working together like clients, feel that it makes your team earn more money, the company has more profit, and so this is just a great new opportunity to look at to really help collaborate and connect your team.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and so here's what's really cool about beauty buddies is that it's super easy to set up in your salon and, and really the the first focus is setting it up in your salon and so pairing up each person on your team to form, you know, a little beauty buddy, uh with each other.

Speaker 2:

So it's somebody that you know if you have multiple shifts a week, um, you know, find somebody that they at least work with together once. You know, maybe, somebody that they don't normally spend a lot of time with um on the team, because really what they're going to be doing is exploring ways that they can support each other, how they can collaborate with each other and also just give them ideas on how to enhance their inner and outer beauty. So truly, that's the whole purpose behind um, behind this beauty buddy system, is to just look for ways to add value to your partner's life. You know, and I think what's super cool about this is, you know, that's really truly what we're in the business of doing is adding value to our clients lives, but I think sometimes we forget it comes down to those really basic skills and understanding. You know a few ways to just look at somebody and enhance their beauty that can really make you feel incredible.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and so I love this.

Speaker 1:

And you know one thing, the reason, one of the reasons this came up in our salon is we were like you know, we really think about like dress to impress, not express, and we knew some members on our team needed some support in just making their look feel more luxury.

Speaker 1:

And so, shout out to my leadership team I think they might even came up with the name Beauty Buddies. I don't remember who did, but you know they're like why don't we pair, like Lindsay was saying, a beauty buddy together, so a less experienced and a new experienced stylist. And like let's do like a check-in every day before shift with your beauty buddy, so let's make sure your makeup at some point, let's give you some feedback on your outfit. And like it was so incredible for the next 30 days when we really measured the beauty buddy success, it was incredible to see how people started showing up different, how you know um, I know I think, lindsay, you might even tell me this story like one of your beauty buddies on your team, like the beauty buddy determined that their buddy was actually a spring or I can't remember what it was. Was it spring?

Speaker 2:

or yes, she was a spring and she was using, like a mauve um blush on her skin and you know her beauty buddy just said hey, have you ever thought about trying a coral blush? And it was like the transformation was huge on the team member. It was it was awesome because it was so simple yet so profound.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I love that. Another success story is we have a stylist that she was like I just put bronzer all over, and so we paired her with one of our, like expert makeup artists, and during that time, the makeup artist taught her which is a stylist as well how to contour, and so now she has a life skill that improves her life. So that's the entire purpose of having a beauty buddy is to, you know, dedicate that time for each member to give each other, and it doesn't be a full makeover, but just some feedback, and feedback from a form of love to help enhance their life.

Speaker 2:

You know, and there's so many different ways that we can do this, we forget you know how, like, just you know the direction of your curls, can, you know, enhance your face shape? And you know just simple little things like this, like really just looking at the person that's your beauty buddy and just you know giving them some feedback, some recommendations on. Hey, you know what, if you tried this and you know even, uh, trying a new lipstick color on, maybe something that's like out of their norm, to really elevate that look, because sometimes, you know, the reason why you've never worn a red lip is because you know, you didn't understand, like, hey, there's some orangey red lips that are great for warm undertones and there's some bluish red lips that are great for cool undertones. And the first time you try on one that works with your natural coloring, you might be like, wow, I love a red lip. And you know so.

Speaker 2:

There's just some cool things that happen when you intend to really help enhance somebody's beauty. You know, and when you dedicate that time to work one-on-one, it really does build so much trust within the team. Because you know, when you think about it, like when you, like Jen mentioned, when you have that life skill of learning how to contour, or learning, you know, that coral blush might enhance you a little bit more than mauve, just some different things like that. Like you remember who taught you that and you remember the experience that you had when you went through that transformation, and so truly you know we are in the business of being beauty buddies for all of our clients every day, and so when we work on elevating with each other first, what it does is set us up for an incredible amount of success behind the chair or the table.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So when you have that, I love that. You said that, because when you have beauty buddies on your team, that energy gets transferred, transferred over to the clients and then you get to become a beauty buddy for the client too. And so, you know, it's all about getting those personalized consultations. You know, looking at those color analysis, that's one thing we like to teach at Salon Business School. You know, doing skin tone analysis, face shapes. You know lifestyle considerations Like it's about creating that complete look for someone. You know help them from head to toe, because when you can really help someone gain confidence, like really, at the end of the day, that's what we sell. Like you know, they're going to transform their life. They're going to go out and do bigger and better things as well.

Speaker 1:

When I think about, you know, talking about being a beauty buddy for clients, I took my niece, who's five, to get her ears pierced. She's finally was like, oh, I'm ready to go, let's do it. And so, you know, when a five-year-old is ready to do it, you just do it. And so we went to a place called Rowan which was like a almost like a high-end piercing studio, and you know the the. It was just really incredible because I remember when I got my ears pierced it was like click, click, you're done, congratulations, your ears are pierced.

Speaker 1:

But it was like it was like an entire experience. It was like they were a beauty buddy to her. You know they had her name on a welcome board, you know they went through the entire process, they had a consultation with a five-year-old, and so like, yes, this piercing experience did cost me $159, but it's an experience you will never forget. Like I don't even remember my ear piercing experience because it wasn't like that, and so I think I just share that experience with you is like are we transferring that over to our clients in the salon space? Do we have, you know, the beauty buddies on board that are helping create their complete look? Just like in when she got her ears pierced, they showed her how to take care of her ears, and so it was just an experience that like, hey, if we're transferring that kind of energy, energy into the salon space, that can do nothing but increase our average ticket and increase our increase, our client retention. I mean it was $159 and we literally were there for 30 minutes.

Speaker 2:

So it was just, it was a really, it was a really incredible like learning opportunity. That's. That's an awesome story, jen, you know, and I I just think that there is so much that does just enhance everybody's life when you put in the beauty buddy system, you know, and I think another area that it really enhances is with clients. You know, when, when you do get more focused on um okay, how, how do I create um an even more enhanced like, pull out people's natural features, like all of the things, the DNA that makes them them and make it even better. If you know, because I think sometimes we get so in our heads about stuff like, even when we're mixing up a toner, we think we're here to cancel out color. Well, no, you're actually there to enhance what's happening and that's what we're there to do. You know, with our guests each day, you know I think another thing that happens is it can eliminate the fear of.

Speaker 2:

You know I'm if you've ever lived through the gray hair trend, you know you've been in the beauty business sometime over the last five to seven years. You know everybody coming in with box black color hair and being like, yeah, I want to have silver hair. So not gray, silver, but either or silver or gray. You know, and once upon a time that would be something that would like freak people out and they would say, oh my gosh, you know you can't do this or whatever it was. But when you, when you die, when you're, when you have on the thinking cap of being a beauty buddy, you know you can ask them. You know what is it that? You know, has you attracted to this look? And then you can go through that color analysis to see, because I remember I had a client one time who wanted to do that Um, and after asking her a few questions, we uncovered, like, hey, she's looking for, she wants like some sort of an extreme change.

Speaker 2:

She wants something that you know just makes her feel alive and fresh and like stand out. But when we did color analysis, we discovered that, hey, she's more of a spring and so if we put this silver or gray tone on her, it's not going to enhance her natural beauty, but what could really make her glow is to do like a rose gold, like a bright rose gold color. And so, you know, we took her to that really light strawberry color and she looked incredible and it really enhanced her natural look. And so you know that's the mindset of a beauty buddy is that you're looking for opportunities for people all the time instead of, like, just being an order taker and being worried about what it is that people are going to order up with their hair. Because, like you can really change that, change that conversation and really truly transform that guest, that client, right in front of you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I love that you said that, uh, lindsay, because it makes me think what being a beauty buddy is not, and it's not, you know, trying to conquer someone or trying to say, oh, you need to do this or you need to do that. And so I do think, like when you're setting up beauty buddies on your team and with you know, as you're going to be a beauty buddy to clients, is making sure that you're approaching everything with love, because we don't want to do things out of fear and we really want to, you know, have that transformation, like you were saying. And so, you know, having those conversations and training your team, I think that's the greatest gift that you can give them. Like, if you're going to be a beauty buddy to client, help them understand the why, help them understand how to do a color analysis, how to do a face shape analysis. All of that is going to help kind of gain their confidence and they will be more certain in doing that.

Speaker 1:

And you know, I have a new stylist on my team as well. They're like I don't know about this color analysis. It's new for them, but the most amazing part about it like, if you set up the context right, if you set up the right way in the consultation of the why behind why you're doing this for the client. The client gets enrolled too, and they can even tell what colors are best on them, and so I think it just really creates that collaboration and really brings out the beauty in all.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's incredible, you know, setting up that context of why you're doing things and really helping your team understand the why behind the beauty buddies and like what that mindset looks like. I love that you talked about that. So when you go to implement beauty buddies inside of your salon, just, you know, start small. You know, begin by pairing team members together and have them schedule beauty buddy sessions into their calendar. So for us, you know, it was like, hey, let's meet once a week and let's talk about some wins that we've had. Because you know it was like, hey, let's meet once a week and let's talk about some wins that we've had. Because you know, beauty is not just outside of us, it's also within us. So, share some wins that we've had. You know, anything you want to celebrate and then look for ways that we can enhance the beauty of another. And, you know, work with each other on the verbiage around it, you know, because it's not always going to feel natural in the beginning, um, if, if it's not something you're already implementing, but the more you practice with each other, the more it just becomes natural to have those conversations with each other. And so you know also, just, you know, make sure that you're celebrating the success of your team.

Speaker 2:

Like recognize your team members who are truly embodying that beauty buddy mindset. You know, whether it's like shouting them out um, if you have a group page or messaging system, or doing some sort of a reward during meetings, like just recognizing, like hey, that's really cool. And having them shout each other out too, you know, because it is really fun when they're like you know, so-and-so told me to use um coral blush instead of mob and it like totally transformed my look. And like just seeing that transformation and then helping them understand. Like, hey, that's what we get to do for our clients each day. Like, how lucky are we? People will love coming into the salon. They're so excited to see us and we just get to help them be even more beautiful than they already are.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, man, I just, I love being a beauty buddy so incredible and so like. If you're ready to, um, you know, really create that collaboration, that connection and that client loyalty, like, talk to talk to your leadership team about this, you know, get everyone set up. I love that we did photos in the back of the beauty buddies together, so they're, you know, all over the back room. I saw Lindsay and her yearbook that she did for your team. You even put it in your yearbook as the beauty buddies together, and so there's so many fun things that you can do with this and cause. It just really helps bring out the beauty in everyone.

Speaker 1:

And so we know that if you're ready to transform your salon into a place where clients and team members feel that value, they feel supported and inspired, you know, start setting up a beauty buddy today. That's going to be a great opportunity for you. And if you even want more insights and strategies, uh, check out our book think and grow. Uh, get rich as a beauty pro. Chapter nine, it dives a little deeper into this. So, salon owners, this is going to be an amazing book that you're going to want your team to read, because it's going to really teach them how to become that six figure stylist.

Speaker 2:

I love that. So remember success inside of this industry isn't just about hair or skin, it's about relationships. So start building beauty buddies and watch your business thrive.