Aesthetics Unscripted

Beauty Pressure: The Truth Aestheticians Face

• Kim Laudati

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 22:10

What really goes on behind the treatment room door — and how do you know you're in safe hands?

In Part 2 of Episode 2 of Aesthetics Unscripted, host Kim Laudati, co-host Angel Morton, and ITX aestheticians Monica and Melanie get into the conversations the industry rarely has out loud. They open up about the pressure aestheticians face to maintain "perfect" skin as their own professional calling card, the burnout that comes with rarely having time to receive the treatments they give, and why staff perks and continuing education matter more than most employers realize.

Then things get real. The team shares firsthand accounts of unethical spa practices — reused sheets and towels, drugstore products being swapped in during high-end facials, and dangerous double-dipping during waxing services. They break down how to spot red flags, what to look for in a reputable licensed provider, and why trusting your aesthetician matters more than chasing machine settings from a TikTok video.
If you've ever wondered whether the spa you're visiting is actually holding up to the standard you're paying for — this episode is essential listening.

SPEAKER_02

Does constantly being exposed to like the skincare, the beauty and everything like that, does that ever lead to moments of like self-doubt or anything about yourself? Like, oh my god, my skin is not that great, or I feel pressure, like I feel like I should be beautiful or something if I'm doing this. Do you ever have that feeling?

SPEAKER_01

Oh my god, that's me every day.

SPEAKER_02

Do you think this is something common, like everyone kind of goes through? Not everyone, but a lot of people go through in your field.

SPEAKER_01

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02

I think so.

SPEAKER_01

I feel like because we provide services, we do help like we held ourselves at a higher standard when it has to do with that. Um not only for that, just even knowing what products are out there, what's the big thing out there, which is why we always, you know, um Kim always provides us, I always say, with like our mini articles. We would call it like the news. Where she's always sending us the exactly where she's sending the uh listen, I get those too.

SPEAKER_02

I don't even work there. I've learned a lot. Thank you, Kim.

SPEAKER_01

It's more for us to keep ourselves, you know, updated with what's out there, what works, what's safer, um, in regards to what type of skin tone. No, not even skin tone, skin itself, um, when it has to do with Fitzpatrick, which is, you know, our what are we trying to target and everything else. Um, we like to keep it safe, but we like to give really good results in what we do, um, which is another good thing. Before we even put anything out in the market, we try it on ourselves. So we're literally the test dummies before everything comes out. So if it doesn't work for any of our skin, which we all have different skin types, um, skin color as well. If you want to see our ethnicity, and then just to see if it works for everybody or with who it would be best suited for in this.

SPEAKER_00

But yeah, but back to your question about personally, I definitely think that we have the pressure of, you know, if uh I get a pimple or if, you know, like an completely of the mentality that no one's perfect and we all break out, we all have bad skin days, we all have, you know, times when we don't know what's going on and suddenly our skin's not as glowy. Um, but I do, I personally do feel pressured to have pretty good skin because I think it's my also, you know, that's how patients get it. So trust me, it's like it's like my business card. Exactly. That was the word I was looking for. It's my business card. It's like, okay, uh, you know, am I gonna go to a doctor who is unhealthy and you know, is giving me advice on something but is unhealthy? Same with how I feel. Like again, I completely understand that for a lot of people they're also going through their skin journey and that also and when they're going through a like, I don't know, uh an acne situation or whatever, even as a provider, that also informs them on how to um help you. So I think it's very valuable, but I do feel the pressure of not having that. So when it happens, it definitely can be hard.

SPEAKER_04

Right. And people, I think patients-wise, especially are always shocked when they get to know us because they're always um just like the other day, right? Um new patient walking out the door talking to us about something completely outside of skincare and just pauses and looks at both of us and is like, amazing skin. Or they'll they always look at Monica. You're you have amazing skin, but they don't realize until they get to know us that it has been a painful journey for every one of us at a certain point in life, and we work hard at it. I'm a little upset with our industry because there's been a big trend that happened with I saw it happening across the board in medical aesthetics before the pandemic. So I can't use the pandemic as an excuse where a lot of employers are no longer providing complimentary treatments to their staff. They're no longer providing complimentary products to their staff, yet your staff is expected to fully understand these treatments, fully understand the products, who they're good for, how do they work, who they're not good for, which is actually more important than who they're good for. Um, to not understand any of this and to penalize your staff by making them pay to get these treatments, like none of this makes any sense to me. So um, when we are feeling like not so glowy that day, when there's time on the schedule, I'm like, don't ask me, just put yourselves on the schedule, treat each other, and um, you know, like do what you have to do because because none of this is what we all look like every day. You know, we all work at it, it's a process.

SPEAKER_02

And with the things that you do that that you perform on people like treatments, do you ever like, as you're doing the treatment, like be jealous of that person? Like, damn, I wish I was getting this at that moment. Every day, all the days. Every hour of the day. We know you guys all can do pretty much everything amongst the three of you, but you don't always have time to do it to each other. You can't do it to yourself, or do you?

SPEAKER_01

We were just oh all the time. We were just talking about that the other day, that sometimes it would it's crazy that we work in this industry and because of our time, sometimes you don't even have time to do treatments. You know, we do it at home, but like to have an actual service, it's very difficult sometimes because you're literally working, working, working, then we're out the door.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, I used to get facials every month before I became an esthetician. That's amazing. Now it's like, I don't like when I can get Mal and to like convince her to like, okay, now let's do it. Uh that's you know, it doesn't happen that often. So every time I have a patient in front of me, I'm like, I wish I was you. So it's exactly every hour of every day.

SPEAKER_04

And I can confess that um, out of all the equipment that we have in our office, and it's a plethora, including Soma Cell, uh, I bought, I personally purchased the mild hyperbaric oxygen therapy chamber. We have a step-in chamber, by the way. As a side note, it's not a claustrophobic crawl-in tube. It's a step-in where you sit in a nice, comfortable, reclining chair. So I bought that um specifically just for myself and the staff.

SPEAKER_03

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_04

And in the year and a half that we've been in this brand new office that we built out in the Columbus Circle area, I can count on two hands how often I've personally been in it. And I'm sure that you both might both agree, even though I'm always on you, like get in the chamber when you have time, get in the chamber when you have time.

SPEAKER_02

How many times have you been in there?

SPEAKER_01

Me, I would say maybe like four times, probably. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And you? Um maybe like five or six. Okay. I was there once. Actually, I think it put me in.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. The thing is, for me, I it like I can't sit still for too long. So I love it because when I'm there, I knock out. But if I have things in my mind that I have to do, like if we have to do something in the office, I prefer to do that until Kim tells me, get in there. So that's like, yes, I'm going.

SPEAKER_02

Now, question. I know in my industry, as I'm doing hair, um, these things pop in my head. Like, does your mind wander when you're doing certain treatments? Because it's so relaxing. No, never. Never? Never.

SPEAKER_00

It depends. If it's a treatment where you really have to be, you know, paying attention to like the number of passes, or like if it's very like like a laser, I'm my mind's not wandering off one laser because you I definitely want my mind to be focused on it. But if I'm giving someone like a nice facial massage, oh wow, I'm like almost falling asleep sometimes. Yeah, sometimes I'm so relaxed by the way I'm doing it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

If the the music or the melody goes in tune with the what you're doing, you forget.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, so I'll bring it back a little bit because you're gonna laugh. Um, because I know this has happened to all of us. With um my first signature um trademarked facial lamenifique going back to 2010. Uh, this was a six-step process that was very forward at the time. Like the the famous facials at the time for non-surgical facelifting were three steps from one famous esthetician and four steps from another. And then I took it to six steps and in my own process. And with uh two ultrasound handheld devices, not ultrasonic, they're actually real um medical devices that are safe to use for the surface of the skin. We use two, and you're working around the face, and it would just kind of be in time to the music, and you can definitely end up being like nodding out in the zone.

SPEAKER_03

You're like hypnotizing yourself.

SPEAKER_04

So I don't know about you, but I can't count now. I can't a bazillion times probably. I was just like putting myself into a trance doing that.

SPEAKER_02

And then just side note, because I love music and everything like that, and I tend to do this. Do you start going to the beat of the music sometimes when you're doing the massage? Yeah. Does that happen like often or just here and there?

SPEAKER_00

Well, it depends what the music is, but if it's like a right, yeah. For sure. For sure.

SPEAKER_04

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00

And sometimes, oh actually, sometimes if the music is great and it's upbeat or whatever, but you're performing a treatment that should be slow, you have to remind yourself to go slower.

SPEAKER_01

Let me just remind everybody when we say like up-be and everything, it's not necessarily your typical music. Right. Talking about like spa light melody.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, it's a little extra piano key in there. Right.

SPEAKER_01

So for us, that's like work music. When I and I tell my sister all the time, I'm like, you put that, I'm not falling asleep. You could put like a heavy metal, I'll probably knock out right away. Because for me, that makes me like in tune to want to work right away. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, for us, spa music is what we're talking about with the beat and everything, not necessarily like your typical pop.

SPEAKER_05

You good with the pressure? Perfect. That's the beat right there.

SPEAKER_04

So, you know what I wanted to talk about a little bit to give the viewers an inside um look at uh like why do we toot our own horn a little bit and why aesthetics unscripted, right? Because we want to be raw and real and we want to just talk about the industry and not just skincare, because aesthetics, you know, we're talking wellness, we're talking longevity. So we want to just be honest and be able to help people debunk, there's a bazillion products out there, you uh there's a million different and millions of different ingredients, there's different machines, you know. So to get here, to come and join us here on the podcast and learn about different things, uh, that's to us is the most valuable message that we want to get across. We can share some experiences that we've all had. Like in my years, the one that sticks out the most to me as an employee prior to opening up on my own was at a very famous establishment at the time. Um, the bed had luxurious sheets and a very luxurious, um, full-length, like extra long bath towel. And the patients would come in and say, you know, like, wow, this is really, really nice. It's very luxurious. So I wonder where this was purchased because it's like Turkish cotton that I've never seen before, whatever, whatever, Egyptian cotton, whatever they thought it was. But the truth behind the matter was that we were not allowed to put that towel in the laundry after the patient unless you turned it twice.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_04

Unless the patient smelled of body odor or had heavy perfume, you could change the top sheet. You did not change the bottom sheet, and you turned the towel, the patient one turn it, patient one turn it, patient one turn it, patient one turn it. So you know, if you get in a pinch, I mean, I hate to say, but if you get in a pinch and you flipped maybe your fitted sheet the other way or something, because there was a lack of was it no sheet or whatever, because you ran out of laundry. But to turn a towel that many times to me was always shocking.

SPEAKER_02

Now, were experiences like that what led you to be the way that you are today with your business and make sure, like, once it's like touched, you're washing it and everything and being so thorough with all right, right.

SPEAKER_04

And then there was another thing um from that same establishment that I had shared with you guys um when you both came on board, was that we had a very extremely high-end exclusive French line. And when the back bark, the professional products that were actually using on you that you're paying a couple hundred dollars for that facial service would run out. We were sent downstairs to go to the local drugstore to get a very generic like acetophil cleanser or moisturizer or whatever to use on those same patients paying a couple hundred dollars for that service. And I was just I was so shocked. I felt so naive because this was second career for me. I wasn't 19 years old or 18 years old coming out of high school, you know what I mean? I was like, I can't believe this kind of stuff happens. And the more I would talk to certain people in the industry that I respected, the more they had the same kind of stories to share. So it's no wonder why a lot of us ended up going off on our own. What did you ever run into in the past without naming names?

SPEAKER_01

I mean, me personally as a client, it happened to me. We went, I went actually with my cousin. She wanted to get waxed. This is more before I even started doing laser or anything like that. I think I did, I started doing You mean laser hair removal. Yeah. Um, I started doing laser hair removal on my underarms first, and then she just wanted to go waxing. And I was like, fine, let's go. Um I was like, you know what? Let me get my legs done since I'm already here and everything. And I booked with her. The place is very nice, you can tell it's clean and everything until you walk into the room. So it's one of those the place itself is one of those um that has like a built-in room, like they made their own room out of like a one like a studio type of thing. Yeah. And I once I started working in the industry, that's one of my things. Like I look at everything, I listen to everything, I look at the bottles. It's like something that I can't stop anymore.

SPEAKER_03

Right.

SPEAKER_01

Sometimes I don't know if I see faces too. So um we're uh she's getting done, she got her whatever she needed to do, and then I don't hear no like taking sheets off or anything, like nothing, no ripping off paper or anything. So I go in and I was like, Oh, you know, I guess it's more out of like force of habit. I was like, Oh, do you need me to step outside for you to change the room or anything? And she literally said to me, She's like, Oh, don't worry, you guys are family. And I go, Yeah, we're family. But we're not that, you know, we're family, but no, we're family that don't share towels. So I was like, oh, you know, I didn't want to make her feel bad or anything. So I was like, Oh, you want that? I'm like, oh my God. I literally got lasered. I started doing laser, and they I just remembered that they told me that I cannot wax. It's literally what I said to her. She's like, Oh, I was like, I got it done four weeks ago. I'm doing two weeks later. You know, I cannot wax. That's one of the things. No sun exposure, no waxing. And she's like, Oh, do you want to get something else? I was like, No, it's fine. It was just my legs. I don't have hair anywhere else. And then I just walked out. My cousin's like, I'm like, no. I was like, I love you, but no.

SPEAKER_04

Especially for waxing, because it's a huge sanitary issue. You know, you don't have to clear the whole room, no double dipping on the sticks. Oh, we've had interviews. Uh, you might have actually conducted some of those interviews in the past, um, where we would interview for new aestheticians and they were more new hires to take on um more day spa type of treatments at the time. And there would be people at, you know, aestheticians at their interviews talking about uh a simple answer to a question of um how many sticks do you usually think you're gonna use for this body part? And they're like, Oh, I can I'll save you lots of bunny. I'll have one stick for the whole body. And we're like, no, thank you. Ew, no, because you know, when you're double dip, every time you stick that stick back in, now you've contaminated the entire bottle of um the container of wax, and everything you touch is going to be contaminated. So maybe that doesn't bother some people mentally because they're thinking, well, it's my contamination. But that wax container is big and it will cover at least, you know, sometimes 50 patients or more. Yeah. How many dead skin cells and somebody else's hair do you want to share it? Some people when you're tearing the hair out to you.

SPEAKER_00

Well no, just go to a clean place.

SPEAKER_04

Right, right. I mean, places like that, that can be sneevy, you know. So you have to make sure as a patient, you have to do your diligence, like Monica said, you have to, and I mean, like Melanie said, you have to look around and uh pay attention to containers. And does this place look legitimate? Because, you know, if you walk in, for example, as a wax patient, and the container looks good, like you don't see hairs in it or anything, but there's like one stick, this is a warning sign.

SPEAKER_02

That is also right.

SPEAKER_04

There should be many sticks, not just one stick. So, anyway, so that's some of our ew heck stories.

SPEAKER_00

Luckily, we don't wax IT. I hate waxing.

SPEAKER_02

And what do you do offer instead of waxing there? That you do laser hair removal. Laser hair removal. And is that for everywhere or anywhere? Places that you don't do?

SPEAKER_04

Had to tell, we do everything.

SPEAKER_02

Wow, you hear that? Have to tell people.

SPEAKER_04

So, Monica, did you have any horror stories of like No?

SPEAKER_00

I don't think I have any crazy stories like that.

SPEAKER_04

That's great. That's great.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, luckily. Exactly. So I don't know that I would last them to industry if I did.

SPEAKER_04

Right, because we don't want to scare patients away, but we're just saying no matter what you're doing as a patient, when it comes to safety and cleanliness.

SPEAKER_02

And maybe not even just the treatment, maybe the people that are doing it for you as well.

SPEAKER_00

But also, I think, yes, I agree. And also don't get overwhelmed. There's so much information, there's so much thing, things out there. You know, as long as you're going to a reputable place that you know that we are licensed, you know that maybe a friend referred you and had a good experience already. So it's, you know, word of mouth, it's always good. They had a good result, and you can trust them, and you meet with us, or whoever you're going to be working with, all that is important. But also, I think a big issue that I find nowadays is that patients come in with so much information, oftentimes wrong information, and they overread and over like they just go a little bit overboard with the amount of things that they see online, and that also doesn't help either.

SPEAKER_02

I was gonna say, is it because they think they're the expert at that point? Like, have you ever been corrected while you were doing a service on someone? Oh my god, yes.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, some patients think that they because they saw an influencer do this or that or use this or use that, then they think that that's the right, the right thing. And I think, I mean, I agree with what Kim was saying of do your research, go to a place that's reputable, make sure that it's clean, that they know what they're doing. But once you find that, let them, let us be the professionals and guide you through it. Yes. Um, because, you know, of course there's things that maybe we don't know that you're telling us, oh, I I do this, like I react this and that. Of course, if I didn't know that, then I wouldn't be able to help you. But those things we want to know. But, you know, if you came in for a microneedling and when you're here at the clinic, we see your skin and we're like, you know what? I don't think microneedling is the right treatment for you today. I think today maybe we do a hydrofacial or whatever it is based on your concerns or based on what I'm seeing. Hopefully, patients can trust us and allow us to do what we do, which is skin care. And I think that sometimes when they come with too much information, they don't let us do that.

SPEAKER_04

Right, that's true. Um, one of my biggest peeves is when a patient, a new patient, will ask you, What's the settings on that machine? They're on the table already, they're on the treatment bed, and then they'll like, while you're at the beginning or even the middle or the end of the treatment, they're like, What are the settings? And my golden rule is we don't discuss settings with you. You're not a professional.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

So I don't care how much information at that level that you've pulled off the internet. Like, we are wildly educated and continually educated every single year on all these different advancements from every single machine company. So maybe you wrote down your settings from another establishment from what two years ago? And that could be a completely different machine, be a completely outdated machine, it could be a brand new machine, maybe that has different settings, and our machine's two years old. It's not technically old, but it's maybe possibly different settings.

SPEAKER_00

Like just changed. Yeah, or the provider who's doing it works with different settings to achieve the results for one.

SPEAKER_04

Right. Exactly. I'm not gonna go to a neurosurgeon and try to tell them how they're doing their job. I'm going to have questions and I'm gonna have a certain level of education to understand basics for the process of whatever it is I'm going in for, but I'm not gonna tell you how to operate on my brain. Right. You know, we're gonna hand that off to the expert, and I'm gonna stay in my lane, and I'm gonna let you stay in your lane. And it's very important.

SPEAKER_00

And I think we appreciate like feedback of like, oh, this is feeling this way, or this last time I felt it more, or I felt it less, or you know, those things, of course, we wanna know. Um, but it's not to tell us, you know, do this setting or do it this way. I think that's not usually helpful.

SPEAKER_04

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02

Do you guys get pissed off at like TikTok influencers and stuff for all the information that they're giving out there? Do Do people ever come in and say, like, I saw this on TikTok or, you know, I saw this online that you should be doing this for your skin and they really shouldn't be?