How to Run a Profitable Salon | Real Owner Tips & Salon Management Software

welcome everyone wanted to start off we had four business owners that we're going to attend today one of them last minute was not able to attend if she is able to join in she will during our webinar but we're going to start today thank you for everyone for joining us um i'm your host andrea miller i am the director of marketing for the day smart beauty brands and i've been looking forward to this conversation for a while these three people have uh that i have with me today have built something truly special and they did it on their own terms. What they also have in common is that they all use DaySmart Salon to run and empower their business. So today we're going to pull back the curtain, talk about what it actually takes to build a business that lasts, the wins, the hard lessons, the burnout, the breakthroughs, all of it. One thing before we start though, this is meant to be an open and interactive webinar. So if you have questions at any point drop them in the chat i'll keep an eye throughout the event on when questions are submitted so if you see me looking back and forth i'm running those on a separate screen and i will get to as many of them as i can uh throughout throughout the event so let's get into it i'd first like to introduce our panelists first we have camille clifford camille is the owner of cleopatra's secret a permanent makeup studio where she has built a reputation not just for stunning results but for genuine connections and a client first experience that turns appointments into lasting relationships she's made her unique personality her biggest business superpower and she uses day smart salon to keep everything running behind the scenes camille welcome thank you for joining us and then we have pamela and gino benson co-owners of eden organics in the heart of san diego here's a fun fact the average salon lifespan is just three to five years pamela and gino have been salon owners for more than 30 years and it's still going strong and they use day smart salon power their business as well so thank you for joining welcome pamela and gino thank you thank you so before we get into the real stuff i want to start with something that might be i don't know if it's uncomfortable to answer but in the best possible way we have out of all the owners here i'm going to ask each of you um who bet you've been through so much but i'm sure you have all one thing in common you've built something that lasts so i want to ask all four of you that or i'm sorry all three of you this and um i'll start with camille for the answer if you don't mind but looking back what is the one belief you held on day one of your business that you have since completely let go of i have let go of basically um what i have to do for my taxes or anything like that or any of my advertising and stuff like that i've just kind of let that go um i have somebody else managing that and taking care of that for me so that takes a lot of burden off of me so she just runs all my ads and things like that that's helped me a lot that's kind of nice yeah get all of that off your plate not have to think about so and pamela and gino from day one um what is one thing that you've completely let go of one belief or or thing could i um say uh buongiorno to my friend in italy stefano yes i was gonna actually say we can't change the final your son of nato de napoli um but i think failure i don't i think sometimes we spend too much time in thinking about the problem with success i think success just happens if you do the right things but i spent a lot of time and worrying about that in my early years yeah i i think i hear from a lot of business owners when i do these webinars and things too just you know sometimes it's hard to sleep at night so letting go of that worry and just really enjoying the experience i'm sure it's very important yeah yeah and i'll chime in just from a husband wife perspective being that you know, it's got, you've got two people at the helm. I let go of the fact that we were going to get along during this process. Just agreed not to get along and that would be okay. It was okay not to get along. And the beauty in that is that you have two different perspectives. Yes. You get to really feed off each other and you learn eventually that that's a really good place to be and you're still together so i mean hey you know as long as pam as long as pam gets to be right we're fine oh my gosh you guys all right well so moving on from that so i think the hard part um i think with service professionals sorry you know the craft you know what you're doing running the business but having to still work behind the chair or work with clients tends to be a hard part for a lot of business owners so i want to talk about the foundation and the idea of working on your business versus working in your business so we often talk about the differences between those so you know what it means you know i'm working in the chair or i'm sorry i'm working in the business with clients but i also still have all this paperwork or all this other work on the side to do sometimes we hand that off to other people some of us uh independent service advisors have to manage it on their own but i'll start with you gino on this what was the hardest shift you had to make personally to stop working in your business and start working on your business i have pam everybody needs a pam and pam um does a lot of the background stuff to be truthful about it her and i will talk about like right now we have signage to go up we have some cabinetry and sort of i'll nudge pam to you know kind of like hey let's get this going but she mostly does it so i have an unfair advantage in that way sorry camille that's okay i am i do have one actually oh you do you know my advertising lady is amazing i got her a year and a half ago and when i went from desktop version from slana to day smart to the um the cloud cloud it is you know she's helped me a lot get we've done a lot of cleanup and a lot of work lot of stuff and she's nice because i'm able to bounce things off of her so it's like she's not like this stuff my advertising lady she's also like like your therapist you know right like you have somebody i can talk to or she's like camille no or rain it back or whatever so yeah it's really nice you know so that's what's kind of helped you know um just finding your right element you know what you want in your shop and actually what you really want to do yeah i think one of the things that i would um you can't it's hard to do it alone isn't it camille i mean you have to have like a support system a support system yeah otherwise it's just like overwhelming it is and i've got i pretty much did it by myself you know and chased after children and stuff like that but a year ago i just decided i needed some help and i found a wonderful you know advertising lady that just doesn't advertise i mean she had no idea i worked with slawn iris you know on the desktop for quite a while but she actually has learned it she knows it so you know i don't have to do anything you know she sends out my emails what's the specialist for the month or whatever or you know stuff like that so that's kind of nice yeah that actually so the answer really is the support system whatever that may be yeah it is i think that's important yeah well before i hop to the next question then i want to talk about financial habits but one you guys know we got another shout out from buffalo new york so no questions yet but we've got italy and new york shouting out to us so we're on the other side of the world from buffalo yeah yes so um so let's get into this so pamela i'm gonna start with you on this one because i i've chatted with you about this before so i want to start with you here we've heard from so many business owners that managing money is their number one stressor so what is one financial habit or system you put in place that made a positive impact sorry on managing your finances and taking the stress out of it the first thing that comes to mind is uh quickbooks to be honest with you i mean it's been a lifesaver as far as being able to see what you know the business does as opposed to what the personal does and not intermingling them and we have another business also so it's really important i think in managing finances to have um that you know um you know to have something solid like that because i think in this industry we get to be you know we're i mean i'm a licensed hairdresser as well but we get into that creative mode and personally i'm not crazy about that part of the business but the way gino and i have developed over the years someone has to manage that aspect of the business and so that ended up being me which was fine because it gave me a perspective of of how important that part of the financial part and and knowing your numbers and knowing how to move forward is and having enough capital to do it too yeah yeah well gino's lucky to have you so he is camille do you have any any feedback on this as well because i know he started i didn't have any that i did everything on longhand because i didn't take have a business or anything stuff like that so i thought i had support with that kind of stuff and everything was on longhand when i did it but um i found a lady that's um you know just not too far away and she's helping people in idaho with um small businesses or whatever and get that tackled and stuff like that and find out exactly how much it's costing and make sure you're charging the correct amount exactly and that really honestly opened my eyes of you know how much exactly a needle cost for my permanent makeup or the ink or how much this is and you know i i was always asked but i never was taught so even taking a small business class and stuff like that is i think is beneficial so yeah that kind of stuff but i think you know that's been helping me and working me but i just started that so it's like you know i you know just kind of things and moving forward so it's been kind of nice oh nice that those are all great i mean all valuable information here one thing i wanted to mention our fourth panelist uh was having technical errors and she has joined as a audience member we can't see her she cannot speak she can only type in the chat but her name is jenna jenna was going to join us today she's a solo stylist that owns cush hair studio on davenport iowa um she her story is really about determination staying true to herself and building client relationships that stand the test of time so she built a thriving salon single-handedly and uses stay smart as well jenna welcome thanks for joining us what i'm going to ask you to do jenna if you have an answer to something that we're asking if you don't mind typing in we would love your feedback and i'll share it for you so um we're just gonna we're just gonna work in that manner today so moving on from financial which by the way day smart slime does integrate with quickbooks um yeah yeah which i need to talk to you about yep possibly not me but possibly our support team oh come on you have it all i try guys i try all right so let's go with what to automate um and what to hand off i know we talked about this a little already because it sounds like you guys have already done that so this could be a repetitive question but maybe we can dig into this a little more camille i'll start with you because you did everything on your own for a while and then just brought on somebody a year ago so for those in our audience who feel overwhelmed um when it comes to managing business and working with clients what's the first thing you suggest automating or handing off to somebody so that you're able to focus on your work the most so so when you did this what was the very first thing or why why did you hire her what was it that you just knew you had to get off your plate well you know i've been in business 23 years and when covet hit my business just tanked because of i may live like in a farming community type of thing you know and so i had to rebuild and so i needed some help to get myself back up there and everything um basically what i handed off is she helped me get on the back office and um she helped me with all the paperwork so i can send that to my clients and it's all done so when they come into my salon i don't have to worry about the paperwork being filled out or anything i can already look at their things find out more information about them or whatever things that I need to look for them at that between, you know, the spa side or my permanent makeup side. And then I can look at them and that kind of stuff. And then she takes and sends all my emails out for me. So people know everything. So I don't have to worry about that. So if there's a technical difficulty, she deals with that for me. So I don't have to, so I can worry about my clients when they walk in the door, it's all about them not filling out their paperwork or doing any that stuff it's all hands-on and visiting with them exactly what they want or what they're really here for that's nice yeah okay wonderful and then pamela do you know do you have anything that you want to elaborate on with this i would say that um along with camille um that there's the we have our clients at least when the new you know when people come in they come in through our website through day smart and they fill out that request and appointment form and so a lot of them i get so much information off that but the beauty of that is it it's the ease of it feeding right into the database so i i've not quite gotten to the point yet where i allow them to book their own appointments because i'd like to be in control of that also exactly well and you want to make sure you make the most of your hours in the day right so you want to make sure it goes top to bottom or bottom to top when you're booking or just outside of office stuff you know what i'm saying grandkids and your personal time and all the stuff i want to be able to control that because you know the calendar doesn't sync with my other calendar so i want to make sure i you know i forgot to put that i went to lunch with my girlfriend and it took longer you know or whatever you know that kind of stuff you know so yeah i like i like to be in control of my time right but everything else pretty much go yeah so and that's what day smart helps do as you do that it just makes that system smooth well that and your appointment times aren't as long because that you know filling out that paperwork takes sometimes 15 minutes to fill out now i have 15 minutes to give to them if i schedule that whole hour so the that the paperwork you know is done and then i can look at it before they come in so that's what's really nice yeah exactly and i think that's the beauty of day day smart actually they i think that's the beauty of day smart they think they consolidate a lot of the uh the time that it would normally take i think we spent some time on the film thinking back to when we would write down our clients on a piece of paper and have to follow up by phone and all of that now is done directly which saves a ton of time and effort yeah or if that you haven't seen them for such a long time the computer already knows that they need to refill out that paperwork you know and stuff like that you don't have to or you don't have to do in the filing cabinet and you misfiled it because that and you don't have to pay and now it's you know go basically paperless and stuff like that so you don't have to that's an extra expense you don't have to pay for is paper you know and that makes it nice you know or if they don't then that's okay you know my older clients sometimes don't quite know how to work their computers or their phones so they can come in and i help them but i already know that i need to help usually the older people to do that so i kind of know that but yeah yeah well it's definitely great to hear that you guys have found that day smart salon has helped you so much um you know sharing your business tips i um am happy to hear that we solve some of these that's why i moved from the desktop to the cloud because it is it offers a lot more stuff for me to do that i don't have to i can add to my clients more than you know waiting for them to fill out the paperwork or whatever you know and stuff so yeah well and jenna just chimed in thank you jenna we're just day sparks getting all the compliments today thank you all she said she wouldn't survive without day smart so that makes me happy to hear i i agree with you guys so online booking is is a tough one because um yeah you lose that control but i think that's one great thing too um i wish jenna jenna if you have anything to chime in about it that'd be great because i think you use it often um you know with the request option because we know like it's scary to use so we make sure you know they can request the appointment you guys can approve it we don't want just an appointment popping up in your books later in the day just randomly out of the blue so um there are ways to use it but it is it is a scary feature to use um but anyhow back to back to that um just all the things you guys are saying is so great in the forms and all of that so i want to dig in now though too let's move along a little bit to reducing chaos so every service business um deals with difficult personalities mismatched expectations and miscommunications so with or i'm sorry what is one policy rule or mindset shift that dramatically reduce the chaos the that you know and a client or employees or difficult personalities can cause for your business um camille i'll start with you on this one um and then i'd really like both of you to chime in here but okay um my mindset is is that um basically i just greet them with a happy smiley face always and you know and then i just kind of take it from there um usually my clients are very stressed out when they walk in the door um because i do a lot of permanent makeup so that's a lot of eyebrows especially eyeliner is probably the worst you know and just try to keep it happy bubbly and keep it very light you know and that seems to help you know um sometimes i have those ocd people that just want what they want and that's fine but i've had to learn myself is just to take a deep breath and just kind of like let them vent or whatever and don't take it personally because that's their personality and just kind of go from there um and i try to keep my shop um very energetically very positive and everything and just keep it very um just very very light and everything so they have a very good place and they feel comfortable coming into my shop is what i try to do so i don't really have too many in the 23 years i haven't had really too many angry people you know um and just try to you know figure out right at the beginning and make it all about them and that seems to help a lot it sounds so welcoming yeah yeah um yeah i i really agree with what camille just said i mean the energy that you set for your salon is it comes from you and if you stay i mean generally i don't have problems with clients i think largely because i don't recognize the problems and right all of it is good you know they're coming in they're wanting to spend money with me and all of it is is you know is it positive to me so when i let go of that that resistance oh this person's a nudge or this person's going to be a pain in the bug today once you let go of that everything's fine yeah yeah and like we figure out that's the personality you just let them go and it's like you know they're just like oh you know wait a minute i was like oh that's your pro whatever and just laughing giggles but that's my personality i'm a happy bubbly and everything personality you know i get in trouble for people telling me you can't be happy all the time and i'm like sure you can why not yeah i i that's why i you know i was like okay i don't need to be your friend no more but you know what i'm very happy i always get called grandma you're embarrassing me and i said yes oh i'm the one that skips in the grocery store by the way you know yeah yeah i'll add to that that when we first got into the industry and you know you're hungry to build your business so we would take anybody right and we're not in that place now you know where you can, when someone calls or I'm dealing with somebody, I can pretty much pick up on if they're a good fit for us. So right now, the lens and the perspective that we use is, are they a good fit for what we're doing? Yeah. And that's my screener. Yeah, I am, I am, because I have no problem saying no to people. If it's not because I wanna, I'm being mean, but because it's just not a good fit for what we're doing. I can tell. You don't need negative energy in your spot. you know yeah that's not what we're about we're supposed to be helping you know i love it when i put on the eyeliner and then they come back and do their brows and their lights just like i said yeah look how great that is you know and how beautiful it is you know and it's like when i put on eyebrows and i'm tattooing them on you know yeah i tell people is like i don't want to you know it's you can't justify my work because they're happy with it they love it and if i do something else on they wouldn't like it you know it's not because it's it's something that they love and as long as they love you because they're my billboard you know they're my advertising and as long as somebody's happy with it that's what they do so you know that's a great question by lisa i don't know if you've seen that on the screen i did i was about to no you want to ask it yeah so what we've distilled it down is me i i've had big salons uh where i've experienced just that people you know you you spend a lot of time uh explain what you're answering real quick our audience can't see the question so let me ask it real quick so the question is one thing we struggle with is building new employees then they leave to rent the problem is um you know they can access all of their salon contacts and just take them with them so basically trying to take the salon's clients and not their personal clients as well is what is an issue they're having at least so go ahead i i you know the solution for for me has been to have a one to two chair salon and uh i you know this is a problem in california you build people's business and they decide to go rent a booth and we've tried both sides of that um the that thing and you know the solution for me was uh keep it small keep it off which is i mean i know it sounds like a compromise but it's worked out for us right agreed yeah small we feel is um and we've done every lisa we're addressing your question um every we've done every model pretty much that um the industry has and um employees was probably one of the most challenging because of exactly what you're saying a hundred percent right and there and the beauty is in that i guess or our thinking is okay you know how do you deal with that right if i were if i were young and i were going to put a group of salons together i would make them small and i'd make a lot of them because i i don't think people are the the big tends to get chaotic and you tend to get like little tribes and pretty soon um i didn't all that investment is uh goes out the door and so it's hard to fight that yeah yeah clicky you get too many people you know it gets clicky yeah you know they get groups it's almost like you know it's like um what's the word i'm looking for it's more like people you know they just are in groups you know and everybody's always somebody's been left out and somebody's feelings are getting hurt you know like i said it's been weird i've tried to um build and rent out stations and i've decided i just need to be by myself yeah and one more one more thing for lisa lisa if you can begin to take a step back away from it and because it creates a lot of anxiety on how to deal with that but step back from it and just see what you can do to start to condense things because small is powerful it really is you'll watch your numbers grow when you have like possibly maybe one or two that totally believe in what you're doing you can you know you can really make a powerful salon with that we've owned three um salons where they had um 30 people or more oh wow and none of them made money like our two salons that were small yeah so you and and part of it too is quality of life do you want to spend a lot of time putting out fires trying to talk people into being faithful to you and and loyal or do you want to just live your life the best way you can it's up to each person what they want to do but i found having big salons was really frustrating and in the end not very profitable it's very interesting those are all great answers and i apologize everyone you can see the chat i did not know that i thought you could but thank you guys those were that's great advice i think um i've even read about this challenge just in various beauty articles it seems to be a very common challenge across the board for business owners so that's great advice from all of you um and thanks lisa for posing that question uh so let's move on then unless anyone has anything else to elaborate on that because it is a hot topic um but i don't see any other questions coming in so let's move on to protecting your energy uh this kind of goes hand in hand with what you talked about uh just before this um you know this work is physically and emotionally exhausting so how do each of you protect your energy and what does that look like for you and and gino or pamela do you want to start on this one but i'd love for both of you to share yeah okay gina well for me i i um i work out i uh give so much to this salon i think it's just balance life balance um i don't feel any more like there's a whole lot of stress in the business so for me it's just uh a joy drink mountain dew all right sorry i shouldn't have laughed out loud like that but i read that i went oh my gosh how did they know mine is dr pepper but that's okay but anyways thanks jenna jenna camille how about you do you have anything that you do specifically especially i i'm i'm an energy worker i don't know if anybody knows what that is but i'm an energy worker a light worker i do all that stuff and i'm into the all the feng shui and all the love of the light and all the stuff like that um that's what i keep the at my work and everything like that and i keep it very going but i also feel like i'm also out in the um people so i try to you know do all that stuff but mine is just not working out i play pickup all three days three to four days a week i do pound i do hip-hop zumba i do line dancing with my grandkids and take them to do things and i take off and go craft shells with them and we do those kinds of things sit around and sew and cook and everything and that's where i put you know that's where i release my energy from all those kinds of stuff you know um i just kind of like that's i just kind of like leave work and then every now and then i pick up my phone if i need to schedule an appointment but that's what i just do is just keep myself you know going and stuff like that you know and just hang out and have fun in life you know just that's my release and my rest time is that's what i do and as you said earlier skip through the grocery store oh i do or sing and dance and i like dance in the grocery store too i'm going to take the opposite view of that which i think there's we're it's such an energy you know you're giving yourself to people all day long right listening to their stories and and you know sometimes you take in more than you probably really want to but i find going inside for me is the best sides like just sitting with myself and kind of redefining you know making kind of just doing what i can internally to ask myself some of the hard questions like where is it you want to go what is it that you want to do but that takes quiet and that takes you know like a meditative kind of i'm sure camille you'll understand this like going inside to really understand your purpose which when you're servicing people it's a huge purpose right yeah it is good yep and manifesting you're not manifesting but just getting the thing that everybody says you need to put your mind at ease and i was having a conversation with my mom the other day and they're like you just need to sit and put your mind at ease and i was like Like, I think I'm, if they had the thing when I was growing up, I think I am ADD because I can talk three times a day. Honestly, I can, and I'm very hyper. But, you know, they go, put your mind at rest, and you need to just sit there and sit in the quiet. I can't do that. So I talked to my mom about it, and she said, yeah, you do. And I said, no, I don't. She goes, you sew. Because how many people walk into your sewing room and go, what are you listening to? And you turn and go, I have no clue. she says that's where you put your mind at ease you have just do it a different way than just sitting there you go and do something else i sit there and you know i just can't sit there and listen to somebody tell me go to the this quiet vineyard and yeah that my mind goes about things i need to be doing but i go so or i go crochet there you go and that's my time to quiet my mind down and stuff like that so she said you just do it differently and i was like oh i never thought it that way good point yeah it's funny how we're all a little bit different with that some of us have to keep busy and some of us need to calm down just to ease our minds so oh my grandkids laugh at me because they go grandma what are you doing i said being an old lady and sit in my rocking chair and i'm crochet and they're like oh this is my downtime leave me alone and that's how my grandson learned how to crochet because he wanted to sit on my lap you know oh sweet and they learned yeah oh yeah he's been crocheting since he was eight years old he's 14 and he helps me he crochets a lot of my stuff for my craft shows you know so that's what i said it's just amazing that i just sit there and they're all learning some like to sew better than crocheting and so yeah my house is pretty full but it's fun but everybody does their own little thing you know and stuff like that and quites are mine somehow you know so sweet so sweet oh so such good advice this is such a good webinar we're getting close i only have a couple questions left. So let's move on to staying in your own lane. So there's always, this is a good one. There's always someone bigger, faster, or more viral on social media. How do you stay in your own lane and avoid the comparison trap? And Camille, I'm going to start with you on this one because your brand really is your personality and you've learned how to figure out like who you are versus everyone else but again please everyone weigh in when you can so mine is to stay in my own lane as I had to learn that because I was talking to a lot of different people because in my area we have a lot of people that are doing what I do and try not to compare myself to them so what sets me apart is I had to brand myself and my branding myself is what I do in my personal life my grandkids and my sports with my grandkids and my craft shows and everything and just making myself happy bubbly and things like that and you know that's how people come in because they like me and who I am and you know a lot of them come in go can't get enough of you because you know what I can do that Brazilian wax let me tell you we have lots of stories to tell I have lots of stories you know so it's quick easy and it's just makes them relaxed and comfortable and things like that is what I do. But you know, it's just who I am, you know, just like Jenna said, yeah, just be yourself as, as what I've decided to people, you know, when I'm out in public, it's like, grandma, who is that? I have no idea. I don't remember names very well, but I know what I did to him. Or I was out just, um, working out one day and this lady walked up to me and I looked at my daughter and I go, I don't know who that was. She knew me because of my husband. I didn't know who she was you just knew me of my husband i was like oh web sorry but you know but it's just who i happily and bubbly and you know um just be out there be yourself you know and that's what people really attract yourself to you know that's what i just do is just making my brand myself who i am yeah it's great advice well we we take a a different approach to that we have reinvented our uh our brand through organic products which oh became um it just it it really has become the biggest part of our business we started about 15 years ago and i think branding is and what differentiates you i think a lot of hairdressers and business owners don't spend whole lot of time with this but what sets you apart from everybody else and when when we were fairly new in the business we did pretty much what everybody else did sold the same products and and hoped that they'd like me better than the guy next to me and now we have come to the place where our products and the way we do business is our brand and uh i don't have that gift of personality so i couldn't go away but yeah he does i am very outgoing he's being very modest camille he's very out there i know i can tell the brand that we created i think is what makes us different from everybody else yeah and when you have products on the shelf that are different from others and people have to come to you to buy them yeah then that automatically sets you apart or if you do something different than everybody else does technically they have to come to you and we've we've found that to be like a big part of our business just being different and creating something new by the way has anybody ever heard of aveda ah that's my background aveda are you vedic yeah uh horst was my hero when we first started doing hair and he had done something so different that everybody else just came on board that that was into pure natural that's our our lineage to organic products now so i think and also going with something that's the best product for your client forget who you are but what's best for them i thought horse did a great job with that and we sort of tried to model ourselves after what he did yeah i'll add to that too it when you kind of watch your path or your journey or whatever you want to call it gino had at one point in our career um had contact dermatitis so bad on his hands from the color we were using that we had to we had to find an alternative now this goes back possibly 15 20 years ago we began to re i just began to research brands because you know to me i want to fix it like let's either fix it or we have to shift gears and change careers which i don't think was really in the cards for us so as we researched we came upon one company that was making color um because horst at that time didn't have a color line he just had products he just had hair products and he he used organic color systems yeah and so we started that's how we went and that's how we and it was awful by the way pam didn't want to pay my assistance so i had to have an assistant to do everything for me and at times i had two of them because of the the applications from the product yeah yeah yeah but i think too just being concerned with health you know if you want to to have a long career in our industry we work with some pretty hardcore chemicals yeah and our hands are immersed in them when you really get into the health part of it um we we hairdressers work in one of the most toxic environments even though it doesn't look that way not in nails huh nails well yeah usually there's there's usually manicurists in the salon so one of the things we learned was we would um in our bigger salons we would encase our manicures with ventilation and plexiglass and and that was fine but now we just don't have one in the salon yeah now it's just us yeah well i have to ask so prior to my being at day smart in another life i was had 20 years in the sun industry before coming here and aveda was my background um i actually worked for the distributor for a while as well so i'm curious and i think everyone wants to know so what is the product that you chose if it's not a beta for organic so we we use uh or uh oway which is from italy uh and um onm which is from uh so the standard for organics is much higher in europe and other countries than it is in america otherwise i would buy american but always from italy aretes from italy organic color systems is from england and onm is from australia those are the products we use and most of them have four ingredients or less which um indicates that they're you know pure products um and and that's what we found to be best for our clients and our clients seem to gravitate towards that because they want they appreciate that yeah it's a lot it's a lot more expensive so it's not for everybody right but we've decided that that would be what we would do that's great that's great and you know we're all product junkies here part of the industry so thank you for sharing that because everyone i'm sure was curious so i was just going to ask what we were all thinking um but this is all great yeah and all great answers i think one thing i used to say was like they can anyone can go across the street and still get a good haircut so what is it that makes them what's the reason they should come to you um though some people are better at cutting than others and things like that i just remember saying that a lot because i think making yourself stand out whether it's organic products whether it's your personality you know you guys have given some really good advice there because you really do have to build your own brand and your you know what's going to draw the people in um for you specifically so andrea i would i would say that all of it's important your personality the products that you sell your approach to your clients all of it is what makes success yeah i agree yeah so and i'm really i actually i'm sad to say i'm on my last question because i'm having so much fun chatting with all of you um but so i do want to close this up though we should wrap this up we're nearing 45 minutes um oh thanks thanks pam um but so i want to end it with this one last question and um i think this will be a really valuable one and a great way to end end this webinar um but what is the one thing you wish someone had told you before you started this journey and if jenna if you're able to type in too that might be that would be great but um either one of you whoever wants to start i i think just that last piece of advice you can share with with our audience today with the one thing you wish someone had told you before you started this journey i think that it would have been really nice to have somebody say that mistakes are inevitable it's a part of the process and as you make them just learn from them and as best as you can take what you need from them and move on as quickly as you can don't wallow in them i would that would have been like uh you know just music to my ears now i learned we learned that along the way but that would be mine i i would say as horst would say it's a spiritual journey and you're going to learn a lot along the way and you're going to grow and don't be afraid to take chances yeah take a business class take a business class no seriously you know yeah a lot of people don't understand that you don't you if you don't know you don't know that you can't take that off your taxes or you can only take this off your taxes and you can only do this or you know is that best to take your mileage or is it best to use your gas receipts or you know know what i'm saying like that find you a good accountant or you know or you kind of kind of know what's going on because you can't rely on someone else what they think that should be the best you just take it to them then they tell you yes or no but you know you need to take like a business class you kind of understand what where you're going or how you can write that off or where you can write that off at yeah and in a balanced way too yeah you need both of those right you need the personal and you need the the business because the two of those if you can balance those can make a super successful business right i gotta go to work oh i got it it's nice it's nice chatting with you yeah thank you and actually i will end this here thank thank you all i'm genuinely in awe sitting here with all of you i what you've built what you've survived and the generosity which you've uh you know taken the time to share all of these tips and all of this um your success and all of your stories with us today means so much to us so to everyone watching i hope you took notes because what these three and jenna um four have to offer uh is not just inspiration but a great blueprint for all of you as well so this kind of wisdom um it only comes from doing the work making the mistakes and choosing every day to keep i love what you do yeah and love what you do so that's what jenna said love what you do that oh yes oh yes and then thank you camille thank you pamela and gino who's now gone and jenna for trying trying to join us joining us in a different route thank you all for being here with us today um and I wish you the best continued success to everyone. Thanks for having us. This is a great moment.

Discover salon business tips straight from real salon owners who've cracked the code on running a more efficient, more profitable beauty business powered by DaySmart Salon management software.

In this exclusive panel webinar, four real DaySmart Salon customers pull back the curtain on the strategies, mindset shifts, and tools that made the difference; and what they wish they'd known sooner. If you're a salon owner, stylist, barber, or nail tech looking to grow your salon business, this is the video for you.

💡 Watch to learn:
How to manage a salon more efficiently
Salon scheduling and online booking tips that reduce no-shows
How real stylists are using salon software to grow their client base
Strategies for salon marketing, payments, and client retention
What the best salon management software actually looks like in practice

00:00 Introduction
02:30 What is the one belief you held on Day 1 of your business that you hav since completely let go of? 
05:40 What was the hardest shift you had to make personally to stop working in your business and start working on it? 
08:36 What is the one financial habit or system you put in place that made a positive impact on managing finances and avoiding stress?  
12:44 For those in the audience who feel overwhelmed managing a business, what's the first thing they should automate or hand off so they can focus on the work they love?
18:43 What is one policy, rule, or mindset shift that dramatically reduced chaos?  
28:07 This work is physically and emotionally exhausting. How do each of you protect your own energy? What does rest look like for you?
33:32 There's always someone bigger, faster, or more viral on social media. How do you stay in your own lane and avoid the comparison trap?
42:52 What is the one thing you wish someone had told you before you started this journey?
45:06 Ending

DaySmart Salon gives you powerful, easy-to-use salon software to help with: 
✔️ Appointment scheduling
✔️ Client management 
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✔️ Salon marketing 
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Whether you're working solo or running a full team, you deserve smart tools that support your journey from the chair to the checkout.

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Salon owners ready to work smarter, not harder
Stylists, barbers, and nail techs building their client base
Anyone managing appointments and growing a salon business
Beauty professionals learning from real salon owners who've been where you are

Elevating the client experience with better salon booking software

✨ Resources 
Try us for Free: https://tinyurl.com/2vn9ft4s  
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