A new salon mentor client I am working with has a problem almost all salon mentor owners have and it is this.
All are infected by the salon industry corporate thinking. This is a massive problem because it really doesn’t work in salons and probably isn’t working in yours.
So first the good news. It can be fixed … look at this.
When I start working with a salon owner enrolled on SALON MENTOR EXTREME, after looking through the numbers and some management and daily running’s in the salon, I set and we agreed realistic targets that I feel can be reached even if they are pretty tough.
So that is what we did in this salon. I set an initial target (based on turnover) and we hit that target in just 21 -days (again). Honestly, I am always amazed that this happens, I don’t know why because it always does but anyway… we did it and hit the target.
So, a new target and second target will now be set so by the end of our period of working together this will be a half million turnover salon (or well on its way to that number)
Is it easy to hit this target?
No, and here is why.
Most salons either have corporate practices that don’t work in salons or they have no practices and just hope and pray they will be busy enough day to day.
The bigger problem with the corporate thinking is it has to be unravelled and then replaced with what I call chaotic thinking.
So, when I work with my EXTREME salons unlike industry training I set nothing in stone and go by feel, results and progress. In other words, … how much is in the cash drawer and how is the salon running at this early stage? MENTOR is pure results driven and NOT farting around endlessly chasing social media likes!
The next step after hitting the target is to start stripping things back a little and even replace teams where they need to be replaced (this is a whole other story but I have done successfully many occasions).
So now I want my extreme mentor salon to do something extreme and that is to increase his team which means increasing his wages bill. They were fighting me but after hitting target one they are now trusting me. This salon has been opened for years so it’s going to take a lot of trust but I can see it falling into place pretty early on.
Exciting for a salon, right?
I mean, why the hell would anyone tolerate a salon that is massively underperforming whilst having even bigger potential? It makes no sense to simply hope and pray things will work out. I have never seen a drowning man hope he can learn to swim before he drowns!
The reason is simple and becomes clearer with every salon I work with. The reason is the insistence of corporations running salons as retail outlets rather than places of creativity and chaos.
I’ll report back on this salon once we hit our next goals. By the way, all salon extreme goals aren’t cash based. If the systems are not in place the cash won’t arrive. So, the cash goal is the initial goal for me and now the deeper structures of turning a salon into a real business rather than just another boring salon corporate puppet that is struggling.
It isn’t the salon owners fault of course. We are creatives. We need to create. Sitting and running a business sometimes just isn’t our thing. We need to push harder to create more. The corporations restrict and hold most salons back as creatives in the way where we can create more from chaos.
That is why we are witnessing the slow death of the chain or franchise salon.
These are exciting and extreme times for salon owners but only if you step outside the lines and take a risk or two. Actually, there is more risk of taking no risk these days.
You have to step away from the corporates idea of what a salon is and should be. You have to stop thinking like a salon and create more.
It’s also interesting for me that salon owners focus more on client numbers than average bills. Just recently I saw a young stylist take an average bill of £148. His weekly takings were £2,220. He is taking my extreme approach rather than the corporate hairdresser approach. I can’t wait for the whole salon to be doing the same.
The profit IS NOT in more clients but in other areas like (for one) average bills. That’s a whole other story.
So …
Has yet to fail to deliver …
- Numbers
- Change
- Results
- Dreams
- Happiness
And of course, my personal favourite … a little more CHAOS.
What are you waiting for? (Despite reports I am yet to see a miracle from heaven fix or change a salon).
If you are finally ready for big changes, if you feel the need to break out of the corporate industry and if you want to grow and design more happiness…
In chaos
THE SALON PUNK, Alan.
