Advice on Acrylic, Acrygel, Bio, Calgel etc

[Roxie20]

Hi everyone, this is my 1st entry on 'The Salon Geek' and I have to say I am very impressed with the whole site!

I would really love some advice from you experts out there please....
I qualified as an LCN nail technician 6 years ago working out of my friends salon, after 3 years I decided to pack it in as all my customers had become friends and I was not hard enough/ business minded enough to charge for broken tips and also to put my prices up when I should of done and was for ever giving away freebies so consequently never really earnt as much as I could of done!!
Having stayed on at the salon just running the reception as I just love the atmosphere of the salon, I have now been bullied (quite happily) back into 'doing' nails again as our last technician has just left... she did Creative acrylic nails.
I would love to be able to attend a Creative Nail Course but just cannot afford to do so at the moment, so I have just attended a cheaper day acrylic course which has obviously helped a little but I am not prepared to charge any clients yet full price for my services as my acrylic nails are no where as near as good as my gel nails! However I would love to be able to go down the soak off root and not buff plus I would like to be able to offer both gel and acrylic nails. On someones advice I bought some Acrygel which I put on my own nails and adored the finished effect however every client so far has complained about agonising burning of nails and I also found that they struggle to soak off.
I have decided to go back to my LCN nails as this is what I am happy with for the time being (even though I think it is an expensive product) but I would like to know if any one out there has experienced the same problems with Acrygel (yes I have tried thinner layers)

Also has anyone experience of LCN L& P and also if anyone can recommend a good soak off gel be it Bio Sculpture, Calgel etc etc. I really can't be spending loads of money trying out various different products or my hubby will most probably kill me!
Sorry this is so long winded and I am sure there are probably answers to a lot of these questions elsewhere but I really don't have the time to trawl through so many posts.
Many thanks in advance to any advice, suggestions etc that anyone can offer me in helping me to get my feet successfully under that nail table once again to become a more efficient nail technician 2nd time around...I do really enjoy being a nail technician and would love to attend course after course however the idea is to hopefully earn some money!!!


Caroline

 

[Alibarr]

Hi
If you can stretch to Creative both the L&P and Brisa gel conversions include kit to the same value of the course so in effect the training is free. In addition Brisa gel is strong enough to do extensions with so it is versatile.

 

[Roxie20]

Is the Brisa Gel a soak off or buff off gel?

 

[angel fingers]

Is the Brisa Gel a soak off or buff off gel?

its a buff off gel.

bio sculpture is a soak off gel, but it is quite expensive to set up.

have you looked at the nobility soak off gel by lechat, it has all the same qualities as bio, but is stronger and less expensive.

LeChat UK - Nail Care Products

 

[Roxie20]

Thanks I will take a look!

 

[Roxie20]

Still hoping someone can advise me on reducing burning when using acrygel?

 

[Bagpuss]

Hiya .. I think that as you already have experience in gel and wish to use a soak off gel and not have to fork out on more training i would recommend Akzentz Options...its a soak off gel. I use the Akzentz gel (non Soak off) and love it.

I know there are many techs on here who use Options.

If you wanted a try me kit you can get one from here... Nails Plus Beauty Akzentz Gels the site owner is called Karen and if you need more advise just ring her... she is fab and will do everything she can to help.

HTH