NSS salons: are they affecting your business?

[beautybemine15]

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong at all in you (or BABTAC) raising the issue. Maybe some find it taboo to speak of but I'm also all for raising awareness. If this kind of thing is going on it's appalling.


But you never mentioned this in your first comment, you just seemed to say that all the NSS salons in Birmingham are shady, illegal and involved in sex trafficing.


What I asked was how you knew this was going on, you seemed pretty sure it was happening at the salons in your area.

And what was offensive was the insinuation that these girls are involved in these activities because 'they don't speak a word of english to their clients'. Not really a valid reason for suspicion!


So maybe it was just worded poorly, but it's pretty bad to generalise like that without giving any back up as to why you've said it in the first place.

Look im not going into a boxing ring .I am certainly not going have a argument with you over my own freedom of speech . Just because you choose to pick fly's out to make a big deal out of my wording.Yes they do not speak a word of English! And it is not just me who have said this i had people complain to me about it who have been to the NSS salon's .And i really do not know what is the big deal in saying so even the government today are cracking down on people who work in UK without speaking good English.Is it nice for clients to sit down have there nails done and not be spoken too i don't think so. money laundering is going on in the nss salons how do they charge so bloody cheap???? I cannot charge half of what they charge id be under cutting myself and losing profit if i had charged the prices that some of these nss salons charge. I do not believe i said anything wrong and i never insinuated anything .If you did read my wording correctly you would have seen that i said the police had closed some of them down. also mentioned NSS which means on these boards ''none standard salons'' so as far as im concerned non standard means '' they are shady'' they need re educating aspecially when they are using mma. People do get subjected to appalling abuse because they do not speak English and can not speak out do you not watch your news or you documentrys that speak on these issues from time to time . I do not believe i have to justify myself to you not when i watch my news for my area may not be all the time but some of the time . And i am certainly not going to drain myself anymore justfying the issue ! *because offence has been caused cos of my freedom of speech i feel like i am walking on egg shells i will leave this thread and not come back,shuts door behind myself chow*

 

[sleepingbeauty]

I think if we just concentrate on doing a good job ourselves then that alone will have to be good enough ... No point in speculating about other peoples work, just let your own work do its own talking ...

Being a good nail technician is about Quality not Quantity. Its also about letting clients chat, letting them share with your their business & you being able to chat a little bit likewise. When clients arent able to share with you then they soon jump ship & will continue to jump until they happily meet someone who is able to fill all their needs.

I used to concern myself with the local NSS, because I used to see there prices & think how the hell am I going to compete. I shouldnt have given it a second thought, because having local NSS around me hasnt seemed to have made the slightest bit of difference because of how busy I am.... My prices are higher but it hasnt stopped clients coming. They know the old 'you get what you pay for' so the day I slow down then that'll be the day I will worry

 

[marion]

Maybe our suppliers could cut their prices, so we could cut our salon prices..
so we could compete with the NSS salons.

Doubt this will happen.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using SalonGeek

 

[Rinn]

I think if we just concentrate on doing a good job ourselves then that alone will have to be good enough ... No point in speculating about other peoples work, just let your own work do its own talking ...

Being a good nail technician is about Quality not Quantity. Its also about letting clients chat, letting them share with your their business & you being able to chat a little bit likewise. When clients arent able to share with you then they soon jump ship & will continue to jump until they happily meet someone who is able to fill all their needs.

I used to concern myself with the local NSS, because I used to see there prices & think how the hell am I going to compete. I shouldnt have given it a second thought, because having local NSS around me hasnt seemed to have made the slightest bit of difference because of how busy I am.... My prices are higher but it hasnt stopped clients coming. They know the old 'you get what you pay for' so the day I slow down then that'll be the day I will worry

you are right ....paddle your own canoe and don't worry about the others.

 

[Chickafish]

you are right ....paddle your own canoe and don't worry about the others.

My canoe has Greg's face on it :lol:

 

[izzidoll]

Maybe our suppliers could cut their prices, so we could cut our salon prices..
so we could compete with the NSS salons.

Doubt this will happen.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using SalonGeek

That would be financial suicide for our suppliers..then where would we all be!

Most of the NSS salons are buying cheap products from china in huge bulk, making it even cheaper for them.

They are buying monomer by the gallon, our suppliers are wiling to sell techs a small bottle

 

[sofia_sparkle]

The thing that really drives me mad with them is pedicures, my local ones take a blade to the feet to take off hard skin so obviously when I rock up with my exfoliator pad (it's a good one as well) you will never get as much off and people have said to me they love that they are so rough! What can u do? I just point out that I wouldn't be insured and they're prob not either!!!

 

[Chickafish]

That would be financial suicide for our suppliers..then where would we all be!

Most of the NSS salons are buying cheap products from china in huge bulk, making it even cheaper for them.

They are buying monomer by the gallon, our suppliers are wiling to sell techs a small bottle

Agreed. I really wouldn't wanna work cheap like they do. I invested so much time and money into training, products, research, ect. I value my time and work, and if my clients can't see that, then they can go back to the fingertip/toes chop shop that is the local NSS. And quite honestly, I cannot stand working on clients back to back with no break inbetween like they do. I like conversing with my clients, and having enough time after each client to breathe. Doing what they do for the price that they do it for, there is no satisfaction in it. It just becomes another thing to do to pay the bills.

 

[salj]

Look im not going into a boxing ring .I am certainly not going have a argument with you over my own freedom of speech . Just because you choose to pick fly's out to make a big deal out of my wording.Yes they do not speak a word of English! And it is not just me who have said this i had people complain to me about it who have been to the NSS salon's .And i really do not know what is the big deal in saying so even the government today are cracking down on people who work in UK without speaking good English.Is it nice for clients to sit down have there nails done and not be spoken too i don't think so. money laundering is going on in the nss salons how do they charge so bloody cheap???? I cannot charge half of what they charge id be under cutting myself and losing profit if i had charged the prices that some of these nss salons charge. I do not believe i said anything wrong and i never insinuated anything .If you did read my wording correctly you would have seen that i said the police had closed some of them down. also mentioned NSS which means on these boards ''none standard salons'' so as far as im concerned non standard means '' they are shady'' they need re educating aspecially when they are using mma. People do get subjected to appalling abuse because they do not speak English and can not speak out do you not watch your news or you documentrys that speak on these issues from time to time . I do not believe i have to justify myself to you not when i watch my news for my area may not be all the time but some of the time . And i am certainly not going to drain myself anymore justfying the issue ! *because offence has been caused cos of my freedom of speech i feel like i am walking on egg shells i will leave this thread and not come back,shuts door behind myself chow*

OK you're offended now at what I've said but if you read what I said you'd see that the reason I challenged your post has absolutely NOTHING to do with your freedom of speech. I am baffled as to why you've said this a couple of times and also why you now feel you have to walk on eggshells.

Whether I watch the news or not is irrelevant and I am not challenging you on raising this issue. As I already said, raising issues like this is a good thing in my eyes.

I challenged you because you made some pretty bold statements in your original post and didn't back them up. If you had said that you'd seen it on the news or read an article, rather than just saying you thought this because the workers didn't speak english, then that would have been the end of it.

 

[MissConfused]

I dont worry as in i have no clients worry, i worry that people are crazy enough to want something doing super quick and to last forever that they are willing to risk their health for it? :s that worries me. Ive had clients say to me the nails at such and such a place are great, they just dont come off! Ive also had clients say to me such and such a nail lady did My last acrylics and i only knocked my nail/trapped my hand and it came off Whole how bads that?? :/ i had to point out that thats a good thing if you bang your nail and is exactly what you want to happen, the last thing you want is to bang/trap your nail and for the acrylic to not be flexible And to end up with your natural nail ripped off! The nails ive seen done on clients look deeelish though, they look perfect - the shape, the finish, the zero lifting after several weeks etc etc. they are Nails that you charge more than £25 for (and that includes shellac too!).


I was doing several sets of shellac for a couple of ladies and it was their friends birthday so they paid for her to have shellac done too the woman who booked the apt told me her friend had acrylics on with shellac over and wanted the old shellac and acrylics removing i said that wasnt a problem, i could do that. I assumed whilst she was soaking off i could do the shellac for the other ladies. As soon as i started filing the bulk of her nails off i could smell such a strong smell of cheese! The cheesey smell was coming from her nails!! Anyway to cut a long story short it took over 3 hours to soak off two hands in warmed acetone (i only brought the one soak off bowl) and even then she was scraping off the excess product herself while i was shellacing and it was thick, gloopy and super sticky. It also smelled of fish (dont know what happened to the cheesey smell?) - not the usual acetoney smell but a pure dirty fishy smell! when the acrylic was off she had lines going up her nails.

She Told me she was told her nails needed to be soaked off because they needed to 'breathe'.

X

 

[izzidoll]

Salj and beautybemine... You seem to have a different discussion going on here which has gone away from the original topic, and is only between both of you.
Therefore should be taken to PM.

 

[marion]

That would be financial suicide for our suppliers..then where would we all be!

Most of the NSS salons are buying cheap products from china in huge bulk, making it even cheaper for them.

They are buying monomer by the gallon, our suppliers are wiling to sell techs a small bottle

'Financial suicide' ??
My supplier makes their own liquid and powder, surely they could give us a break

Sent from my GT-I9300 using SalonGeek

 

[Bo]

Just started doing nails again after several years away. Had to remove NSS l&p last night. What a work out! I was actually sweating Client told me she equated having her nails done like going to the dentist. They ripped her nails off by prying with a nail tip. It should be a pleasure and relaxing to have nails done. I could tell when I first touched her hands she was bracing for the worse. She was caught in trap of her nails looking and feeling so bad she would go get another set to cover it up. I was happy to help her "stop the vicious circle" and put her on the path to healthy nails. She loved her gel polish and even embraced shorter nails.

 

[linzi]

'Financial suicide' ??
My supplier makes their own liquid and powder, surely they could give us a break

Sent from my GT-I9300 using SalonGeek

With the greatest of respect, that's massively oversimplifying matters.

Remember that respectable manufacturers will have astronomical research and development costs, then they pay for the advertising and marketing of the brand, any import duties due (which make up a large percentage of your end price; the government hates to see money leaving the UK so makes it as unattractive a proposition as possible) are crippling and are why some people think to try buying some in themselves, illegally. That's without starting on the costs of distributing and providing customer support, etc.

There is so much more to It than someone in the back room of a house saying hmmm, Ill throw a little of this, and a little of that together and flog it for $200 :lol:

 

[VHunter]

NSS are frustrating to deal with, but I don't see an end to them. The only option is to do your best to show your clients you know what you're doing/talking about, and hope for the best. .

I would have to disagree with this statement. There IS something we can do about. Conscientious techs and consumers can band together and work towards raising awareness and demanding better standards and legislation of their government. But that requires being proactive versus just sitting here and venting about it.

They do effect me..... they take all the cheap chavvy client who don't care about getting sore fingers and one size suits all airbrushed white tipped nails. That leaves me with the nice, normal clients who want good quality nails and who will look after them :wink2: :hug: xx

Not all are cheap and chavvy.
a) some simply don't know any better and haven't been educated
b) some simply can NOT afford better, but refuse to go without services and so plunge in and take the risk anyway.

Just because someone chooses the lower priced service does NOT mean that they are chavvy. It simply means they dont have the money. I drive a 13yr old car because I can't afford a new one. I buy no-name brand laundry detergent because it's half the price of Tide. Neither of these things make me chavvy.

I think if we just concentrate on doing a good job ourselves then that alone will have to be good enough ... No point in speculating about other peoples work, just let your own work do its own talking ...

I DON'T think it's good enough to simply focus on our work. We should be fighting for change. I've been reading the same complaints for years. Other techs have been reading/hearing about them for years longer than I have. But no one is uniting.

Being a good nail technician is about Quality not Quantity. Its also about letting clients chat, letting them share with your their business & you being able to chat a little bit likewise. When clients arent able to share with you then they soon jump ship & will continue to jump until they happily meet someone who is able to fill all their needs.

I used to concern myself with the local NSS, because I used to see there prices & think how the hell am I going to compete. I shouldnt have given it a second thought, because having local NSS around me hasnt seemed to have made the slightest bit of difference because of how busy I am.... My prices are higher but it hasnt stopped clients coming. They know the old 'you get what you pay for' so the day I slow down then that'll be the day I will worry
Much of what you say is true. BUT have you ever stopped to consider the clients who suffer the extreme health issues as a result of NSS are costing you money right out of your pockets? Yup, the client that contracts Hepatitis or worse and develops long term health issues is a burden on the health care system that citizens pay for.
Have you stopped to consider that if standards were raised and legislations established and NSS reduced greatly, how much MORE money you could make as a qualilfied tech? If the consumer isn't going to the NSS, then they could visit you. You could expand your salon. You're losing money no matter what way you look at it.

With the greatest of respect, that's massively oversimplifying matters.

Remember that respectable manufacturers will have astronomical research and development costs, then they pay for the advertising and marketing of the brand, any import duties due (which make up a large percentage of your end price; the government hates to see money leaving the UK so makes it as unattractive a proposition as possible) are crippling and are why some people think to try buying some in themselves, illegally. That's without starting on the costs of distributing and providing customer support, etc.

There is so much more to It than someone in the back room of a house saying hmmm, Ill throw a little of this, and a little of that together and flog it for $200 :lol:

DITTO!

 

[VHunter]

I am NOT ashamed to admit that they DO affect my business.

While I'm busier than some 'legit' techs that I know, I'm not as busy as I'd like to be. NOR as busy as I was last year at this time. Last year, I was going CRAZY. It was GREAT.

Then the economy went SPLAT..........
Next I knew:

• A client's hubby lost his job because the company declared bankruptcy suddenly.
• Another client got laid off
• Another client had her hours cut in half
• Another client's own business folded
• Then another client had the choice to be demoted (with huge paycut) or unemployed, she took the paycut.
• Yet another had hours cut

and the list goes on.
I'm in a small, blue collar town. Everyone knows everyone. And these are clients that have been with me for several years. I KNOW that they've hit hard times for a FACT.

Also, as a tech in a small blue collar town, you can only set pricing so high. I'm not in a rich town. I'm not in the heart of a metropolis. I'm in podunk-nowhere town with low cost housing down the street for the welfare-recipients (govt financial assistance for the permanently unemployed...). We don't even have a real shopping center/mall. Not even a Wallmart. And on a warm summer's day, you can smell the 'fertilizer' 3 towns over used by the farmers.... (yes, cow dung!)

Having said all of that:
YES focus on yourself and offering quality services, set yourself apart from the NSS. I do NOT disagree with that.

BUT.......... you CAN do something.
Spend a minimum of 20min a week (not much time really, you use more time than that here on SG or on FB or watching commercials LOL) and be PROACTIVE against NSS and MMA.

WHY?

Let's say for example that some wonderful legislation and standards were established... what do you think would happen?
1- NSS would be scrambling to meet the standards, while YOU ARE ALREADY established and qualified.
2- While the NSS is scrambling and most being shut down (no license, don't pass health board inspections, etc), you have just earned yourself a shedload of new clients because YOU ARE ALREADY A QUALITY TECH.
3- NSS reduce in number, and the quality techs reap the benefits and as a result NOW CONTROL THE PRICING SCALE.
4- Hey look? Suddenly many are earning a better wage.

Distributors/Manufacturers/Educators really should jump on board with this.
WHY?
HEYYYYYYYYY look at all the NSS flocking to their doors in a mad rush to get educated, earn their licenses and purchase products and etc so that they too can pass inspections? No one's buying MMA from who knows where (ok, maybe not "no one" BUT less of them anway).

NOW, the former-NSS that actually step up their game will have to raise their prices to cover the costs of QUALITY products, and QUALITY services.

WIN-WIN FOR EVERYONE.


So, I ask...................what are YOU going to do about it?
Are you going to sit and whine and waste time and effort complaining?
OR use that very same time and effort to work towards a change?

 

[Rinn]

Hi Victoria,
i agree with you whole heartily.
i personally think that yes we should be licensed and that should be linked to your insurance.
no license- no insurance and vice versa.
i also think you should be obliged to complete a set number of CPD hours per year to maintain said license .

all this will cost money , which will mean us having to put up our prices and as you said yourself , people are strapped for cash.

where i live and work sounds very similiar to where you are (although we probably have twice as much rain, :sad: ) , it is very rural and most of the local salons would all offer shellac or a gel polish ( some of them are absolute messers and still they have clients ) there are only 2-3 of us offering enhancements.
one girl i know uses a very well known , high end brand of gel and absolutely crucifies clients nail plates ....
so what about the likes of her? she's been educated , she uses a great product , she would get a license no bother. but if she , herself , cannot see what she is doing is careless and if her clients are prepared to put up with that , who will change that attitude?

as i said i agree with you that some sort of legislation/good practise requirment should be in place but the techs involved also need to want to change , the only way that will happen is if THEY start losing clients to the likes of us , who maintain our own high standards regardless .

 

[Paul Bryson]

Let's say for example that some wonderful legislation and standards were established... what do you think would happen?

Why wait for the government? You could start a local trade association. Then you can set your own standards, enforce your own membership requirements (reasonable dues, proof of training, and accountability to the standards), and create a trademarked, legally defensible logo, which could only be used by members in good standing.

Then you educate the public to look for your professional association logo if they really want quality, sanitary service. Member salons can use the logo on the shop windows, websites, business cards, etc. And your association would have a list of member salons on its website, so anyone with a question could check up on any salon, to see if they really belonged, what services are offered, contact info, etc.

Best of all... when or if the government finally gets around to the issue, most likely they will ask your association to advise them when they write new regulations. Or, if they don't, your association is in a very good position to approach them with helpful suggestions, as a recognized expert group. Either way, there is a good chance you'll end up basically writing the laws, when laws are finally made. (Speaking from experience).