Product or college course?

[NicMA]

Hello everyone,

I am in my thirties and have decided to retrain in something I love, nails! My aim will be to train, refine my skills on my friends/family/colleagues and then become self employed once I am able to produce a good standard of work, eventually progressing onto nail art at some point.

I would like to be able to offer gel polish and lovely hand and nail treatments.

I can see my local college has a part time course (although doesn't show the next dates I assume there will be one for sept 2016) it is a level 2 award in manicure, but does not include the health and safety qualification which they say you have to do alongside.

However, after reading the forum I can see that some of the product companies offer their own courses which seem to be quite similar, and often include a starter kit (handy!), and unlike the college course which is 6 weeks they are more of an intensive burst.

I wondered if anyone either had a recommendation for one of the product companies courses, or if people generally think its better to just go to the local college? (I would not want to do any purely online courses).

There probably isn't a right or wrong answer here, but as all you guys understand when spending such money you want to get it right

Thanks for your help

 

[cheekychick]

It depends.
If you know which brand you want to go with then I think specific brand training will help you more then a generic course. As all products are different and can have different methods of application etc.

I chose shellac in the beginning then converted to nail harmony as I wanted to use Gelish and the training with them was brilliant, I learned so much and came away feeling really confident and ready to offer my services to the public.

However My experience with my local college wasn't so great so I'd personally recommend training with whichever brand you chose but I know others who have trained at college and have got on fine. It really is personal preference. x

 

[Iseeiwant]

I'm in my 30's and doing level 2 beauty therapy at college and really love it. Missing it already tbh as it finishes in june. It covered all beauty including mani/pedi/health and safety. Already starting to look around for further courses. Best decision i made, nice social aspect every week. It's nice to catch up with like minded people who are similar in age to me. We all gee each other up when needed. I understand college isn't for everyone, due to cost/time issues. But it's been invaluable to me. Good luck whatever you choose to do. Xx

 

[NailsbyGini]

I'm currently training through Nail Harmony (no previous experience whatsoever) and as cheekychick said, it is a brilliant course! I'm learning so much and it's such a friendly environment with less students in each class you get more one on one time to perfect you application.

Highly recommend!

 

[NicMA]

Thank you so much for your responses, it's lovely to hear of other people retraining.

Funnily enough the product I was thinking of working with was Gelish, so I will contact my local educator for some advice.

I might use my local college as well for other courses in beauty therapy, best of both worlds!

 

[Struckbyastar]

I wrote out a whole big comment and then forgot I was underground on the train and pressed send and lost it all! :/ when I was trying to decide the same I discovered my college has their own training salon, so I booked myself a manicure there; it was a great chance to chat with both students and tutors. I decided against the college option as I wanted something more intensive and also I realised I wanted to train specifically in the product I would be using rather than a variety of lesser known brands.

I managed to find a couple of salons around me offering different brands that had training centres near me so I booked a few appointments to get my nails done (research is EXPENSIVE! but my nails were so pretty for a while! Ha) and was a very inquisitive customer.. I didn't mention that I was considering training to be a nail tech, but I wanted to see their use of the brand, how they marketed it and what they said their unique selling point was. Besides one really bad set of gel extensions in the brand I actually trained in (I think more tech than product on top of my nails not being ideal for gels) I found that my chosen brand felt luxurious and pampering and that the tech was able to talk me through the brand.. It was exactly the image I wanted to have as a nail tech so 2 years later I've finally managed to have the time to do the course and have been qualified a few months! Good luck! Xx

 

[Karina B]

Many many moons ago I trained in manicure with OPI. I then decided to go the whole hog and do my NVQ in beauty therapy which meant redoing my manicure.

The thing when you go to a brand course there are only a couple of people so much more attention is given to you.

Doing an evening course at college may be slightly different, but I found doing the full time course there were some there because they didn't know what else to do so plumped for beauty, we're not really interested in the course content. (Now kids have to stay in education I imagine it is much worse).

Now I am coming back into beauty I am doing some refresher courses and going private all the way. I went to my local Sally's and they spoke with me at length and gave me a big catalogue detailing all of their courses.

Hope this helps!

 

[NicMA]

Thanks everyone, I had pretty much changed my mind and decided to do college and have gone back to deciding to train with a product company again ha!

I've decided to do the All That Jazz manicure and pedicure courses, works out very good value even when purchasing the kits.

Very excited! And my husband is looking forward to his pedicure already ha!

 

[Cindy2021]

I've done both and would recommend college as it gives you much longer to practice with a tutor beside you.

Good luck [emoji4]

 

[cheekychick]

Thanks everyone, I had pretty much changed my mind and decided to do college and have gone back to deciding to train with a product company again ha!

I've decided to do the All That Jazz manicure and pedicure courses, works out very good value even when purchasing the kits.

Very excited! And my husband is looking forward to his pedicure already ha!

The all that jazz training is brilliant! You won't regret it. And the products are a dream to work with x