Christel
Well-Known Member
hi guys,
just want to run some stuff passed you all and get your thoughts...get a fresh brew, because i will rant for a while!
Not expecting answers, just want to 'bounce' some stuff of you all....
Up until the end of last year i was professionally pretty happy, having been a freelance tech since '95, Magnetic Nail Care distributor since 2003, salon and nail academy owner since 2004.
I have always been extremely passionate about my craft and that has resulted in the past in a column in Irish beauty, nail art publications, being asked to write several articles for 'Readers Digest' and some other bits&pieces.
At the moment, I haven't touched anyone elses nails since january this year, and i am working fulltime now for a major computer company as a foreign language agent..... I haven't even been 'Geeking' until last night....
Magnetic and I have parted ways about a year/year and a half ago mainly because of differences in opinion and NOT because of me falling out of love with the brand-still one of the best out there!
I dabbled with a few other brands (Nail Creation, Pure Nails and Palms Extra) but apart from the latter found the brains behind them a little too pushy regarding the relatively small market here in Northern Ireland- if that was the wrong impression than i apologize to anyone from those companies right now, but after my 'very expensive' Magnetic years, i wanted things done on my terms for a change.....enough said about that now!
Anyway, I found through the years that clients were flooding through my doors-complaining like mad about the competition-telling me I was (and i am!!!) the next best thing to sliced bread etc etc...never to be seen again.
I also found the competition literally spying on me by sending 'mystery shoppers' who would pump me for business information (the 'Bourne Identity ring any bells???:lol
This of course tells us more about them than me, but still- very strange and disturbing! Let's not get into strange calls, appointments booked and not showing up, telephone numbers being false when you check them etc...
Managed to build up a good solid clientele in a town that has weird loyalties and worked steadily on building up my reputation as a nail educator. Trained girls regularly but I must admit that it is very frustrating to have people booking in and then not sending a deposit....it's just the dissapointments and (even sadder) the fact that after a while i actually was surprised when a deposit would be paid-and that shouldn't be the case....
It was starting to of course effect the day to day business, because if someone books a few days with me, I cannot book normal clients! If a week later you still don't have a deposit, you have to say: shoot! Could have booked those clients in anyway!!! ggrgrgrg.
But still, things went well and i was starting to get to the point that something was gonna give, OR I needed help...
A few years ago I decided to hire a girl on a parttime basis, one of my most talented students and I paid her decent wages, commission, discounts, free own treatments, free nail art by me etc etc
Started of well, she would cover work in the salon, I would focus on getting the nail academy off the ground and was also travelling to colleges for nail art classes and Tooth Fairy training (which would than get my 'Nail' name out there as well!!!)
Then some complaints started to come in, she turned out to be less willing to do her bit and her work became sloppy- after a few months we mutually agreed to call it a day, she is now in a completely different line of work and very happy! Nice girl, still stay in touch but guess nail biz is not for her...
Still...business wise a bit of a blow.
Had loads of room to spare and decided to rent a room out for a beauty girl... What a mistake.
She was not completely new but had only done clients from home and a bit mobile, so instead of paying rent I offered her that in exchange of me getting a % of her turn-over (which included water/electricity/rates etc and all this officially through the books!!!!) she could build up clientele and we would see about proper rent in 6 months,
I sorted out the room with a new light system and she and her mum put in new beauty room furniture etc. Included her in my new yellow pages add as well and only charged her a tenner a month for that (I had a nice full colour biggie!)
I promoted her like mad because any beauty clients she already had, might become my clients as well!!! Sorted her out with business stationery, introduced her around etc etc
Disaster from the start: she would stay in the back-watching 'sex and the city' dvds all day (my electricity bill trippled!!!), was ignoring MY clients when she did walk passed (they could be her 'bread and butter') and for someone having apperantly a good business from home she only brought in her auntie and granny....and that auntie treated me like dirt???:irked:
WHATEVER!!!
I personally might have realised after a short while that her 'ignoring clients' was a sign of severe shyness but it is beyond me that someone in this business (who is loud enough in the room with a regular client!) is so demure when it comes to possible new clients....she was completely different with me on a one-to-one basis and I couldn't have known what she was like with strangers...
My clients actually complained about her behaviour.....
I sorted out a new more general reception area (never really any need for that when on my own to be honest...) and i had to almost physically persuade her to sit there as well! Showing her face!!! Answering the phone!!!
I said from the start: i will answer your phone when you are busy, you will answer mine, makes sense-no missed appointments etc. she actually was too scared to answer my phone until she got over that fear....
A real shame, because she was good at what she did-it turned out that her mum was the one pushing her (she did beauty college herself years ago and never did anything with that education, must have seen this as a "2nd chance???") and this poor girl became increasingly depressed about her business not doing well which of course didn't do the atmosphere in the salon a lot of good, her mother actually started to blame me as well!
3 months after it started it blew up with her crying in the car afraid to face merolleyes mother hysterical and me dumbstruck that a chat to either get it sorted once and for all OR to get rid of HER (if the former proved pointless)
turned into me getting blamed for things and ME getting ditched...they still owe me money by the way.
:zzz: you are still with me so far?????
To cut a long story short, towards the end of 2006 my mum got breastcancer (is fine now!!!!:hug and after some very stressfull months and a lot of mental anguish I decided that enough was enough...business was making money but not worth the stress involved. More important things in life!
was thinking about switching brands to get a bit of oompf back and had a few chats with Gigi regarding this, which i was very grateful for...but I never acted on any advice because I wanted to get back on my emotional feet first.
Talked to all my clients about me going mobile (all of them were very enthousiastic!!!), took the plunge, closed the shop at the end of august last year and only got contacted by 3 clients!!!!
Did the promotion and all that stuff, but what a regular customer says and what they actually do is not necesarilly linked!!! So, hugely dissapointed is not the term i would prefer to use.
I was then headhunted by a local business man to set up his nail bar!
FAB!!!! Loads of promises and the feeling that 'this is too good to be true???'
Good salary, fabulous expensive area, I do my bit and he sorts the finances, I am the manager, will have staff paid for by him and am similar level to the manager for his hairsalon.
we had long discussions, he paid me what I asked for and he offered me the position...
how ideal? NOT!
he promised me the earth and it turned into a 'bullying' situation.....
right before Xmas last year my daddy (who is perfectly ok now and even back at work at the age of 70!) drops stone dead in the house (turned grey..with just my mum there-screaming), mama gets people-local police woman does cpr, 2 ambulances arrive, he had a massive heart attack and the ambulance guy was shaking his head at my mum, not to get her hopes up.... they tried to kick start him several times and he had a heart beat again whilst on route to the hospital.
Only about 2% make it there alive, and eventhough his brain could have been mush by then, the fantastic cardiologist decides to give papa the benefit of the doubt (his heart DID start and that meant it was probably ok) and performs surgery.
I didn't have a clue about all this until my sis's hubbie called from the Netherlands and i found out whilst doing a set of nails that papa was in surgery that very moment...
strated screaming, crying etc etc (am a daddies girl..)
called my husband who was coming over to collect me and I finished this client because what else apart from crying can i do? (the manager of the hairdressing salon owned by the same business man actually had the nerve to ask me to finish this client...:smack
And what a set of nails did i deliver??? absolutely perfect!!!! A++:lol:
was on a flight to Schiphol airport a 6am the next morning and my dad is now officially according to the medical staff a complete miracle!!!! apart from the few days around when it happened, full memory is back, completely normal and even slowely back at work as Holland's best bicycle repair dude!!!
On my return several days later, things got from bad to worse (this hair girl was upset with me that I was happy about my dad's recovery because another member of staff had just lost her granny...eventhough the girl in question and i were very chummy and SHE was very happy for me...)
It got to the point where this guy was actually screaming at me and my husband (how grown up am I at the age of 38???? :lol called him up and resigned on my behalf! (didn't know he actually was planning that!!!!)
:zzz: getting there! no worries!!!
Found this job now, within a week and a half of looking, was hired straight away and have been here since end of january. Nice enough work, great collegues, loads of fun! down side; long days, up very, very early because of train travel and very tired!
As i said earlier, haven't touched someone elses nails for months and have had the ususal emailers/callers about training courses (Trendy Talons / Northern Ireland Nail Academy- if that rings any bells) whose tune now is to never follow up on their calls. Have totally lost the drive to act like a proper sales person and to chase them.
Something my husband said got me thinking, in maybe a few years (working parttime by then possibly) I could maybe rent a tiny industrial unit and maybe do wholesale 5 mornings a week and do a bit of training? And as soon as i think that I hate myself because right now I don't even want to look at someone elses nails....and i used to live for this business.
I thought i got the nail thing out of my system, actually feel very resentful now when people comment on my nails, very annoyed that coming from being seriously the person who introduced completey wacky nail art in to NI (and i know for a fact that anyone who does anything the way i do it, has been trained by me, or has bought the Dutch nail art book that i translated on Magnetic's behalf and got similar ideas out of that!!! Doesn't mean someone elses style is lousy!!!! Don't hit me mentally, but what I do IS special!!!:green
from someone specialising in toe nail art (and being 1 of 3 salons in NI offering that to any extend), that clients can be so fickle and just drop you like 'that'???
Anyway, 6 pages later, am very desillusioned, feel like all my hard work from the last 12/13 years is wasted (and don't get me wrong, my husband totally supports anything i do, does not agree with my perception of being a faillure etc etc!!!) but I am also not happy about the fact that 'acqaintances' are sooooooooooooooooo happy that I appearantly in their minds must have gone bankrupt!!! Why would you give up having a "successful" business????
Have gone from actually being recognised by magazine readers at a few trade shows to being a tiny ant in the hill and that doesn't feel nice either,
very silly I know...but it is like I am back to square one...
Sorry for this huge moan....:cry:
any spelling mistakes, pc in work hasn't got spelling checker and i AM Dutch!!!!!
:hug:
just want to run some stuff passed you all and get your thoughts...get a fresh brew, because i will rant for a while!
Not expecting answers, just want to 'bounce' some stuff of you all....
Up until the end of last year i was professionally pretty happy, having been a freelance tech since '95, Magnetic Nail Care distributor since 2003, salon and nail academy owner since 2004.
I have always been extremely passionate about my craft and that has resulted in the past in a column in Irish beauty, nail art publications, being asked to write several articles for 'Readers Digest' and some other bits&pieces.
At the moment, I haven't touched anyone elses nails since january this year, and i am working fulltime now for a major computer company as a foreign language agent..... I haven't even been 'Geeking' until last night....
Magnetic and I have parted ways about a year/year and a half ago mainly because of differences in opinion and NOT because of me falling out of love with the brand-still one of the best out there!
I dabbled with a few other brands (Nail Creation, Pure Nails and Palms Extra) but apart from the latter found the brains behind them a little too pushy regarding the relatively small market here in Northern Ireland- if that was the wrong impression than i apologize to anyone from those companies right now, but after my 'very expensive' Magnetic years, i wanted things done on my terms for a change.....enough said about that now!
Anyway, I found through the years that clients were flooding through my doors-complaining like mad about the competition-telling me I was (and i am!!!) the next best thing to sliced bread etc etc...never to be seen again.
I also found the competition literally spying on me by sending 'mystery shoppers' who would pump me for business information (the 'Bourne Identity ring any bells???:lol
This of course tells us more about them than me, but still- very strange and disturbing! Let's not get into strange calls, appointments booked and not showing up, telephone numbers being false when you check them etc...
Managed to build up a good solid clientele in a town that has weird loyalties and worked steadily on building up my reputation as a nail educator. Trained girls regularly but I must admit that it is very frustrating to have people booking in and then not sending a deposit....it's just the dissapointments and (even sadder) the fact that after a while i actually was surprised when a deposit would be paid-and that shouldn't be the case....
It was starting to of course effect the day to day business, because if someone books a few days with me, I cannot book normal clients! If a week later you still don't have a deposit, you have to say: shoot! Could have booked those clients in anyway!!! ggrgrgrg.
But still, things went well and i was starting to get to the point that something was gonna give, OR I needed help...
A few years ago I decided to hire a girl on a parttime basis, one of my most talented students and I paid her decent wages, commission, discounts, free own treatments, free nail art by me etc etc
Started of well, she would cover work in the salon, I would focus on getting the nail academy off the ground and was also travelling to colleges for nail art classes and Tooth Fairy training (which would than get my 'Nail' name out there as well!!!)
Then some complaints started to come in, she turned out to be less willing to do her bit and her work became sloppy- after a few months we mutually agreed to call it a day, she is now in a completely different line of work and very happy! Nice girl, still stay in touch but guess nail biz is not for her...
Still...business wise a bit of a blow.
Had loads of room to spare and decided to rent a room out for a beauty girl... What a mistake.
She was not completely new but had only done clients from home and a bit mobile, so instead of paying rent I offered her that in exchange of me getting a % of her turn-over (which included water/electricity/rates etc and all this officially through the books!!!!) she could build up clientele and we would see about proper rent in 6 months,
I sorted out the room with a new light system and she and her mum put in new beauty room furniture etc. Included her in my new yellow pages add as well and only charged her a tenner a month for that (I had a nice full colour biggie!)
I promoted her like mad because any beauty clients she already had, might become my clients as well!!! Sorted her out with business stationery, introduced her around etc etc
Disaster from the start: she would stay in the back-watching 'sex and the city' dvds all day (my electricity bill trippled!!!), was ignoring MY clients when she did walk passed (they could be her 'bread and butter') and for someone having apperantly a good business from home she only brought in her auntie and granny....and that auntie treated me like dirt???:irked:
WHATEVER!!!
I personally might have realised after a short while that her 'ignoring clients' was a sign of severe shyness but it is beyond me that someone in this business (who is loud enough in the room with a regular client!) is so demure when it comes to possible new clients....she was completely different with me on a one-to-one basis and I couldn't have known what she was like with strangers...
My clients actually complained about her behaviour.....
I sorted out a new more general reception area (never really any need for that when on my own to be honest...) and i had to almost physically persuade her to sit there as well! Showing her face!!! Answering the phone!!!
I said from the start: i will answer your phone when you are busy, you will answer mine, makes sense-no missed appointments etc. she actually was too scared to answer my phone until she got over that fear....
A real shame, because she was good at what she did-it turned out that her mum was the one pushing her (she did beauty college herself years ago and never did anything with that education, must have seen this as a "2nd chance???") and this poor girl became increasingly depressed about her business not doing well which of course didn't do the atmosphere in the salon a lot of good, her mother actually started to blame me as well!
3 months after it started it blew up with her crying in the car afraid to face me
rolleyes mother hysterical and me dumbstruck that a chat to either get it sorted once and for all OR to get rid of HER (if the former proved pointless)turned into me getting blamed for things and ME getting ditched...they still owe me money by the way.
:zzz: you are still with me so far?????
To cut a long story short, towards the end of 2006 my mum got breastcancer (is fine now!!!!:hug
and after some very stressfull months and a lot of mental anguish I decided that enough was enough...business was making money but not worth the stress involved. More important things in life!was thinking about switching brands to get a bit of oompf back and had a few chats with Gigi regarding this, which i was very grateful for...but I never acted on any advice because I wanted to get back on my emotional feet first.
Talked to all my clients about me going mobile (all of them were very enthousiastic!!!), took the plunge, closed the shop at the end of august last year and only got contacted by 3 clients!!!!
Did the promotion and all that stuff, but what a regular customer says and what they actually do is not necesarilly linked!!! So, hugely dissapointed is not the term i would prefer to use.
I was then headhunted by a local business man to set up his nail bar!
FAB!!!! Loads of promises and the feeling that 'this is too good to be true???'
Good salary, fabulous expensive area, I do my bit and he sorts the finances, I am the manager, will have staff paid for by him and am similar level to the manager for his hairsalon.
we had long discussions, he paid me what I asked for and he offered me the position...
how ideal? NOT!
he promised me the earth and it turned into a 'bullying' situation.....
right before Xmas last year my daddy (who is perfectly ok now and even back at work at the age of 70!) drops stone dead in the house (turned grey..with just my mum there-screaming), mama gets people-local police woman does cpr, 2 ambulances arrive, he had a massive heart attack and the ambulance guy was shaking his head at my mum, not to get her hopes up.... they tried to kick start him several times and he had a heart beat again whilst on route to the hospital.
Only about 2% make it there alive, and eventhough his brain could have been mush by then, the fantastic cardiologist decides to give papa the benefit of the doubt (his heart DID start and that meant it was probably ok) and performs surgery.
I didn't have a clue about all this until my sis's hubbie called from the Netherlands and i found out whilst doing a set of nails that papa was in surgery that very moment...
strated screaming, crying etc etc (am a daddies girl..)
called my husband who was coming over to collect me and I finished this client because what else apart from crying can i do? (the manager of the hairdressing salon owned by the same business man actually had the nerve to ask me to finish this client...:smack
And what a set of nails did i deliver??? absolutely perfect!!!! A++:lol:
was on a flight to Schiphol airport a 6am the next morning and my dad is now officially according to the medical staff a complete miracle!!!! apart from the few days around when it happened, full memory is back, completely normal and even slowely back at work as Holland's best bicycle repair dude!!!
On my return several days later, things got from bad to worse (this hair girl was upset with me that I was happy about my dad's recovery because another member of staff had just lost her granny...eventhough the girl in question and i were very chummy and SHE was very happy for me...
)It got to the point where this guy was actually screaming at me and my husband (how grown up am I at the age of 38???? :lol
called him up and resigned on my behalf! (didn't know he actually was planning that!!!!):zzz: getting there! no worries!!!
Found this job now, within a week and a half of looking, was hired straight away and have been here since end of january. Nice enough work, great collegues, loads of fun! down side; long days, up very, very early because of train travel and very tired!
As i said earlier, haven't touched someone elses nails for months and have had the ususal emailers/callers about training courses (Trendy Talons / Northern Ireland Nail Academy- if that rings any bells) whose tune now is to never follow up on their calls. Have totally lost the drive to act like a proper sales person and to chase them.
Something my husband said got me thinking, in maybe a few years (working parttime by then possibly) I could maybe rent a tiny industrial unit and maybe do wholesale 5 mornings a week and do a bit of training? And as soon as i think that I hate myself because right now I don't even want to look at someone elses nails....and i used to live for this business.
I thought i got the nail thing out of my system, actually feel very resentful now when people comment on my nails, very annoyed that coming from being seriously the person who introduced completey wacky nail art in to NI (and i know for a fact that anyone who does anything the way i do it, has been trained by me, or has bought the Dutch nail art book that i translated on Magnetic's behalf and got similar ideas out of that!!! Doesn't mean someone elses style is lousy!!!! Don't hit me mentally, but what I do IS special!!!:green
from someone specialising in toe nail art (and being 1 of 3 salons in NI offering that to any extend), that clients can be so fickle and just drop you like 'that'???
Anyway, 6 pages later, am very desillusioned, feel like all my hard work from the last 12/13 years is wasted (and don't get me wrong, my husband totally supports anything i do, does not agree with my perception of being a faillure etc etc!!!) but I am also not happy about the fact that 'acqaintances' are sooooooooooooooooo happy that I appearantly in their minds must have gone bankrupt!!! Why would you give up having a "successful" business????
Have gone from actually being recognised by magazine readers at a few trade shows to being a tiny ant in the hill and that doesn't feel nice either,
very silly I know...but it is like I am back to square one...
Sorry for this huge moan....:cry:
any spelling mistakes, pc in work hasn't got spelling checker and i AM Dutch!!!!!
:hug:
