Why Independent Stylists Should Re-Think Everything About Luxury Haircare Retailing

If you retail in your salon, you should read this. If you retail small brands, you should FOR SURE read this, and if you're hooked on only selling products in your salon that are also available on Amazon, please, for the love of all things holy, read THIS. A friend of mine shared that little gem with me a while ago with me and it's been my go-to "I FREAKING TOLD YOU SO" ever since.

"Finger decided he would sell Oribe on Amazon if the company squashed the unauthorised sellers. His salon partners agreed and the reward turned out to be well worth the risk. “The sales are phenomenal,” reports Finger. Online now accounts for 35 percent of Oribe’s sales, a number that could reach 50 percent in three years."

When Oribe starts selling on Amazon, that's a pretty huge wake-up call, or, at least it should be.

If you're making a ton of money with retail, by all means, keep going! I don't want to discourage anyone from anything - other than feeling frustrated that clients go to Amazon, Ulta, Sephora, etc. for products that you show them how to use.

Some of these things are gong to sound kind of savage, so remember, I just want you present some options and get everyone thinking outside of the box in a more self empowered way.

Here are few things I want you to remember:

1. Most product companies don't really give a &*$* about you, the independent stylist.

Independent stylists are small potatoes in a world of Amazon and Ulta and Youtubers. Even larger, commission based salons are becoming second tier in this day and age. This isn't personal, it's business- and that's totally fine. Annoying ASF, but fine.

Haircare companies are not non-profit entities designed to feed stylists egos and fill their pocketbooks. I'm saying this to you as tough love - I don't want to see stylists become enamoured with smaller lines that not many people know about and then feel shocked when their clients start re-upping online or asking if you honor the discount code the youtuber offered. When they only know it exists because you showed them. #thingsthathavehappenedtome #toomanytimes

2. LOWER YOUR EXPECTATIONS of most of these companies when it comes to any kind of loyalty to stylists. Can you order $300k of Redken Shampoo like Ulta can? Do you have 325 THOUSAND followers on youtube or instagram who consistenly buy prodcuts based on your suggestions? Exactly. Sorry, totally not trying to be rude. I don't either. I just say things that need to be said. It doesn't make me a ton of friends or business partners, but it makes me the right ones, I'll promise you that.

Also, why is it some brands really crack down on diversion and other ones don't? BECAUSE THEY ARE STILL MAKING A SHIT TON OF MONEY AND THEY DON'T CARE.

3. Put yourself in their shoes -

Would you rather do twenty five thousand haircuts that cost $20 each for the nicest coolest people ever, and work 100 hours a week until you completed that task, or would you rather do ONE half a million dollar haircut for somoene who really didn't care about you and be done with it, and walk away fanning yourself with a nice wad of cash?

If you answered "the first one" just stop reading now, unfollow me, and go home. I can't help you. If you're starting to see my logic, by all means, read on.

4.Guyyyyyyys.........Independent stylists ARE the $20 haircut to the product comapnies. They might even think you're super cool, but you don't make them big money - compared to their other options. Don't hate the player - hate the game - and take it one step further......DISRUPT THE GAME AND MAKE THE GAME YOUR BITCH.

I was behind this woman in the salon supply store the other day and she was buying arm loads of Pureology while simutaneously hardcore bitching that her clients could also get it at Ulta for the same price. DUDE- 1. false, and 2......

Instead of feeling perpetually f*$ked over by companies selling in Ulta, on Amazon, going to 3rd base with beauty bloggers and vloggers while they're not returning your texts...I'll stop, you get the point....I want you to step away and take the emotion out of the equation and look at it differently.

Ask yourself these questions-

How can the brands I use help make ME money?

Can I sell them in the salon?

If so will clients repeat purchase in the salon or go online to repurchase once they know what to buy?

Sell online?

If I sell this product online, on my own, am I competeing with Amazon? (my personal advice is NEVER compete with Amazon) The actual product company? etc. Will I be able to sell & ship the product for a competitive price and still make a profit that makes doing so worth my time?

Affiliate marketing?

If the company is giving beauty influencers discount codes? Yes? Then they sure as shit can give them to you. Some don't like to do this because it cuts into their bottom line. Just know that if they do it for the "influencers" they already have a system in place and can do it for you.

Using their hashtags on social media?

If I mention this product company or use their hashtag on my social media, am I helping my business or am I helping the product company drive sales to their own website? The smaller the product company the more likely the latter is happening.

What can I ask of them for promoting their brand?

If you find you are showing your clients how and when to properly use their products, and then they are either buying from you once but restocking online or another non salon retail option OR taking pictures or writing down what you use and then going price shopping online, how do you get your fair share for turning them on to the product in the first place?

1. The simplest, quickest way to do this.....

Raise your service prices by 15%-20% call the styling portion of the service a "lesson" and call it a day. This is not sarcasm - this is truth. This is a real option if you are honestly providing value related to product education.

You need to use backbar and you have to pay for it - and if your clients are no longer purchasing retail from you in a traditional way, you are more than justified in raising your prices to makeup for that.

2. Reach out to the company and

be very direct.

"I enjoy using your products - I am finding that I am spending a good deal of time showing my clients how to properly use and apply your products to get amazing results. Unfortunately for my business, your products are readily available for my clients to purchase online either at a lesser price than I can offer, or through a shipping option like amazon, or even through your own site that offers reduced shipping costs and sales/ discounts through bloggers and youtubers/ that I, as a small business, can not afford to compete with. I do like your product line and would like to continue a relationship. Would you be willing to give me an affiliate link that I can place on my website? offer me substantial free backbar products each quarter? Please let me know if and what you are willing to do to work with me. I look forward to a continued and mututally beneficial relationship."

xoxo, if you don't someone else will,

your name here.

It's not wrong to want to know exactly where you stand, or to expect a completely transparent and straightforward

response about what they will and won't/can't do for you.

Lob it out there and see what comes back - how they handle your request will be a great litmus test about what to expect and where they stand.