Mom, I want to open a beauty salon: What to expect
Want to open a beauty salon after you graduate from beauty school? As you know, obtaining your cosmetology license gives you lots of beauty career options. Many of our students feel that owning their own business, a beauty salon, is the right choice for them. There are a few things you need to keep in mind if you want to own your own beauty salon.
1. Overhead to get started. Overhead means the costs you will have to pay every month to keep your doors open. Some examples are rent, electricity and employee salaries. The amount of income, money coming in, has to equal what you need to pay the overhead costs. To get started, you will need to have a good guess as to what your client base will bring into your salon. Most likely it’s not enough in the first several months to pay all the bills. Therefore, consider how much money you need to have saved up to cover the extra costs while you build your business.
2. Long hours and weekends are to be expected. Guess what? Owning a beauty salon means you have to satisfy all the customers all the time. If you are one person short, you’ll need to jump in and fill the spots. Beauty salon hours are typically when people have off from work, like after 5 p.m. on weekdays and all weekend. Be sure you’re prepared to do what it takes.
3. Owning a beauty salon means running a business. It’s not just about cutting, coloring and styling hair. If you own a beauty salon, you also need to balance the books, manage your employees, do inventory of your products and market the beauty salon to keep clients coming in. If there are client issues, it falls to you, the owner of the beauty salon, to resolve them.
The first step in owning a beauty salon is to obtain your cosmetology license. As you know, you’ll have to attend beauty school to get started. Make sure you consider all the extra details so you know what it will be like to own a beauty salon. Between the long hours and costs of running a business, owning a beauty salon is a huge committment.
How about you? Have you owned a beauty salon? What was the biggest challenge? What do you wish you knew then that you know now? At the end of the day, is the income and scheduling freedom worth the stress of a start-up business?
