Name: How to Reopen: Changes coming to hair and nail salons
Uploaded: 2020-05-21
Duration: 4 min 25 s
Description: Professional Beauty Association Executive Director Steve Sleeper explains how the industry is reacting to coronavirus.

Professional Beauty Association Executive Director Steve Sleeper explains how the industry is reacting to coronavirus.

How to Reopen: Changes coming to hair and nail salons

Retail

PBA's Steve Sleeper on the future of the beauty industry. 

Obviously, the biggest thing is health and safety issues because we're in close contact with people doing services. It's you can't can't get six ft distance. So you know that's a primary concern. And I think one of the benefits of this industry it is a licensed and regulated industry. So you start with people who are trained in infection control and sanitation, and they understand the science of some of that stuff. So it's it's a head start. There's always a state board of cosmetology or state board of Health or some equivalent agency that's responsible for the health and cleanliness and safety of salons and licensed professional. So that's that's the baseline we start with. But we've built obviously a lot of new recommendations, as we've worked with governors offices across the country to help reopening, and we did publish and put out back to work guidelines. So everything from how to manage the new client flow, like I said, how to implement the new cleaning protocols, the PPE requirements, all those things it was pretty comprehensive. Um, we published and pushed out so most of the salons that we worked with and have been talking to you know they've had, you know, weeks, unfortunately to prepare. So most of them have been gearing up to be ready, and they've been trading their teams and going through the new protocols, having kind of a trial run. Head of the teams come in and they're walking through those new protocols and how they're handling clients, how they're cleaning their stations after every client, how they wear their PPE, what they should and shouldn't do while they're donning and doffing it. And it's pretty rigorous. It adds a lot of extra work to the process. But you know, it's necessary that we can help our clients and guests feel safe again. We have a lot of independent stylists who work as independent contractors who work on their own as a business of one, Um, and you know, they're the smallest of all. So I would argue, perhaps, you know, they're feeling the pain, the worst, because they don't have any resources necessarily that are maybe part of a larger organization. My even even unemployment based along with 10 15, 20 people might have a bit of a head start, but it's It's been painful for everyone devastating, I think. Unfortunately, you know, we're gonna see some small businesses fail, right? They just want to have been able to ride this whole thing out. So there will be some of that. You know, there's sort of a downside. There's always an upside for folks to rethink their business. I think it's for people to really focus on the business side. You know, most stylists and cosmetologists are artistic, driven first, and business kind of comes second. At least that's been the traditional path. And I think a lot of them are thinking about Hey, how do I beef up the business acumen? How do I have to get a better position? No matter what happens and what comes down the pipeline, Think long term it will. But I think you know the things in the short term where obviously were the recommendations on going back to work are mast mobile clients, guests and service providers. So, you know, if you're doing something that involves having to get underneath the mass like a beard, trim or facial, those things can't be done right now, right? At least according to our recommendations. So there's gonna be some things are going to be harder to do even even with the PPE on. But I think, you know, assuming we get past this time frame where we've got some, you know, higher level of safety and assurance that we've got this thing under control. Yeah, I think I think that the services will come back. Mm hmm.