Price & Income Ceilings as a Hairstylist: Myth or Reality?

Hello, my friend. Welcome back to The Modern Hairstylist Podcast. So, within my programs, I have a pretty strong belief that you are in one of these four categories of focus and growth when it comes to your journey as an entrepreneurial hairstylist. So, number one is going to be your guest experience, which we can sum up to actually be sales.

So, with your guest experience and within your sales department, you are optimizing your client experience to be the absolute best and most amazing, and then taking your current clientele, taking the people on your, on your plate and the business that you already have, and maximizing the amount of income that you can get out of it. So, that's the first place that we look at. The second part is going to be your growth and your marketing, so how you actually get new clients and new ideal clients into the door. And then you have your operations, which looks like streamlining and automating, um, and delegating your current operations to run your business as smoothly as possible.

And then lastly, which I think is the most important part, um, is inspiration and knowledge and education, which I like to call our discover category. So, within our programs, we have grow, serve, streamline, and discover, and all of those correlate with each of those traditional department names in any business. And the—the theory is, is that you are always going through and cycling through each of those core focuses as you go through your journey as a hairstylist and inevitably, you'll—it—as you go through each section of those, uh, those core focuses through your journey, you should be raising your prices and making more income as you're going through all four, right? So, you raise your prices, you make more income, then you focus on marketing again, you build up your demand, you raise your prices again, right?

And then it just keeps on going on and on and on. But, the question then becomes, do I just keep on raising my prices over and over and over and over and over again and, like, lifting them to skyrocket heights? And, like, when—w-what price is too high? Like, when have I priced myself out of my market?

And so that's why this question comes up. In today's episode, we're gonna be talking about why I truly believe that the ceiling is as high as you want it to be, and also some alternative ways that you can scale and grow your income that don't have to necessarily do with your prices, and, um, some other things as well, too, that are relevant to this conversation. So, if you're ready to get into it, let's freaking go. What's the tea, friend?

My name's Hunter Donia, industry business educator for hairstylists, but my friends just call me Hunty. Whether it be growing your clientele, making more money, or automating and streamlining your systems, in the next 20 minutes or so, you'll be hearing realistic, actionable strategies to create a beautiful career for yourself behind the chair. So, if you're ready to get into it, welcome to The Modern Hairstylist podcast. So, I have a friend, a very, very, very close friend of mine, and for those of you who know me, you know that I love live music.

Like, concerts and going to concerts and music festivals is how I spend a lot of my free time, and I've gone to at least 100 shows , um, and I spend a whole lot of money on going to those shows. And this one really good friend of mine is kind of like my concert buddy. Like, he's probably the person that I've gone to the most concerts with, and we have really similar tastes in music and we have a great time with each other. And so he, um, i-i-honestly, he doesn't make a crazy amount of money.

He makes just enough to pay his bills and get by, although he oftentimes does complain or gets nervous about being able to make his rent every week, right? But, he also spends a shit ton of money on concert tickets, right? And so, the reason why I bring this up, and the reason why I bring him up, is because, you know, the other, the other month, we both decided that we s- we were gonna spend $360 on a festival ticket because the lineup was so insane. Like, these were all of our artists that we absolutely love, we listen to on the daily, and that really fit, uh, within our crowd of people that we like.

Like, all these artists were very, like, queer , and they— and—and oftentimes had very queer audiences, and so they were speaking directly to us, so we were like, "Hell yeah, this $360 is completely worth it to go to this festival," even though my friend doesn't really make that much money, and in the first place, to be able to spend that much money on that type of ticket. But, he made it work. He prioritized it. He found the value in that to be high enough to make it work, to make sacrifices and to reprioritize his life to go to something that he found to be super valuable.

And not only that, but he goes to a lot of concerts, way m- even more than me, and he will spend a lot of money on these concerts because he finds a lot of value in them and it's worth it to him to be spending that much amount of money and then to sacrifice on however else he has to struggle and get by. So, the point of bringing up this story is that if you're offering a service that is really valuable to a certain market or clientele, then you can get people to spend however much they n- they need to spend to get the result that they're looking for. A lot of the times people will be like, "Oh, well, I'm in a small town and I can't charge these prices and nobody's looking for this," and I'm like, "Dude, you are in the perfect circumstance to be able to raise your prices to insane rates and to build a crazy amount of demand." Why?

Because of your supply in your area being so low and the demand naturally being so high, because if you're filling a niche within your small little area possibly, even if the medium average income is on the lower side, then your opportunity to get a shit ton of people banging down your doors is absolutely insane because you have zero competition.So, the reason I bring that up is because normally when we have these conversations about this topic, is there a cap on my income, is there a cap on my prices, am I charging too much for my small little area, it's actually quite the opposite. I think that the people in the smallest areas can charge the most because you are filling such a needed niche and there's such a low supply in comparison to what you're offering. So, no matter what, if you can offer a valuable enough service and be fulfilling a need or a want that is big enough, then somebody will be willing and will make it work to spend as much money as you're asking for.

That is my theory and I think that it's true in so many different circumstances, right? So, don't feel like just because you're in this area or you're with whatever your current circumstance is, that you can't charge a shit ton of money because you absolutely can as long as your marketing and your sales are- are really good and your customer experience is really good and you're speaking to a specific niche and you're fulfilling a specific problem, right? Another example that I would like to bring up as far as, like, being- somebody being willing to spend a shit ton of money, um, is myself with these freaking Taylor Swift concert tickets, right? I'm- wouldn't necessarily consider myself, like, a Swiftie.

Like, I'm not, like, obsessed with Taylor, okay? However, I really like a lot of her music and I think that she puts on a great show. So, I saw Reputation Tour, um, a- like, a couple years ago whenever she was touring it in Philly, and I probably spent, like, I don't know, like, $100 to $200 on those tickets which I think is pretty fair for a stadium concert, right? With somebody- with an artist that is that massive, right?

But then, of course, Eras Tour comes around and I liked her new album. Like I said, I like her music a lot. I would love to see her in concert, but I would have never expected myself to spend more than $200 on a Taylor Swift ticket. It just doesn't seem that worth it to me.

But what happened was, as we all know, that the Eras Tour became absolutely insane, right? And the demand for those tickets became absolutely insane to the point where this became a huge phenomenon within our culture and the world. Like, literally, if we think about how significant it is, what this tour is actually doing and the headlines that it's making, the records that it's breaking, it really is astonishing, right? And so for me, now it's no longer just about going to see Taylor.

Now it's about becoming a part of this experience and experiencing this thing that these- that a massive amount of people want to experience as well. And literally just for the pure fact that there wasn't a lot of, uh, tickets to go around and the tickets were seen as so valuable and so scarce that people would be willing to spend thousands of dollars on them, that made me and a lot of other people want to go to the concert, the tour even more so, right? I guarantee you if there was a bunch of tickets to go around and they weren't listed on StubHub for $1,000, that people wouldn't be fiending and freaking out and doing everything that they can and spending a shit ton of money on those tickets to get into that arena. I promise you.

But because of the scarcity, the urgency, also the experience, right, and the phenomenon, the demand on those tickets, it made people more- more willing to take action and make things work to get those tickets. So, I ended up spending $600 on a floor ticket to see Taylor and I scored that ticket very rarely. I was like, "This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I am snatching up this ticket."

And $600 is a shit ton of money. Like, I ha- I don't think I've ever spent that much money on a concert ticket, like, literally ever. And like I said, I've been to at least 100 concerts. But to me, it was completely valuable and completely worth it because of the demand on those tickets.

So, the reason I bring this up is because if you relate this back to our business, if you create enough demand and urgency on your service for your business and the- the products and the services that you're providing, then it creates a perception of more value within your services which will then make it so people are willing to spend more money to be able to get into you because you are now a commodity. You are rare and it's difficult to get in with you and people will pay more for access and for something that is in high demand. So, if you can get your business to a point where you've built a lot of demand for yourself and people are banging down the doors, then that will organically create a higher level and a higher willingness of how much money somebody is willing to spend with you. For me, in my behind-the-chair business, for example, because I'm still doing hair once a week, like, I have a really tight, inconvenient schedule.

I only work one day a week. That- those times and days change all the time and I'm charging high dollars for the amount- the services that I'm offering, right? But I still have people banging down the doors to get in with me because I've created such a tight demand for myself. So, that- this is the other part of the conversation which is, if you can create enough demand for yourself, then I believe that you can create the willingness in people to spend a shit ton of money with you.

So, that's just another example from what's going on in the world. And, you know, the interesting thing is- is- I'm- I'm talking about entertainment, right? I'm talking about something that is purely recreational. For a lot of people, hair and beauty is completely not a luxury.

It's not just recreational. For a lot of them, it's a feeling of need and, like, want, right, that is so high and intense, much more intense than going to a concert. So, like, although the comparison is a little bit different as far as industries go, I think that it makes the- makes my case even more strong because we have this unique factor of, you know, we always say that we're a recession-proof business, right? And that's because people look at their hair as a need and not just a want.

So, that's my tea on that, my friend. If you can build enough demand, then I believe you can charge whatever the hell you want to. Now, this also brings me to my next point, and it goes back to what I talked about at the top of this episode in the intro, which is the cycle of you growing your business and then raising your prices and then growing it again, and then raising your prices, right? So, the other thing that i- important to take into consideration when we talk about, you know, raising your income and is there a- is there a cap on your prices, is the way that you get to have a raise, the way that you get to raise your income, is by getting the demand on your time, building enough demand to where you can have a substantial price increase, lose some of that demand, and then allow people who are willing to spend that higher price with you to come into that book, and then do it over and over and over and over and over again.

That is the formula, right? So, what happens when you kind of capped out on the demand that you can get with the current efforts that you have now? Well, the next thing that you need is you need to just get more leads. You need to get more potential new clients to get eyeballs on your services.

So, how do we do that? We expand our marketing efforts into other places that we weren't before. So, let's say, for example, you've built, you've mastered and you've built a beautiful marketing machine on Instagram. Like, you're getting a shit ton of clients from Instagram, right?

But you raised your prices to be pretty high ticket, and you're- you're seeing that your demand isn't as high as you need it to be to be able to then substantially raise your prices again. Well, maybe you just need more leads and you're- you're not optimizing and utilizing other spaces to be able to get those leads into your chair, or get those eyeballs onto your business. So, you've mastered Instagram, but now maybe let's go and look at what we can do with Facebook, right? But, you a- y- you know, and- and- and ideally, you know, maximize the opportunities that you have with Facebook and that platform to get those leads and get business into the door.

But then the question becomes, I'm only one person, I already work my ass off to perfect this one platform and utilize this one platform to get a bunch of leads, right? How the hell am I gonna have the time to focus on the Facebook, right, or the other platform, Pinterest, or to do local network marketing and focus all my time on that, right? Because I wanna make sure that you're putting 100% effort into those other platforms to actually make them work. You've gotten to a point, hopefully, where your tickets are so high that you are making enough money to be able to then start to delegate your already well-oiled Instagram machine, for example, to be able to be taken over so then you can go and learn and optimize and perfect a new marketing lead generation system on a new platform, or in a different way, right?

You're creating a new funnel, and it's best that you're the one who actually starts and creates that new funnel, because nobody's gonna be able to do it like you're gonna be able to do it. Nobody's gonna be able to sell your business like you can sell your business and your products and your services, right? So, you've perfected and you've mastered one platform, now it's time to go and perfect a new one, but keep the already working one going, right, by delegating it possibly to somebody else. So, hiring a virtual assistant to be able to take that over for you.

So, then you will get multiple leads, more leads hopefully, from multiple places. You'll get more eyeballs on your business, which will then mathematically increase the amount of demand that you have for your business. And then you'll be able to raise your prices again and get to the next level. So, that's just another thing, another way that you can look at, okay, I've capped this out.

I feel like my- I'm doing the same thing, but I'm getting the- I'm not- I'm not growing anymore. I'm not getting the same results as I used to. There's a saying in business which is, what got you here won't get you there, right? So, in order to break through to your next level, you have to be doing something different, but that doesn't mean that you wanna stop doing what's working right now, right?

But first you gotta make the thing that's working right now, or- or the thing that you want to work right now, first you gotta make it work. You gotta make sure that the thing that you already have in place is already well-oiled and working before you start to expand your efforts, or else you're gonna spread yourself too thin and none of your efforts are gonna work and they're all gonna fall to shit, okay? So, that's my tea on that. My next thing that I wanna speak with you about is, is that there's so many different ways that you can scale your current business, okay?

Scale and grow your current business/ take some of the responsibility off of you to be able to make the income, right? So, the first thing, of course, and I- for me, this was not really... Some of this was a part of my business, Behind The Chair, and then some of it became, like, no, like, I'll never do this. Which is hiring, right?

Hiring an operator to actually make income for you, right? So, that looks like opening up your own salon, or that looks like hiring an assistant. For me, I did have personal assistants behind the chair. Granted, it was for a short amount of time because I very quickly transitioned into education, but when I had those personal assistants behind the chair, I was able to get more- fit more clients into my day, therefore was able to make more money and was still profitable on the back end.

And then a lot of people end up opening up salons because there's so much demand on their time that they want to take the demand and then spread it across other people to be able to take as many people as possible and not have to refer them elsewhere or get them out to somebody else and not make a profit off of that referral or off of that person who wants to spend money with that person, right? So, that is how you can go ahead and you can start to scale your business. I mean, I've even heard of models, which I think is super fascinating, where you are now the person who just formulates and consultates and does, like, the special parts of the service, but then you have an assistant actually be the one who applies the color, right? So, you could literally just sit down with a client, do the consultation, come up with the formula and the plan, and then have an assistant actually apply the color for you, and then you just move on to the next one.

And then you can create a crazy machine, right, of having a bunch of different assistants who are doing this stuff for you throughout the day. And I know that that's thinking really crazy and big and different, but it- why not, right? Think bigger.Think-- think out of the box.

Think about things that have never been done before, you've never thought about. That is how you get to the next level. That is how great, insanely profitable and longstanding businesses break through those glass ceilings, is by thinking outside of the box, and those are some examples. Now, I'm somebody who I was like, I never wanna fucking open up my own salon.

It sounds like hell to me. However, working with assistants seems like a feasible thing that I would be interested in, that would bring me joy and would be profitable and help me get to my next level of growth behind the chair as well too, and also help me utilize the demand that I have of my time, but, uh, make more money while I'm doing it, you know? So, that's something that you can s- consider. Another-- the other ways to scale what you have going on right now is, of course, you know your retail sales.

We talked about, you know, making sure that you're optimizing your current business that you have right now and squeezing every dollar out of it that you possibly can, right? So, if you're not selling retail, if you're not upping your average ticket with add-ons as much as you possibly can, then that is really what you want to start focusing on to be able to optimize what you have in your chair right now. That will really maximize your income and help you make more money without having to raise your prices or without having to get any new people through the door, right? And then we have affiliate link marketing.

So, if you wanted to go beyond just your local area, your local market, then you could start an affiliate online business in which you are advertising products or s- or whatever for other people, and then you make money through those affiliate link sales. That is absolutely so possible for you as a hairstylist. We have somebody in my program who does this so excellently and makes a killing doing it on social media, and I think it's a really fascinating and interesting way for you to scale beyond whatever you think your cap is, right? Then, of course, you could start education.

You could get into education. You could start taking whatever methods that you have that are working really well for you right now and then create a business out of it, just like I did, right? Um, you could start your own product line. Like, there's so many opportunities that you have to build beyond whatever you think your cap is right now, right?

Um, so the-- I hope that you understand that the-- the gist of this episode is no matter what you want to do, no matter where you want to go, if you just want to stick behind the chair, do what you love to do and make a killing doing that, and you don't wanna be an educator, you don't wanna have assistants, you don't wanna open up a salon, I feel you, my friend. And from my examples earlier, I hope that you can see that with the right strategy and thinking bigger and making sure that you really understand how to market, you can make that happen for yourself and you can make a shit ton of money doing it, right? On the other side of things, like, if you're like, "Okay, well, I think I have like a what's next that may be different than this," then that's absolutely possible for you too. You've built a skillset that is really valuable and the knowledge that you've retained from listening to this podcast, from being a part of my programs, from educating yourself, and also from your own experience, nobody can take that away from you.

And that is so, so, so valuable and you can do so many things with that that can help you break that glass ceiling, right? As long as you think outside of the box and you're willing to put in the work. And lastly, before you even think about scaling or starting a new endeavor, and I know that I've talked about this before, or starting on a new platform and expanding your marketing efforts, like I said earlier, make sure the current business that you have now, the current system, the current funnels that you have right now are 100% working and scaled and well-oiled. Because if you try to start another endeavor but you haven't first figured out the first one first, right?

How many times can I say first? Then you're not going to be able to give the new endeavor or your new action the energy and love and care that it needs to actually be successful. So, let's first start with making sure what you have now is as optimized as possible, streamlined as possible, and then let's focus on getting to the next level and breaking through that glass ceiling, all right? So, my friend, if you enjoyed this episode, I would really appreciate it if you left me a five-star testimonial wherever you're listening to this, preferably a written one because I think that those help me reach more hairstylists just like you You and I, my friend, I know that you and I care a lot about this industry and I know that you may want to help me in my mission, in our mission together, of revolutionizing this industry, and you leaving that five-star testimonial and a cute little blurb, um, really helps us make that happen.

So, I appreciate you doing that in advance. I hope that you enjoyed this episode. Thank you so much for tuning in and I'll see you in the next one. So much love to you.

Peace out, girl scout.

End of transcript. © 2023 Hunter Donia LLC.