Ep. 417 • The Essentials of Professionalism w/ Antonio Estrada - The Hair Game

Episode Transcript
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(00:10):
The Hair Game (00:00)
Hey Antonio, how are you? I'm great. For the listeners who don't know you yet, you're an Arizona hairdresser and extension specialist. You're an ambassador for Sexy Hair, Salon-centric and Bio-ionic. And we're gonna get into your whole story. Let's just start from the beginning. Where are you from and why hair? Why didn't she become an attorney or a doctor?
Antonio Estrada (00:02)
Good, how are you?
Yeah,
so I'm from what? Yeah, I don't know. They were very chill. My parents had me when they were very young, so they weren't really like the best.
Your parents might've told you that, right?
What's the right word? I don't want to say adults because they were good adults, but they weren't very like motivating. So there is kind of let us free. Yeah, but anyways, um, yeah, I feel like it kind of shaped me to be the hard worker that I am today.
Okay, that's funny. That could be good, by the way.
yeah, so I'm from New Mexico, southern New Mexico. It's a border town, very small town. I was raised with a firefighter as a dad, so I thought that that's what I wanted to do. ⁓ As I grew up, I realized that I was very social and I love the creative side of life. I love to like go to parties and get dressed up. And then that's when I realized like, I think my path is gonna be more on the creative side, even though it took me, you know,
five or six years to figure out exactly what I wanted to do. I always had the passion for hair. For me, I was in the closet a lot of my life, so I thought that hair would be like the first sure, you know, coming out story. as soon as I came out to my parents, I started hair school and it's just been amazing since then.
What age did you come out to your parents?
24.
And was that difficult?
⁓ you know, I was with a partner at the time, my ex partner, and he was pressuring me to come out to them. ⁓ my family, never have like me and my family, we don't have like a strong connection when it comes to like communication. We just kind of talk about anything. So it was very, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it was actually easy for me to not have to talk to them because we
Was your dad was a strong silent type? He was a firefighter who didn't talk about emotions?
about being gay because I lived with my partner at the time. We had a one bedroom apartment. We had two small dogs. I mean, it's very obvious that we're more than just friends. So I didn't really feel the need to, you know, voice it and actually say I'm gay. But as soon as I did, ⁓ they kind of just were like, yeah, we already knew and we love you. So it was, it was stressful, but it was a good, ⁓ good conversation, I guess. Yes.
Yeah, that's awesome.
sure great relief.
And so by at 24 you had so you felt the creativity you were going to go on a different path ⁓ and so when did you ⁓ when did you go to hair school?
When I was 24, I literally came out to my parents and started her school like the next month.
Okay.
So what were you doing before that?

(00:31):
⁓ so before that I was like bartending and waiting tables. So. Yeah.
Okay,
all right. Which could be a bit of a trap, by the way. I've had some friends, ⁓ plenty of friends who were bartenders and you can make good money, right? Especially as a 20 year old or 21 year old, 22 year old, you can make really good money as a bartender. Especially if the owner of the bar wasn't there a lot. I know there's a lot of, maybe not anymore, because everything's digital, but.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
But I remember some of these guys making six figures bartending at like 21. And I was wondering to myself, like, how long are they going to do that? So yeah. All right.
Yeah, it's definitely, could
be, it could be a trap for sure. I know when I was waiting tables and bartended, I got into this vicious cycle of having to make money and living beyond my means and needing that extra hundred bucks. So that definitely kind of created like a foundation for me being a hairstylist, knowing like, I'm never going to be in that kind of situation anymore, but it was really fun and you can make a lot of money. So yeah.
Yeah.
And you know, you're staying up late and you're waking up late and you know, kind of hard to imagine getting, you know, a more normal job that starts at a more normal time. And, and there's a pay cut. Yeah. There's a pay cut. And the same for being a hairdresser. It's going to take you a while before you start making more money.
more normal pay. Yes, the pay cut.
Okay, so you made this kind of transition and I'm sure it had been building up and you were very anxious about it for a long period of time and then it was probably very relieving when you got it behind you and you could kind of feel free to move forward.
Yes.
I feel like that's when I started dressing like a little more ⁓ gay, I guess you could say. I was just feeling really good. And as soon as I started hair school, I just felt like my whole life shifted. And it was like, that's what I was supposed to do. I've always loved hair. I always loved my hair growing up. I would style my younger sister's hair. So once I started, I was like, okay, this is where I'm supposed to be. And it kind of just progressed from there into what I've created now.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Were you good at it early?
I feel like I
will. Yeah, right from the jump. I was pretty good. I've always been good at styling hair. That's always been like something that I just have this creative ability to like do. I was never the best at coloring. ⁓ I was good at cutting. But as soon as I got into assistant role at this one I was working at, I realized this is now a business and I want to make money and color is like where you could really bring in some cash. So I got good at that. Yeah.
And I like how you went to beauty school a little bit later than maybe most. ⁓ At least in, you know, in all the people that I've gotten to know in the industry over all the years, people tend to go into beauty school sometimes around, you know, 18 to 22 or whatever. ⁓ But you with your more mature sort of experience and outlook on things, I'm sure you...
Yes.
probably hit the ground running. Did you feel like you hit the ground running?

(00:52):
Yes,
I did 1000%. I mean, I've never been the best at school. I even graduated high school a year late. So I kind of start everything a little later. But as soon as I got into there, I was like, okay, this is it. I need to start like making money. My relationship at the time wasn't like the best. And I kind of felt like I needed to like really step up. And I had tried to, I went to college for like, just like the basic general classes.
and I would start and then drop out and then start and then drop out. So I was kind of like on this last, like, I don't know which one to say, this last chance of like making it. And that's when I started school. And luckily, you're just all kind of worked out.
All right, so then you graduate and you felt like you're in the zone. You felt like you're in the right place. And where'd you go first?
So I went to just, it was really interesting, right? When I went to school, I lived a block away from the school and then I waited tables across the street from where I went to school. And then the salon that I worked at was in like the same like plaza as the restaurant. So my whole life was like just really close. It was really nice. I still used one, but I didn't need one. Yeah, so right out of. ⁓
wow, convenient.
Even more amazing.
You don't even need a car. That's amazing.
I have a lot of stories, so if I'm doing too much, just let me know. But right after school, I was feeling the pressure to get a job right away. The last relationship I had was just a little toxic, so I was feeling a lot of pressure. And I had wanted to work at a different salon that I saw. So I reached out to the team at the school that placed you in salons, and they said, what's the email for this salon, blah, blah, blah. And they're like, by the way, this salon is hiring.
No, this is great.
And I was like, where, where's that salon? And then I realized, wait, it's like right here. So I went over there and I got the job that same day. So.
It's so
funny you hadn't noticed it before that. That it was right there, you just hadn't looked around yet.
Yeah, I don't know. Yeah.
I just was like so busy from like, I literally would go to school like Monday through Friday from nine to like four and then wait tables from like five to 10. Just like the whole solid year just to make some money. Yeah.
Isn't amazing? I mean, you're still really young. I'm almost 50. And I think to myself, geez, that's a long day. The things that we do when we're young, ⁓ yeah, we have to do them when we're young because when we get older, we're not able to do them, especially working at a bar with the highly energetic and social environment. And did you... ⁓
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You had gotten to know a lot of people at the bar, I assume.
It's funny, I actually had a client that I still do till this day. she all, every time I get a new assistant, we always talk about how I used to make her the best cosmopolitans. Yeah.

(01:13):
Nice.
So that's the story I hear pretty often is people building their clientele from the bartender job that they have. Server job a little bit, not so much, but the bartender job, right? Cause everybody's hanging out there. Everybody wants to know the bartender. And so you get to know people and they come in, you know, pretty often and, and it's a pretty good way to like parlay, you know, a career in hair.
Yeah, think especially if you're, you know, I was very excited about doing hair and I felt very strongly about it, especially when I started assisting. I just like saw like the type of money you can make and I was looking at all the other stylists who were busy and I'm just like, okay, this is like it. So I just started promoting myself. And I think when someone's just really excited about something, you want to go to them, you want to be around them. So it just kind of like just happened organically.
It happens naturally and it's technically maybe a sales pitch, but it doesn't feel like a sales pitch to the person that you're talking to about your excitement. And it just, makes somebody want to be part of it, right? And it kind of makes me think about this industry's effort to sell take-home products and retail products to our clients and how it's been such a struggle for so many years.
Yeah.
Yes. Yeah.
And it seems like the brands who have the best education are always talking about just talk about how great this product would be for your client. And that excitement will encourage them to want to take home the product.
It's really that simple. Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, it's really that simple, right? It's like,
you just gotta be excited. Maybe some people aren't so apt to be excited or to show excitement.
You have a really, you're very personable and you have a big personality and you clearly like people and talking, you know, just communicating with somebody else. And so it's easy to see how your excitement could come out, especially in a social setting. Okay, so you go to the salon and you assisted, said, early on? How long?
Yes. ⁓
it was really funny. My, my timeframe is that kind of like a really similar. So I was in school for like 14 months. I assisted for 14 months and then I got an assistant after 14 months. So every like year or something like big was happening, but yeah, I assisted for about 14 months. I actually failed my first test out, ⁓ at the salon. Yeah.
not school tests.
Not school test. Yeah. So this one I worked at they had like this curriculum, obviously, we have to learn which I love and we still do that now. In my salon that I have with my business partner, we have like assistance that we teach every Monday, all those things. But ⁓ we I actually failed my first test. And it was because of like the bob haircut. And I did so many of them. But that now I'm like really good at them. Yeah.
Because you're
new to them then.
Yeah, and I didn't really like I never I didn't really like structured cuts. I liked them really long and pretty, you know, so it was just a little more difficult for me. But once I kind of like got it, I got it. So yeah.
All right,
very good. So you kind of evolved up like that and you were slowly building a clientele, I assume.
Yes. Coming in early, staying late, coming in on days off, you know, all those things. Yeah. Being available. That's what I like to say. Yeah.

(01:34):
and
grinding.
being available, that's so important. I mean, part
of what I wanted to talk to you about today is a little bit of the evolution of the industry over the last five years, really kind of, you know, from the time that we got back into the salon after COVID to now. Now, give me a timeframe on when you got out of school. What year did you get out of school?
my god, 2012? 13 maybe? Yeah.
2012, okay. So
you have a lot of experience. So you look much younger than your experiences. So you have a lot of experience going back before COVID, but coming out of COVID, it was a very interesting time. People had money in their pockets, disposable cash. They hadn't been going on vacation or even going to restaurants or even going to salons. They had extra cash.
Yeah.
They were excited to get back in the salon. got back into the salon. Arizona was much better than California and New York. were in California, we were shut down forever. It wasn't until January 25th of 2021 that we got back into the salon. Everywhere else was pretty much sooner. And, ⁓ but of course,
Yes.
the experience in the salon was different, right? We had to wear masks. We had those stupid plexiglass screens in between the receptionist and the client and all sorts of other protocols. People were nervous, you know, am I gonna get sick? I, you know, is this gonna bad thing gonna happen? that bad? And so customer service, as we've been talking about it as an industry for all these decades, really became
less important than let's all be safe, right? And let's just get back in the salon and actually get my hair done, get my hair colored. I've been waiting for all this time. And then as we move from 2021 into 2022, people were very busy. The clients were coming back in. And then as we go from 2022 to 2023,
Some people brought the customer service back into the experience and some people didn't. And so what was your experience with that kind of topic back then?
I
have a couple different perspectives on this because whenever COVID happened, I was still like commissioned. So it was a little different. So I don't have to handle a lot of the things myself. The salon really took the initiative to figure everything out, call clients, all those things. So I wasn't really part of that. We were only off one month and people were begging me to come to their place to do their hair. So I think it's a little different in Arizona because we didn't really like struggle too much with the lack of clients.
Yeah.
If anything, we didn't have enough time for everyone. ⁓ So once I do agree with you that client experience didn't wasn't really priority until recently. And I've seen it in the industry and I've seen it through TikToks, people saying, where can I get a quality blow dryer? Where can I get a good experience? I don't mind paying for it. I need someone to like care and give me a good experience. So for me, client experience has always been number one.
And I feel like that's why I've been able to do very well and make money and kind of, you know, have clients for 13 years because consistent, I'm like reliable. I'm always there when I say I'm going to be there. I just work with them if things go wrong, stuff like that. But now that I'm a salon owner, ⁓ we are about to go in three years, ⁓ owner of Cast Salon and North Phoenix. ⁓ We've noticed for our first year ⁓ when we were doing these calls and we were checking on clients.
we're realizing that they're not seeing like the value and getting the hair done at cast. So then we were like, ⁓ okay. So we're, you know, sit down a little brainstorm and we figure out like, it's client experience that needs to be better. Cause they're not saying the hair is bad. They're not saying the salon is ugly. They're not saying all these other things, which I kind of wish they were saying something bad about the hair cause that's something we couldn't fix. Yeah.
Yeah, sometimes maybe easier
to fix.

(01:55):
Yeah, let me just fix your hair like it but yeah, but there you know, we're realizing that client experience is not the priority for everyone in the salon. So 2025 was big year for us to do client experience and we've seen a lot of return clients. We've seen a lot of positive things that come from that. And I know that it's client experience is working because if someone's not happy with their hair, they're still willing to come back to the stylist and come back to the salon because of the experience.
Right.
And I feel like that's the biggest thing that I can ask. I tell all the assistants, all the stylists, like, we're gonna mess up, right? We're not gonna nail everyone's hair. I mean, try your hardest, obviously. But at the end of the day, I want them to come back to you and like come back to Cast where they had a good experience. Because I know even for me, even if I don't like something, I'll still go back if I liked the place and the people. But if I had a bad experience, I don't care how good.
you the food was or how good my haircut was, I'm not going back. Yeah.
Right. So that
was a great description of what a lot of people are seeing around the industry. As we've kind of, we're getting a lot of space between us and the COVID period. All of that pandemic savings has been spent down and inflation has been, you know, it was obviously spiking there in like 2022, 2023, and now it's settled back down, but it's still.
Yeah.
you know, higher than anybody wants it. And I often talk about the cost of deodorant. My deodorant is $12. It was, swear to God, it like $4 in 2019. Now it's $12, right? Insurance has spiked and everybody's experiencing this. Hairstylists are experiencing this personally, professionally. All of your clients are experiencing this within their workplace and personally at home. And so,
You
What all of a sudden is the order of the day is how do we make clients feel like their experience is worth what they're paying? Because by the way, we've had to increase our prices in the industry for probably, mean, collectively,
Yes.
I would say the first time in a long time. mean, our industry has been really bad at keeping up with even the moderate inflation we used to have, you know, the 2 % inflation. And yet, you know, how many times have we spoken to a hairdresser who hadn't increased their prices in five years at all, right? Crazy. And so all of a sudden,
Crazy.
The narrative in the industry is raise your price, raise your price, raise your price. There's this thing called inflation rearing its ugly head. So then people raise their price and then the clients as they have less disposable income are like, whoa, you know, my hair used to be a hundred dollars. Now it's $200. And by the way, I have less money in my bank account because my insurance doubled also. And I didn't have a great experience last time I went to the salon. So I need to rethink whether
or how often I wanna go to the salon now. And so ⁓ back to your great description of how you guys at Cast have looked at it. ⁓ How do we improve the experience to make the client feel like it's worth what they're paying? All right, so let's talk about nitty gritty. How have you done that?
You know, it's really, it's really, I'm glad you brought this up because I want, I'm glad you brought this up because I wanted to talk about it. ⁓ it's really simple. Just care. I feel like that's what it is. That's all you got. Yeah. It just care about.
boils down to that, doesn't it? Care about,
care about what?
just care about your client the whole time they're there. mean, our client experience starts from their booking when they call and book an appointment. So we have our front desk, a salon coordinator that kind of creates that whole experience for them. ⁓ Simply when they walk in the front door, if they want something to drink, it's really basic stuff that we do. We're not doing anything too extraordinary. We're not mixing up machas. We're not doing anything where it's like too extreme, where the price is gonna be high for the client experience, for the business.
we're just doing more things like, you know, making sure if they're at the shampoo board for a long time, putting a little pillow behind their neck. If they're if we're brushing out their hair and we're seeing them kind of like, you know, be in pain, kind of make sure they're okay, or kind of walk them through the whole service if it's going to be a long service. So for example, if we're doing blonde and root smudging, then we're gonna blow dry them into Brazilian, it's like just letting them know ahead of time how the day is going to look so that they don't think that wait, where am I getting where am I going now? Or where am I
Like who's dealing with me now? Like, did they mess up my hair? What's going on? So list little simple things like that. And then for me, I've always done this and I feel like this makes a big difference. Making sure to style your client's hair like really good. Like the finish needs to be 10 out of 10 because that's going to be, they're going to feel so pretty, right? They're going to feel so good. And that's what we do. It's like, why wouldn't we? And, um,

(02:16):
they're gonna just want to come back, right? They want to come back for a blow dry simply just to get their hair styled. ⁓ Also, it's gonna be great for your business because as they're out in the world, they're gonna be so glam and look so beautiful and everyone's gonna be like, whoa, like where did you your hair done? Stuff like that. you know, I don't want to sound too like cliche when I say care, but that's really what we focus on on cast is just like caring about the client and you know,
All right.
Absolutely.
value like being grateful that they're spending their money with us and showing them in a way that's just like taking care of them simply. Yeah.
Yeah,
so it's avoiding going on autopilot because when I speak to my friends who are not hairdressers, they're clients of various salons, not just ours, but various other salons out there. And if they might, I ask them a lot of questions, you know, my own little,
my own little focus group. And I've been doing this for years. And I would say that one of the major themes is if they're not pleased with their hairstylist, it usually comes down to them feeling like the hairstylist is on autopilot with them. And because when you go on autopilot, the major part of your conscious brain is somewhere else and your clients can tell, right?
you're just kind of going through a routine. You're not putting a lot of effort into it. It doesn't feel like you're putting a lot of effort into it. Versus consciously caring about what your client is feeling, thinking, doing as they're at the salon. it's correlated to something that I'm trying to get my kids to do.
The listeners who have been with me for a long time here, we've been doing this almost eight years now listeners. Actually this month, my gosh, I just realized this. I'm such a bad host. We did our first episode. This is a bit of a digression, so I apologize to everybody. We did our first episode in August of 2017. Here we are in August and I just connected the dots. I think this is about our eighth year. Anyway, I sometimes correlate things.
⁓
⁓ perfect.
to my experience with my kids because kids are, you know, they're humans who come out and they don't know shit. And everything is kind of like boiled down to its very essence, you know, of humanity. And it's like, as you become an adult, you take a lot of things for granted, but kids don't know anything. And so they do almost everything wrong. And so you're in there telling them about just the
You ⁓
basic elements of life that we now take for granted. So the other day I was having a conversation with them. When they have friends over, they're like 12 and 13. So they have friends that are coming over to the house now. And no longer are, is like mommy in there doing everything for them. They kind of go off on their own and they do shit. And we realize that they're horrible hosts. Like when...
Hahaha
When these other kids come to our house, they, our kids like run down the hall, like, and then the kid is standing there and they look at me or whatever and I'm like, well, you can run down the hall too. I don't know where he's going. And like, I apologize for the fact that he just ran down the He's probably very excited to take you to look at his bike or something like that. Right. So my wife and I sat down with our kids and we're like, okay.
with it yeah yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah. ⁓
So when a kid, when a new friend comes to the house, you are the host, the friend is your guest. They've never been here before. They don't know anything. They are feeling kind of normal human anxiety being in a new place. They don't know where the bathroom is. They don't know where the food is. They don't know what you're going to do. They don't know where your room is. They're intimidated by me, you know, and other people just because they don't know. So
We're trying to convince, you're trying to convince your 12 year old to be a good host, essentially to care, to think about, to be empathetic about the experience of the guest. Think about it from their standpoint. And that will help you be a good host. That's going to improve the play date or whatever. Similar to like your guests, a new guest, especially when they come to the salon, they don't know where the bathroom is. They don't know how long it's going to take.
They don't know, you know, they may not know what products are sold, who's where you are, you know, and so think about it from the standpoint of being a host, a good host to somebody who's maybe a little bit nervous coming into an environment for the first time.

(02:37):
Yeah. I always say that with, you know, sometimes I get clients that come in and they're so nervous to get their hair like glossed. And I'm just in my mind thinking like, you're so dramatic. Like, this is so easy. Like, why are you so nervous? Like not in my mind. I'm thinking like, yeah, yeah, I'm just thinking like, okay, you're getting the most simple service, like you there's no need to freak out. But obviously, she's very scared. So I had to explain to her like,
You
Yeah, that's my kid. That's my 12 year old kid.
Pero no.
You know, what we're going to do today is it can be very easy, straightforward. If you don't like it, this is what we can do. I think it's going to look good. You know, just kind of like the experience needs to be better to calm her down. And I think that's one thing that happens a lot of times in this industry is, you know, I've had clients for the whole time that I've been doing hair since the first time that I've done the first month that I've been on my floor on the floor. I still see them to this day every month. And I've done the same base color on one of my clients the whole time.
Right. And I think she likes that I am still suggested. We still change things up with a haircut. We still do Brazilian blowouts. We still do treatments. We do new products. She's a part of like all this fun stuff that's happened in my life. I'm a part of all this great stuff that's happened in her life, weddings, whatever. But at the end of the day, we are still like a business connection. I still, if that makes sense, like I've never crossed the line to where we are now friends.
yeah.
Absolutely.
It's always been
like a business. So for me, I'm like, I love her and I hope that I'm a part of her life forever. But at the end of the day, it's like, this is business. And I feel like she feels the same way too, because she wants to make sure she gets her hair done. She wants to make sure it looks good. She wants to come in whenever she wants to. So it's like, I think that's sometimes what happens is you become more friends. And then that Clyde experience goes out the window a little bit. And when you were talking about like, think about
Right.
your kids friends and like how they feel and how they would, you know, could feel. I say the same for, you know, any stylists in my salon that maybe got a bad review or a bad phone call or someone's not happy with their hair or the client experience wasn't good. It's like, would you go back to you? Would you come back to this? You know, Cass has dropped the ball several times too with calls and, you know, miscommunication. We're all human, so I get it. ⁓ But.
It's always about like, I always think about like what kind of service would I like if I went somewhere? You know, I'd want to know like where the bathroom is. I'd want to know where to go sit down. I'd want to know who's working on me. I'd want to feel comfortable with, you know, everything.
Yeah.
That's just empathy, right? It's kind of trying to understand what the other person is feeling and experiencing in the moment. And if we can do that, then you can almost reverse engineer your business to improve. know, some people are better than that at others, than others, but it is the essence of the business that we're in. It's a customer service business.
And I love that you brought up your relationship with the one client that you described because I think it's an extremely important thing that first and foremost, there is a business relationship here. You're giving her an experience that includes a hair service and other things and then she's handing you money. And so she will always expect a certain thing. She will expect her experience to be worth the money.
Yes.
You know, and you can't forget that even though you guys have become so close and you know, between the friendly, I often like to say, you you have to be friendly to everybody. You don't have to be friends. Yeah. ⁓ and you have to, ⁓ appreciate the professional nature of, your relationship, first and foremost. And it is human nature to maybe try to.
Yeah.
gravitate towards being friends a little bit and away from the professionalism and sometimes the clients will even act like they want it to go in that direction. But I think even though they're acting like they want it to go in that direction, they're still paying you money and I guarantee you and I and they value their money and so I guarantee you they are gauging whether the experience was worth the money.
Yeah.

(02:58):
Yeah.
And this, you we have conversations pretty regularly where hairstylists are ⁓ hurt if a long time client who they consider to be a friend, all of a sudden starts ghosting and they don't come back. You know, how many times have we had this conversation where it's like, I can't believe, you know, Janice, I haven't seen her in so long. She totally ghosted me and I feel really bad about it. Did I do something wrong? ⁓
You know, I think the bottom line is well, short of any specific thing, Janice moves or Janice loses her job, she can't afford it. But clearly I think the basis of that decision that Janice made was regardless of the friendship, Janice pays 200 bucks and at a certain point you didn't make that worth $200 to her.
Yeah, exactly. And you know, there's, you know, as you become, you know, long term with your clients and you build these relationships, you go through deaths, you go through weddings, you go through divorces, like there's so much things that happen between us. You know, it's always stays business and there's little ways that you can help each other out, right? There's little ways that kind of can work more on the, I'm trying to say, I don't want to say like friends, but
You know, at this point in our relationship, there's been ways that we figure out how to help each other more than just the business. So for example, if I, you know, she needs to come in early 30 minutes one day, it's like, of course, yes, I love you. I'll come in 30 minutes. But on the same hand, whenever I'm traveling and I'm like, you know, we need to move your appointment. She's like, well, whenever, whenever you need me to come in, I'll come in. So it's kind of like that little give and take, you know, that little give and take of like, you know, if we have extra samples, it's like, love Manaf, let her try this.
Let's give her like a little sample. So it's like, there's things you can do that will make them feel special, but it never needs to be where the business gets involved or where like the money exchange gets involved or where their experience gets involved.
I I consider that part of the business relationship is having a little bit of tolerance. If you have trust with each other, she shows up on time, she's always good, you know, right? And you hold up your end of that relationship well, you show up on time, you do a great service, then there could be some tolerance in one direction or the other.
Yeah, everything.
You know, as you deem fit in your business judgment, you know, ⁓ and it's, it's all, that's all part of it. ⁓ I think it's when we really fall off the rails, it's when you, is when you start skewing way too far in one direction, you know, it's benefiting just one side, you know, and, and we kind of make excuses for it because
you know, she's such a friend or whatever. And then after a few months of the relationship skewing towards one person at the expense of the other person, all of a sudden things start falling off the rails because one of you is like, wait a second here. Like, I'm tired of, you know, going late every single time and she's taking advantage.
Yeah.
So, know, ⁓ these are all nuances, but. ⁓
Yeah, I think is
if you if you just like, I always just say if you're always more focused on the business side of things, everything will always like seem to work out. Like if you start going into emotionally and like you're too personal, and if you're taking everything so personal, and that's when things kind of go bad. I even know that with staff, it's like my first year I was so emotional about every decision and I was so affected and I was like so
Mm-hmm.
pissed off because they're not grateful. They're not freaking grateful. It's like, look at all the stuff I've done for you. What the hell? But at the end of the day, it's like none of that matters. It's like, what is the what's best for business? Like, what are we gonna do? Like, are we gonna let her go? Are we gonna keep her like it doesn't even matter how I feel. It doesn't matter what she's done. It's like, as long as you just keep like more of like a business mind, I think you'll start getting the clients that like that, that want someone that's reliable that wants someone that's going to be there and like,
Mm-hmm.
They don't mind pain, but they just want to be able to like know that, you know, it's going to be a good service. I'm going to get my hair done. They're busy. They don't want to be dealing with cancellations and bad hair. Same thing with me. get, I go, I get services and I like the people I go to because we're all like business people. It's like, get my brows, my lashes, everything done. And it's like, I know like if I book, they're going to be there and they've been there for the, I've been getting my skin done by the same girl for like 13 years. And it's like, we,
gonna be there.
Yeah,
We're always.

(03:19):
that's why you look so young.
Thank you. Yeah, I'm always there. She's always there. I paid whatever I need to pay. If anything, now I'm in a spot where I could like buy all the products and I could do everything that she wants me to do. And it works out now. And the same thing with my clients too. You know, there's been some that we started together and now they're doctors and now they're doing all these things. And now, you know, at the beginning, maybe it was like, I can't really afford like a balayage. And now they're like, well, what else should we do? What else should I get?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I love it. mean,
so what we're talking about is professionalism. That's really kind of the essence of what we're talking about. And the people that you're describing in your salon, they're professionals. You're a professional and you understand what it is to be a professional versus to have a personal relationship. It's very different. So this is the perfect seg... Yeah, please.
Yeah, at the end of the day,
Hold on, I want to say one thing about that. There's one thing
that it's been like heavy on my heart and one thing that's kind of, I really am trying to ⁓ get out to the world. I feel like sometimes hairdressers get this, ⁓ you know, we're just not the best business people or it's just like for fun or we're just service providers. I really somehow want to like get out to the world that we're just as important as any other business. And that starts with
that starts with professionalism I don't know if you watch a lot of reality TV. I don't know if you do or not. Well, we are obsessed.
I try really hard not to. I mean, I
have, but I think I've done a pretty good job in the last number of years stopping. Which one are you talking about?
Well,
well, we're obsessed and we also really side note at the salon, we treat every year as a season. like we're on season three now, so we do like a big photo shoot, we do a whole thing like running. actually really fun. But anyways, going back to somehow making the world understand hairdressers as like a serious business that, you know, we make money, we do pretty much everything else the business does. We just have a little more fun doing it.
That's cool.
But right now there's two shows that I watch secret lives of Mormon wives and housewives of Utah and on secret lives of Mormon Well secret lives of Mormon wives the hairdresser is the most successful person on the show Yeah, and it's really cool because that's kind of like kind of going for going towards like what I want to do with this industry is I want You know whoever watches she was the one that makes the most money. She's she has an empire. No one else on the show does
And yeah, hair has been a big part of that. know, mean, pop-
Yeah, not surprised.
And also, Jesse, she came to the salon, I love her. she also, they were trying to get more money to be on the show. And she's like, I don't need it for the money. I just want to be on the show. And I'm like, that is so cool. The hairdresser, the hairstylist is she's killing it, you know. And then also on Utah, one of the main girls, they have a salon chain, and they're in the hair industry. And they're just doing so well. So it's really exciting to see stuff like that. Yeah.
Absolutely, 100%,
This is a perfect segue to something I wanted to talk about, which is how do you deal with the emotional? ⁓
⁓ the emotional elements of getting to know your clients over time and the tendency of some clients to kind of dump their baggage on us behind the chair. How do you deal with that on a daily basis?

(03:40):
So going back to like what we're talking about professionalism, pretty much the majority of my appointments really focus on like really light topics, except the people that, know, the 13 years people that I've had forever. If anything, there's still very like light topics. ⁓ I've always been the type to just be like really driven by like money. So I'm trying to get it done quick. I'm trying to be good. I'm trying to do it faster and better and all those things.
Mm-hmm.
while being very, very friendly and experience focused.
So I.
Yeah, I mean, it's,
it's, sounds like it's not achievable, but it really is because all you got to do is like smile and have a light conversation while you're applying color. It's not too difficult. But I've also I've also seen, you know, throughout my whole career, there's been a lot of like moments that shaped who I am today. For example, when I first started at my other salon, I was looking at these heavy hitters in the salon that are making a lot of money. And I thought I wanted to be like them.
Right.
As I got to that point, I realized, hell no, I do not want to be like that. They're working 50 hours a week. They've been in the industry 30 years, you know, 30 years in the game. And that's when I shifted to social media and I was like, okay, I need to have something else happen because I cannot just not do hair. I mean, cannot just do hair. Like, I feel like that's like too much. It's like, I'm going to start hating it. Like I can't be, no, that's like too much. The same thing that goes with a stylist that...
was very open to her client and talked about everything. And I realized quickly that they were only here for like the gossip. They were only going to her for the gossip. And then she was having issues because she would break up with her boyfriend and they would want to know all about it. And it's like, why? She doesn't want to talk about it, but obviously they're there for all those things. So that kind of shaped me to like be very quiet about a lot of things that are going on in my life that.
⁓ I wouldn't want to talk about again. So everything just stays very light. Everything just stays like I'm going here, I'm going there. love the resort, it was so pretty. The restaurant's so nice. And that's what I try to do. It might sound so like, I mean not, I don't know if it sounds bad to do stuff like that, but I try to really focus on my staff focusing on those type of conversations as well. Just so it's just like a good moment.
Interesting. So I wonder if...
Right.
Yeah. Interesting.
Just the experience is nice. Now they know where to go to eat,
stuff like that. And I feel like when you start getting too personal, it could turn them off.
Yeah, interesting.
So I wonder if, so what you're describing is, you your interaction with your client kind of ⁓ dissuades, discourages any kind of ⁓ emotional baggage dumping.
From me for sure. No, don't feed from me. know, sometimes they'll want to, you know, tell me their stories too. And it's like, obviously it's very sad, but we just like listen, don't really say much and then like just move on.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
Got it.

(04:01):
So the listeners driving down the street going to the salon who get baggage dumped on them every day they're like, God, it's me. What is it about me that's making my clients want to dump the emotional baggage on?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I feel like it goes back to just like how you want to run your business and what you want to do because, you know, in, you know, some of our stylists, I feel like they approach their clients like very friendly, because maybe they're not the most competent in their skills. So they want them to feel like if they don't like to hear they like DM me, like, let me know. But it's like, that just opens up the just it's not good. It's like, just if they're not happy, they'll call back or just make sure their experience is so good that they want to come back to you. ⁓
I really try to just keep it very like straightforward and like all about hair always. Yeah.
actually had, you know, a flux of like new clients recently, which is exciting because they're at a new price point. But I have had one where, I want to say this because I, I feel like, you know, there are going to be the people that see us as that person as someone that could just trauma dump and someone that could just talk about everything and they want to have that relationship with their stylist where
They could talk about sexual things or they could talk about their husband. And I know for me, whenever it's stuff like that happens, I just immediately like move on. Cause I don't want to talk about any of that stuff. And I feel like that that sets. So it's either going to be, she continues coming to me with that, you know, idea of how the conversation is going to go, or I'm just not the person for her. But I know for me, don't want to talk about those type of things. Cause I know even my assistant was like laughing with her and I'm just like, bro, don't.
Don't talk about that. It's so uncomfortable. I don't want to know about her husband's stuff and I don't want to know about sexual things. I don't want to know like, I don't know. It was just like so uncomfortable, but you will be tested with those type of people who are willing to pay, who want to see you, who want their hair done by you. But their conversation is just so like not professional. Now they don't have to be professional, but it's just like inappropriate. it's not like we're not talking about that.
All
Yeah.
Inapprop-
Yeah, so, right.
Let's talk about your hair. And I think
once she realizes, then she'll decide that she wants to come to me or not. But I think for me, it's more about that rather than just trying to get her back in, even though we don't vibrate well.
So you're creating professional boundaries, whether you know it or not. I think you're doing it naturally by just the nature of what you consider appropriate conversation in the salon versus what you don't. And frankly, I think it sounds like a personal decision. You just don't feel comfortable talking. It's really almost personal boundaries, not even professional boundaries. ⁓
Yeah.
No, I don't want to!
Yeah, I don't want to talk
about it.
I mean, it sounds like if you're at the bar or whatever and some lady was sitting there telling you about this stuff, you would just kind of go to the other side of the bar and, you know, help a couple of guests over there versus sitting there and receiving the trauma dumping and responding. you unwittingly, I think you've created a more professional environment in your salon by doing that. I think that's that's all awesome advice.
Yeah. Yeah.
Do you have any horror stories?

(04:22):
⁓ I'll never forget this one time when I first started, I got a new client and she was on a heavy budget and I only colored half of her hair red. I don't know why I would do that. ⁓
She can only pay half.
Yeah, like so all this yeah, so like
all this I didn't color and I just colored the Yeah, like occipitable down I was like it's gonna be like $300 like I only have like this much and I'm like Well, maybe we could just do like the top And she's like sure and I'm like, okay, but it was it was horrible because we did it It was bad. I had to highlight her hair right after and then it was even worse because everything turned really pink I don't know. Yeah, you know
He's pointing towards the back behind the ear.
And then she came back for another highlight, which was just a disaster. Yeah. But I learned a lot. Just say that.
Yeah.
Yeah, that sounds
poorly thought out. ⁓
That was in my building phases where I was just like, okay, like I want to just like make money and I like what can I do to like, you know, I quickly learned that, you know, my mentor always said 20 % of the people make 80 % of the money. And quickly after that, I realized I need to be on like the 20 % and just like set my boundaries and I'd rather not do her hair than do that. That makes sense or come up with a different idea come up with a different thing that fits her budget but
Mm-hmm.
Don't paint half of the person's head a color.
yeah. That's amazing. I love it.
Any last words for the community?
No, I would say we're very lucky to be in an industry where we get to choose how much money we make and take advantage of that and have fun doing hair and love it. And I promise you'll make money again with the 20 % of people that make 80 % of the money. you love it, if you care, if you want to be successful, if you want to travel the world and do everything, it's like hair can do that for you.
yeah. Absolutely have to care. Bring in that customer service. Bring it back.
but you just have to care. Yeah, yeah. Well,
I mean, any job you have to care, let's be real. Anything you do, yeah. I know whenever I was, sorry.
Ideally, ideally, I mean it matters. Anytime
you're dealing with humans to the extent that we deal with humans, it matters more.
I remember even when I was like, I worked at Burger King for like a few months. And when I was there, I was like, I'm going to be the best drive-through guy they have. I've always been the type to be like, I'm going to be like, I'm the one. So yeah.

(04:43):
I love it. That's the attitude. That's the attitude. mean, good businesses
hire for attitude and aptitude. know, aptitude is your like mental capability to absorb the material and do the job, right? But attitude is attitude. And it's something that's very hard to teach. Maybe impossible to train. You can try, but you know what you just described there, that's innate in you.
and a tremendous quality. And I think people can decide to have a good attitude, but they need to decide internally. know, that it's not gonna be a, they're not gonna go to like training of a new job and then unlikely they'll be convinced to have a good attitude, you know? Maybe the new salon or the new employer can trigger something in the new employee.
that will convince them to decide to have a good attitude, but it sounds like you've got the right one and hopefully, if people are struggling with their businesses behind the chair out there, just consider, look at it from the standpoint of your clients. Are you delivering something that makes them feel like the money they're spending is worth it? And it might come down attitude, might come down to your customer service doing a little extra things to make them
to make them feel that way.
Curling their hair, that's all it takes. Just curl everybody's hair, yeah.
Just curl their hair people.
All right, Antonia, this is great. Nice talking to you.
You too, thank you.

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Ep. 417 • The Essentials of Professionalism w/ Antonio Estrada

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep. 417 • The Essentials of Professionalism w/ Antonio Estrada