Listening & Loyalty: How CX Drives Culture and Revenue

The Advisory Board Podcast
Episode: Confidence, Culture & the Blushington Way
Guest: Natasha Cornstein, CEO of Blushington Holdings
Sponsored by: ClientTether – the smart way to grow your franchise.

What do luxury beauty, Broadway, and power listening have in common? Natasha Cornstein, CEO of Blushington Holdings, joined us on this episode to share how a next-gen beauty brand is setting the gold standard—not just for glam, but for how businesses should listen, lead, and scale with soul.

 Beauty with a Mission
Natasha might not be the founder, but she’s the visionary CEO behind Blushington’s bold expansion. With locations in NYC and upcoming launches in Boca Raton and Houston, Blushington isn’t just serving makeup and blowouts—they’re serving confidence in a glass of champagne (or sparkling water, if that’s your vibe). The mantra? Confidence looks great on you.

Customer Experience = Business Strategy
For Blushington, customer experience isn’t fluff—it’s strategy. Natasha broke down how every detail, from hair washes to tone of voice, is engineered to make guests feel heard, seen, and celebrated. And we’re not just talking lipstick and lashes. We’re talking about a culture of power listening—a practice that’s been baked into the DNA of the brand since day one.

What’s “Power Listening” Anyway?
It’s not your average active listening. Power listening means really hearing—without interrupting, without ego, and with the intent to understand, not just respond. It’s how Natasha leads her team, trains artists, and builds loyalty both in-store and across her franchise network. The results? Artists feel valued, customers feel heard, and services like wig styling (yes, wigs!) are born from team ideas that rise to the top.

Diversity and Inclusion: Not Just a Tagline
Blushington’s commitment to inclusivity isn’t performative—it’s operational. From inventory to training, their team is equipped to serve all women: all skin tones, hair textures, and backgrounds. This isn’t new for them—it’s who they’ve been since 2011.

Franchising with Heart
Transitioning from a corporate model to franchising, Natasha is all about balance: structure meets creativity. With powerhouse partners like iFranchise and Baker McKenzie onboard, she’s building a franchise culture that values the operator’s insights as much as the playbook. Her franchisees? Often customers first. Loyal to the experience, now committed to scaling it.

Bonus Round: Glam Meets Broadway
Fun fact: Natasha’s husband is co-producing a Broadway show, Take a Banana for the Road with Jeffrey Ross, opening this August. So if you find yourself in NYC, you might just catch some blush, a blowout, and a standing ovation all in one trip.

Listen in to hear how beauty, business, and culture intersect—beautifully.
 And thank you again to ClientTether, for sponsoring today’s episode and supporting smarter franchise growth through automation, lead nurturing, and CRM tools designed for brands that want to scale with impact.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Everybody, I want to welcome you to another episode of
the Advisory Board podcast, where we bring in experts from
the franchise industry and other industries to share wisdom and
insights that can help you build a brand that will last.
I've got with me today Natasha, who is the CEO
of not the founder, but the CEO of the Bleshington Holdings.
And this is a really interesting group and an interesting

(00:22):
franchise concept that's newer to the scene but already expanding.
So I can't wait for her to tell us little
bit more about what they're doing at Blushington. But let
me tell you about her. I should probably say her fault.
I did to see her last name, Tasha Hornstein, right,
I apologize. I totally stip, so.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Thank you for having me. That's okay.

Speaker 1 (00:40):
Yeah. So Natasha, guys, she is here because she's got
some really interesting insights to share about customer experience and
diversity and inclusion as part of their business model. So
I want to get to those, but let me brag
on her for a minute first and tell you a
little bit about why you want to hear from Natasha today.
She is a top fifty beauty leader by Glossy Magazine

(01:03):
twenty twenty four, Beauty Tastemaker by Harper's Bizarre Magazine, Beauty United,
mentor for Women of Color COO, co founder of the
Courts of Dreams Foundation, which is so cool, like refurnishing,
refurbishing inner city basketball courts like yes, and also an
avid Steelers fan, an NFL fan, which I didn't see

(01:25):
that one coming, by the way. And she's also an
avid reader guy, so first hour of every day she
spends reading, so I found her to be already We've
only been talking for a little bit here, but very
well informed, articulate things that typically I find correlate quite
well with people who read quite a bit. So can't
wait to learn more from you and Natasha today. But
would you tell us a bit more about Blushington? And absolutely, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Please absolutely, And Dave, thank you so much for having me,
and thank you for that great introduction. I always say
I'm beauty by day, sports bar with my husband and
my son by night. I have a very rich, full life.
But really, in a nutshell, Blushington is all about the
experience to make our customers feel beautiful and confidence. We

(02:12):
always say confidence looks great on you. So the essence
of Blushington is coming in having personalized beauty experiences. That's
makeup applications, blowout, skincare services with a pro makeup artist
that is trained to listen to you. So you come in,
it's about a conversation. You have a glass of champagne

(02:35):
if you'd like. Of course we can serve you water,
but a lot of our guests go for the bubbly
and it's a one on one experience and it is
the essence of who we are at Blushington.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Well, that sounds kind of amazing and even in the
way you describe that you're focusing on helping people develop
confidence or feeling beautifusms like you guys have. Oh before
I ask that question though, but you guys are already
opening locations, right, don't you have a couple of locations opening?

Speaker 2 (03:08):
We absolutely do. We are really proud of our Fat
flagship location in New York City. We're right on fifty
seventh Street in the heart of Manhattan. It is a
beautiful store that I hope you'll come to visit, and
even more excited to share with you that we're opening
in Boca Raton, Florida this fall, as well as Houston, Texas.

(03:31):
And what's truly amazing about these first two openings is
that both of our franchisees are longtime ble Washington customers
love that.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
Well. That doesn't surprise me though, right because when you
build a truly remarkable experience people, you become very memorable
and impactful on people's lives.

Speaker 2 (03:53):
And yes, it's really People ask me what is it
like at ble Washington, and it's it's a community. It's
more than just coming in for a service. Sometimes people say,
while it's a very luxurious, beautiful environment, they call us
sometimes the Cheers of beauty services. Everybody knows your name,

(04:15):
it's comfortable, it's warm, there's nothing intimidating about coming into
a Blushington and for many many women in particular, beauty
can be very intimidating. So we take the intimidation out
of that.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's incredible. My wife has shared with me a few times,
and she's a beautiful woman with very platinum blonde hair
and bright blue eyes. But she's gotten to get her
hair done a few times and people have been unnecessarily
critical or said things that made her feel really uncomfortable
and almost kind of small in the chair, and she
I mean she went through cosmetology school and even then

(04:51):
she just confident when she was getting her hair done.
So it sounds.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
Like that's the opposite of how we would want anyone
to feel. We want you to feel like you're being
embraced into a warm hug when you walk in through
the door. We want you to love your time at Blushington,
enjoy the music, enjoy the conversation with your artists, or
just take time for yourself for a quiet forty five

(05:17):
minutes while you get your beautiful blowout and your makeup done.
And our customers have confidence that their experience is personalized.
So what may feel like glam to someone might feel
like very natural makeup to another. If you may want big,
bouncy curls, you might say that, but actually you want

(05:37):
very straight hair. So it's always a conversation and we
make sure that no one leaves, or we do our
best to make sure that no one leaves without feeling beautiful,
confident and heard.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, love that well. And this is the core of
what we're going to talk about today. And as I'm
grateful you shared that with us to start, because we
really want to talk about how custom more experience can
be a core part of a business strategy and it
is it is for you, Natasha, Can you tell us, like,
how did that idea morph into a core pillar of

(06:11):
what you guys were building at Blushington.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
I think it really harkens back to my founder, Stepie Marin,
who really did struggle with acne and in turn with
her own confidence as a young woman, and when she
created Blushington, she set out to create an environment where
again everyone would feel comfortable. We created experience before this

(06:36):
buzzzword about experiential services began. We're experiential at our core.
It's who we are. And when you talk about customer
experience as the essence of a business model, it is
about making sure that at every touch point you thought
through the customer experience. I say to my team every day,

(07:00):
it's all in the details. It's in the detail of
how somebody is greeted. It's in the detail of how
immaculate your store is, your workstation. It's about tone of voice.
It is about the experience of having your hair washed
in a beautiful way, not getting soaking wet, but being

(07:21):
very mindful about every step of the process. And so
experience starts with I think a real commitment to detail
and to understanding that it's all those little details that
add up to the overall feeling, the overall experience. And
when someone loves their experience, they're coming back. They're your

(07:43):
best brand ambassadors. They're talking about your services. The next
time they come in, you'll have developed the trust to
try another service, perhaps that's a second service from the
first one that brought you in. So this business strategy
is pre to who we are as a management team

(08:04):
and to our team members about creating memorable, beautiful experiences.
But as the CEO of this company, creating impeccable experiences
is what drives the bottom line.

Speaker 1 (08:16):
Yeah, no, it does. And you've mentioned a few ways
I want to we'll come back to that because I'd
like to talk about outcomes and things at the moment.
But the core of this, this whole of this whole
kind of movement that you're trying to you guys have
emulated so well, is that you're trying to ensure that

(08:36):
everybody who comes in feels feels heard and feels ass
when they leave. Tell me about that the portion of
feeling heard. I feel like that's it wouldn't normally correlate
that necessarily to a beauty experience, and so I find
that unique. Can you tell us more about how that
became part of it.

Speaker 2 (08:52):
Absolutely, again, from day one, it was so important to
our founder, Stephie that all of our customers felt listen to.
You mentioned your wife's experience, and every woman can probably share,
you know, a terrible story where they sat had their
hair or makeup done and didn't recognize themselves when they

(09:13):
got out of the chair, or didn't like the outcome,
but maybe wasn't sure how to communicate it. So from
the very beginning, it was about being a destination where
women of all backgrounds, ages, skin tones, hair textures would
feel comfortable. And that starts with training and specific to

(09:35):
your comment about listening about how you make that central
to the experience, it is a key part of training
at Blushington, and it starts with the recruitment and hiring
process and understanding in this artistic space, it takes a
very special talented person to be great at hair, to

(09:58):
be great at makeup. I don't know how often customers
think about the hard work and the talent that goes
into being a great professional hairstylist, A great professional makeup artist.
So when we're hiring at Blushington, we're looking for that
combination of talent and temperament. And in that temperament, we're

(10:20):
looking for somebody that is collaborative, that doesn't have an
ego when it comes to their artistry. That's someone that's
really willing to listen. And that's something I feel funny
saying it now because I'm doing so much talking, but
really for to my leadership style and core to what

(10:41):
we look for when we hire at the artists level
and also in our management team is does this person
have the ability to listen? Do they have a temperament
that allows for flexibility? So I think that's really the
foundation of the listening call it power listening.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
Yeah, well, and I want to dive into power listening.
But one speaking quite a bit is the expert on
a podcast is excusable. So don't don't feel self conscious
about that. But let's talk about powerlessing. And by the way,
backing up a second, whether it's beauty or food, or
home service or pet care or elderly cares, any segment, automotive,

(11:26):
good heavens, we wish that they would adopt this mindset
in that industry, and some are and they're doing excellent
They're doing excellent things. So I just want to massure
everyone listening, like, yes, we're talking about a wonderful beauty
brand today, but this concept is so applicable across every
concept in franchising or any business in general. And so

(11:48):
this is the whole idea of being mindful of every
stage of the customer touch points and journey. Love it.
I'm taking some personal notes thinking, I wonder how well
we do at certain stages. We're actually we have valuating
some of our processes to make sure at this point
we feel like maybe we haven't given the most exceptional experience.
We're going to fix it. But I want to come

(12:09):
back to that the process of a value absolutely, But
to talk about ego, because I that is a challenge.
I think, especially when Manhattan Hair and Beauty care place,
there are a lot of talented, talented artists in that area.
So how do you how do you identify somebody who's
willing to be collaborative and also isn't getting to let

(12:30):
their ego get in the way of the customer experience.
Because I think that's a real challenge for people.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
I think it is for many people, and I think
this is an important aspect again of recruitment and of training,
understanding the culture of the company, the execution, and really
envisioning will this person fit in. So we take our
time with hiring and I think that that's something that

(12:55):
I would encourage whatever industry you're in. And I learned
that by making a lot of mistakes, so I think
that what I learned is nothing. I'm not going to
say anything particularly unique here, but higher slowly and part
ways quickly, because you want to have a lot of

(13:15):
harmony in your workplace. So I think that the way
we approach it is that it's a multi tiered interviewing process.
So it starts with the phone conversation, it's an in
person meeting, and then, depending if it's an artist versus
somebody in management, you are performing services as part of

(13:36):
your interview. So there is a technical piece to the
interview and that's really applicable to anyone in the franchising
services business. It's probably a great idea to see your
team member in action. So I think, really again it
starts with the foundation. Is your foundation strong? And I

(13:57):
would say our retention rate is one of the aspects
of Blushington and the Bleshington franchise model that I'm proud
of stuff finding that path to retention has been really
I think an outcome of a mutual respect of the
power listening not just for customers, but for one another.

(14:21):
And retention is really important to experience, coming back to
where we started, maintaining relationships having excellent artists that your
customers will see time and time again, and there's a
reason our artists stay with Blushington, and that's a reflection
I really believe of the power listening culture in large measure.

Speaker 1 (14:45):
Well, and you've said it a few times now, so
let's hone in on power listening because we've all heard
of active listening, but this sounds like active listening on steroids.
So would you explain what does power listening mean in
the Bleshington culture?

Speaker 2 (14:59):
Power listening in the Bleushington culture. And I always say
to my team, power listening is for business and for life,
and if you can practice it in all aspects of
your life, you'll see a great improvement, in my opinion,
in the quality of your relationships. So we often think

(15:20):
people are listening, they're being quiet, they're letting you speak,
But they're thinking the whole time about what they want
to say. So when I talk about power listening, I
talk about being able to really dial in and hear
what somebody is saying. Whether you want to call it
active or power I think I use power listening because

(15:43):
it takes a lot. You have to have a lot
of empowerment on your team to not talk over one another,
to know that they will be heard, that they will
have a chance, and trying to remind myself and remind
my team to just listen, don't don't be thinking about

(16:03):
your response or rebuttal or you know, taking the conversation
in a direction. Give everyone the grace to listen. And
I think when that happens, ideas become greater, execution becomes sharper,
the flexibility becomes more second nature. If that makes.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
Sense, No, it absolutely does. Are there some mechanics to
powerlessing that you teach your you teach your artists and
your front desk staff as well.

Speaker 2 (16:38):
I think it's modeling. I think it's modeling the action.
I think it's letting somebody know that whether you're the CEO,
whether you're in you know, maintaining the facility that everyone's
going to be listened to, and that starts with me.
I know from my early twenties there was nothing worse

(16:58):
than being asked feedback or asked for an opinion or
taking the time to write out an idea, and then
you never hear back from anybody, and that's very demoralizing.
So something you know that I've worked on showing my
team is I'll listen and we'll talk it through, and

(17:21):
I value your ideas and if it's an idea that
makes sense for the business model, that will move us
forward as a business and as a community, will action
on it. You know, it doesn't fall on deaf ears.
So I think when you gain the trust of your
team by listening, and that doesn't mean, Dave, that I'm

(17:43):
always going to take an idea or execute, but I'll
certainly give the courtesy of a response. And I think
when you set that courteous environment, it just it's not
that it's a particular training curriculum, it's a culture. And
I think we have a culture of listening, of being

(18:03):
courteous and respectful to our customers but also to one another,
and as a CEO understanding and again this came from
learning and from making a lot of mistakes. Understanding that
in my seat that our team is a constituency that's
on par with our customers. So really understanding that helped

(18:27):
me evolve as a leader.

Speaker 1 (18:29):
Have you seen ted Lasso before the time? I love
Ted Lasso, same fell in love with it. Well do
you remember when he first got there and he put
out the suggestion box that seems I love it so much,
but I love that I love That's where the episode ends,
which is, oh, roy in the shower and the pressure
just like knocks that guy down. And you see the

(18:52):
look on his face of oh, this is like hardened
roy Kin, right, and he recognizes that he listened to
And there's magic in that moment because all of a
sudden the relationship changed right between ors and last. So
great and kind of fun cinematic way to illustrate the point.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
Absolutely, And I can tell you one of the services
we recently introduced came from one of our artists. We
introduced whig styling services, and she came to me and said,
we're doing blowouts. We have all of the inventory, we
have the skill set. It was a brilliant idea and

(19:34):
I said, let's let's go explore it. And spend six
months researching it where she would go out and research,
we would come back together, sit with our manager, talk
through the ideas, competitive landscape, training for several months, a
marketing plan and so it was very exciting and rewarding

(19:56):
for this idea to come from a team member and
then and have you an artist take a business plan
and learn through to inception and incarnation of idea to
coming live on the floor. And I think it's something
incredibly gratifying. Again, it creates loyalty, It adds so much

(20:20):
dimension to the business. Again, great ideas, culture listening that
drops to the bottom line that brings us a new customer.
The wigs are a five billion dollar industry and growing.
People wear wigs for fashion reasons, religious reasons, health reasons
often so to be able to bring this client tell

(20:44):
and expand our experience to wig wears. Again, great addition,
idea came from a team member and from a business perspective,
utilization of the same personnel, the same inventory.

Speaker 1 (21:00):
That's powerful. Yes, And I think we have a tendency
or many leaders have a tendency to want to feel
like the great idea is like I'm leading this place
that those ideas are coming from me, and that and
gets in the way of the best ideas which come
from the people that operate at the ground floor all
day every day.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
The absolutely and I would say, when I look back,
I'm in my early fifties now, and when I look
at some of the biggest mistakes I've made in my career,
it was really wanting to have it be my idea
rushing and you know, I can look. I would say,
if I were to say, in my skill set of talent,

(21:43):
it might be to see several steps ahead and really
how to take an idea and how to execute it.
But when I was younger, I wanted it. I wanted
the credit, I wanted it to be my idea. I
wanted it done fast, and my whole team was standing,
you know, in a different place. And so that has

(22:05):
been actually a beautiful thing to learn. And again it
took me time in my career to learn that, and
now I think we've been able to be successful because
I surround myself with people that are a lot smarter
than I am, and I listen to them. Again, it's
ultimately my decision. When you sit in the leadership chair,

(22:28):
you own the decision and you own the decision making,
but being able to surround myself with smart people has
been a game changer and something that I love about
the franchising model and adding exceptional franchise owners to our
leadership team because I consider our franchisees leaders of the brand,

(22:52):
and just with our very first two franchisees, the ideas
that they've brought to the table, the perspective of seeing
it through fresh eyes has already helped us to improve
our business model. So I'm excited about bringing on incredibly
talented owners that I'm going to learn from as much
as they're going to learn from our decade plus of

(23:15):
being in the business.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
I love that, you know, that's a constant point of
contention and friction, and franchising is sometimes the franchiser. There's
a model, right, You guys have a model, Yes, and
it's great. It's great, and they want to buy into it.
But the model isn't the superpower franchising. It's what you're
just describing, which is the power of these brilliant operators

(23:39):
working the model and then coming up with ways to
innovate the model and improve upon the model that you've
been improving for ten years. It's the iterations that they
can go through, and it's that's the superpower I think
is that the continual innovation in my and morphing of
this already great model into something even better because you
have brilliant operators in the middle of it.

Speaker 2 (24:00):
And I will tell you you know, we have been
so fortunate as we transitioned Blushington from a corporate model
with ten years of experience to a franchise model, to
have had the opportunity, from my perspective, to have worked
with the best of the best enfranchising. We were super
diligent about doing our homework. We interviewed I think twelve

(24:23):
fourteen firms before we decided to work with ifranchise to
build our franchise programs. And I may be biased, but
I think our franchise attorney, Will Woods at Baker McKenzie
is arguably the greatest franchise attorney in the world. And
what I learned with I franchise and with Will is

(24:45):
this incredibly there's this dynamic tension, but not tension in
a bad way. There's this this very dynamic relationship between
franchise or and franchisee. And as we transitioned our model
and created our FDD. I wanted to find a real

(25:06):
balance in the relationship, you know, where it's not as
a franchise or being onerous to franchisees, but where there
is this mutual respect, respect for the model and the
systems and the operations, but respect for the ideas and
the brain power that franchises bring to the to the

(25:28):
overall business community or our franchise community at Blushington. So
I find that one of the most fascinating aspects of franchising.

Speaker 1 (25:39):
Yeah, and it can be one of the most challenging
or rewarding. You know, the tests that you build, and
I think the best brands in the industry they've they've
figured that out pretty well and they listen, and I
mean they actively I guess they use power listening, right
They're they're they're searching for feedback there. They're listening and
learning from their operators and they're like, you just shared

(26:01):
that example of wig styling, and then they're implementing. And
we didn't talk about this before, but my wife and
I were also multi unit owners of that. Yeah, so
we actually sold them in January to another franchise owner
that was expanding and I'm quite busy running a technology company.

Speaker 2 (26:20):
Congratulations, Yes, but it was so fun.

Speaker 1 (26:23):
Like one thing I loved about it, and I'm not
so much the franchise or loved it as well sometimes,
but was as it was operating in this business model,
I figured out some ways to do things a little
better than they had been done before. And I don't
mean that in any sort of raggedocious way, but just
you know, they worked with a lot of schools, and
I figured out a way to really have a high

(26:44):
impact on the recreation departments, which personally found more rewarding.
So that's not you know, these are the kids in
urban areas that need to have nice uniforms like they
see all these These are the kids that often are
watching more TV than the kids in suburbias, have fewer
opportunities to go outside. So see the cool uniforms of
the pro ball players, and they want to look like them.

(27:06):
Then they show up for the first game they were
in a T shirt that has like Dodgers screenprinted on it,
and they're like, oh, this is that's not the same.
And so we were able to innovate and find ways
to make that work well, and all of a sudden
we built out this entire portion of the business that
I had been told by other franchisees, I don't even bother,
you can't do anything with that, which is for me
is usually the trigger to say, oh, I'm going to

(27:28):
go figure that one out.

Speaker 2 (27:29):
Now I think we share in that.

Speaker 1 (27:33):
Yeah. But then as we started to figure it out,
to their credit, the executive team at the home office said,
how are you doing this? Hold on show us? How
can you teach everybody in our Monday calls? And they
really tried to harness that, and I think as an organization,
all of the owners, I think they have about thirty
different owners now they all now understand better in their

(27:55):
local markets how to sell to recreation groups and help
them get better uniforms on kids. A lady tell us
that a mom complained about her little boy because he
wouldn't take his jersey, his basketball jersey off and to
take a bath. It was creating problems at night. And
I thought, that's the best win I've ever had in
this business.

Speaker 2 (28:14):
So yeah, absolutely, And look, I think that is you know,
the hallmark clearly of a great franchise or and an
action that I certainly would want to emulate. And there
is this exquisite balance between franchise or and franchisee and
as a franchise or really understanding that the best ideas

(28:37):
will always come from your team in the field. They're
on the front lines, they're interacting with customers, they're running
your facilities. And so I think that this will be
very enriching to the Blushington business model as we move
forward and expand across markets.

Speaker 1 (28:55):
Yes, and you'll also find there are different stylistic and
beauty needs in different market. It's across the country, so
you'll have to have a measure of flexibility. And I
saw you went to school in the Midwest. I'm from
the Midwest. Different hair as am I Yeah, so yes,
hair styles there in Saint Louis versus Chicago, even versus
the New York or versus I live out in Utah

(29:16):
now Salt Lake City, very different hairstyles. You know. It's
so I assume you'll have to have some flexibility and
really continue your power listening as you open in those
markets and.

Speaker 2 (29:27):
Really to align and to find owners that understand and
are committed to the core values of inclusivity. And I
think if we maintain the excellence of our operations, the
excellence and quality of our services. Yes, you do adapt
to the local community, to the local styles, because our

(29:49):
listening and the experience is so core to who we are.
I think it'll be a really seamless transition to understand
what are the particular styles as you go into Dallas,
as you go into as Salt Lake City, a Boca Ratona, Houston,
understanding those nuances and really just delivering them the Bleushington way.

Speaker 1 (30:11):
Yes, And speaking of the Bleshington way, I want to
make sure we have time to talk about the how
how did you begin to focus so much on inclusivity
in the way that you treat your clients, you know,
women of all ages and backgrounds and skin color and
hair texture. With something you've said multiple times even before

(30:33):
we started this, and it feels like that is not
rehearsed because it's rote, but rehearsed because it's important as
part of one of your core values.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, it is the essence of who we are, both
on the artist side and on the customer side. We
bring this unique talent set together and we understand the
customers of all ages, all skin tones, all hair textures
have the desire to feel beautiful and confident, and for

(31:03):
us to operate this business. It was really essential. Excuse me,
it was really essential to us that we were able
to deliver on that promise. And that starts with training,
That starts with having the right inventory, and if you
don't have that commitment date, you can't live up to

(31:25):
that promise. It starts with it starts with having that
in your brand DNA, It starts with having it in
your training and in the inventory you carry. And it
was truly essential to us starting in twenty eleven, I
think long before this became part of the business lexicon

(31:46):
of twenty thousand to twenty twenty five. This is who
we've been at Washington since day one. So I talk
about it because it is authentic to who we are
and I think it's what differentiates Washington from others. And
there's lots of room in the industry. I always welcome

(32:08):
conversations with my competitors. I try to find camaraderie where
it makes sense because there is room. We just want
to do it the Flushington way, and at the core
of that is being a destination where any customer can
walk in and leave not feeling confident and beautiful.

Speaker 1 (32:28):
I love it. I love the way you describe that, Natasha.
I know that we've run out of time together today
to continue on, but I do want to want to
ask you an important question. So if there's somebody that's
listening to this today and they say, man, I would
love to talk to Natasha and pick her brain about
any of the things we've talked about about power listening,
about building inclusivity to the business models, about really building

(32:53):
these tools into the culture of what they're trying to
create with their brand. What's the best way for them
to reach out to you.

Speaker 2 (33:01):
The best way to reach out to me is on
our Instagram, send me a DM at Bleushington. You can
certainly write to me on our website b Washington dot com,
and I would love to have a conversation with anyone
that's building their business. We can learn from one another.
And if there are listeners out there that are interested

(33:21):
in becoming the next Bleshington franchisee, they can certainly come
to our website at ble Washington dot com, fill out
that inquiry form and they will be getting on the
phone with me personally.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
I love that well. It sounds like an incredible journey
that you're about to start rolling out to in Houston
and book of reto. Congratulations on that.

Speaker 2 (33:41):
Thank you so much. It's I'm really proud of my.

Speaker 1 (33:44):
Team, as you should be. Thanks again for joining us, Natasha,
it's been a pleasure having you.

Speaker 2 (33:49):
Thank you so much. Dave, thank you for the opportunity