With men there will be a move towards more natural looking hair, to achieve this
look men will become more experimental with their use of styling products. Colour
wise, the trend of more men feeling confident to try colour will continue.
Style requests
We’ve had a few clients ask for a Victoria Beckham and recently we’ve
had a couple of girls ask for a short crop like Kylie.
How do stylists keep ahead of trends?
Josh is on the Redken Artistic team, so he gets to work with some of the UK’s
best hairdressing talent. He passes the inspiration and guidance on new evolving
techniques onto the hair team at Heaven Spa through our six weekly creative
evening. These sessions are amazing for helping the team – more than
just a training exercise, these sessions are about experimenting and discovery.
Out stylists read all kinds of magazines to help them see the diffusion of
catwalk looks onto the street. And of course they see the trends that are on
the street when they are out and about.
Josh Lowe is Creative Director and co–owner of Heaven Spa.
Main factors behind our success as a business.
The hardest thing is often to stay focused. This is such an exciting industry
it can be easy to get distracted and go off on a tangent. We see ourselves
as being experts in all things hair and beauty and this vision drives our
business decisions, team training, customer service and our marketing strategy.
Having a clear vision enables us to manage the business by ensuring we provide
consistency in everything we do. We’ve always believed that the thing
successful businesses have in common is consistency and we strive for that
day in day out with our team. This ensures our clients feel well looked after
and want to come back – and that is what it is all about.
How does Shortcuts contribute to our success?
Shortcuts is ideal for us as it is so good at measuring key performance indicators.
This helps us manage the consistency of service we are looking for. We share
the information with our team to inspire them and challenge them. Shortcuts
helps you identify really early on if your new member of staff is going to
be good for your business. We use information from Shortcuts every day for
our daily 5 minute team meeting, every week in our management meeting to
review performance and then in each team members monthly review. As well
as helping us measure, monitor and control, Shortcuts is great for helping
us in our marketing. We like to communicate regularly with our clients – letters
about new services, e-shots with this month’s special offers, birthday
cards, Christmas cards and other mailings throughout the year. Shortcuts
is a fantastic tool that helps us do all these mailings with great ease.
We’ve been shortlisted for a couple of major awards this year. Information
from Shortcuts really helped us with our award entry and I am sure it impressed
the judges.
Retail success
Our daily 5 min team meeting helps us with retail sales. We find it helps the
team focus on what they are doing. We see that making recommendations to
the client is all part of providing the expert service we aim for. It is
not about hard sell – it is about helping the client make the right
decision about which products would work best for them.
Rebooking
Our revenue earners have a bonus based on their client retention. Our target
across the board is 70%. The team have realised that the best way to ensure
they hit their client retention target is to get their rebooking rate up.
The two measures are intrinsically linked. The team make a verbal recommendation
to the client, pop the information on the CPC and then the reception team
can look to confirm the recommended rebooking for the client.
We use the Value of Appointments report a lot with our team. Each day they
have a look and they know how they are against their daily target. They love
to start the day knowing they are on target and they understand that rebooking
is the biggest single influencer in getting their column full. Rebooking
works well for clients as they get to have the appointment they want. Our receptionists
are very busy and rebooking does help cut down on the amount of incoming
calls
for appointments – so it works well all round!
How do we deal with no shows?
No shows are always an issue. Like most businesses we have had loads over the
years and lost a lot of money. Our way round it is to inform clients that
we have a cancellation policy that requires 24 hours notice. Also we call
each client the day before to confirm their appointment. This approach has
helped considerably to minimise the problem. We are just in the process of
setting up the texting facility from Shortcuts as we think this will help
iron out the problem.
What our clients think about Shortcuts
Some of our clients are quite complimentary about our computer system. They
are impressed the way it stores their technical colour details and keeps
a record of all their retail purchases. What most people comment on though
is the receipt with their next appointment on! They really seem to like that
feature.
What’s the biggest growth area in the salon?
The individual service that has grown the most over 2006 is Brazilian or
Hollywood waxing. It has increased exponentially – and with all age
groups!
How do we see the crossover between hair and beauty?
We find the two work hand in hand. Many of our colour clients like to book
in for a mani or pedi whilst their colour is developing. People are short
of time, so anything they can do to increase what they can get done appeals
to them. We often have clients that ask for two therapists at the same time
so they can get all their essential grooming done in one appointment.
How does the team get on with Shortcuts?
Our team find Shortcuts easy to use. The great thing is that you can have a
new member of staff trained quickly as it is quite intuitive.
Heaven Spa and the Hilton
It was our third birthday on August 2006 and we were able to celebrate it in
real style as we had just heard that we had been offered the contract to
run the spa in the new Hilton hotel in Manchester. It is probably the most
coveted opportunity this year in Manchester and we are ecstatic at being
the chosen company. The hotel opened in October and it is in an amazing landmark
building – the tallest building in Manchester in fact. The hotel has
been incredibly busy since it opened and that has helped us get Heaven Spa
off the ground quickly.
http://www.heaven-spa.co.uk
