Wayne White is a 46 year industry veteran, professional hairdresser, Chantilly Academy educator, former Graham Web educator, mentor and former Marine.

Today we're going to hear his story, how he got to where he is and what his perspective is on the state of the industry.

Welcome back to the Hairdresser Strong show.

My name is Robert Hughes and I am your host and today I'm with Wayne White.

How you doing today Wayne?

I'm great, thank you.

Awesome, awesome.

Well everybody, I met Wayne and through Craig and at Fairfax County Public School CTE program and so shout out to him and we got, we were introduced because we're working with the schools to help the students get into salons, foreshadowing and interning etc and so, so, and then like during that process I learned that you were a former Graham Web instructor.

We also have had a student in common, Sarah Dufresne.

So shout out to Sarah, what's up?

And so I'm excited for this conversation.

Always excited to meet local folks and hear their stories because usually there's something in there that either is related to me or is something that I didn't know about my local, local community.

So I'm excited for this.

So, so again, thank you so much for being here.

Well, thanks for having me.

I appreciate it.

So let's dive right in.

Let's just jump.

Let's go straight to the beginning.

You know you're, you got into, got, became a hairdresser.

Like why did you do that?

Did you go to school?

Did you do an apprenticeship?

Let it tell us what's up.

Well, like a lot of people, I wasn't really good in high school and I was really fortunate that my mom and dad at a barber school at the time.

I walked away from a four year full ride scholarship in diving.

I used to be a junior Olympic diver but I knew I wasn't disciplined enough to make it through that.

And my mom and dad said, look, just get your license to see where it's going to land you.

Gives you an opportunity, gives you some freedom.

So I chose to do that, did that for a while, was extremely successful, competing on the national level, local level and one day decided to go into the Marine Corps.

Well, actually before that I decided to play college football because you know, why not?

Did that first semester and my grades were just as good as they were in high school so they kindly asked me not to come back.

So at that point in time, me and a buddy were just out having fun one night and I just said, I think I'm going to join the Marine Corps.

And I did that the next day.

I was super fortunate under the 1984.

83 to 85 actually I was part of ceremony honor guard in D.C.

so that's where I got to find out about Graham Webb.

And after that came out of the Marine Corps because I blew my knee out.

So they were like, you can't run and kill somebody.

So have a good day.

Back in the 80s, you know, they didn't fix you up, they just told you to go home.

When I got home, my mom dad said, hey, we opened up a cosmetology school.

Why don't you get your license, see what's going to happen.

Chose to do that.

And they said, why don't you get your instructor license because you've coached a lot.

Why don't you just give that a shot?

Turned around, got my license in instructing for cosmetology barbering.

So at one time I was an educated idiot in here.

Barber, barber, instructor cos.

Cause instructor.

I worked for Boys Town.

I don't know if you really know who that is or what that is.

It's made a movie in that.

Gosh, back in the 70s, I think he ain't heavy.

He's my brother.

You can look it up.

It's a very famous home for use.

It's kind of like the Youth for Tomorrow out here in Virginia.

That's how they base their model on the Youth for Tomorrow does off of Graham or sorry, off of Boys Town.

And that's kind of where I got my chops in teaching high school and coaching football and wrestling and track football.

Found out that's kind of what I love to do.

It was.

And it was neat to give something to somebody so young who didn't have those opportunities.

Was there five years.

They got rid of my.

Got rid of all the VO Tech programs as we used to call them.

And now they're called Career and Technical Education.

My wife at the time, I met her out here in D.C.

we moved back and she was going to college.

They surplus my programs.

You said, hey, let's go back.

So we went back on vacation.

I knew about Graham Webb.

I decided to check that out.

They were inter.

While they weren't interviewing, but they were remodeling.

So I swear to God when I tell you this.

And my wife, my ex wife still hates this.

I was in a polo shirt, flip flops and shorts went to hand in my resume because they were remodeling, renovating.

So I didn't think they were open.

And she said Excuse me, the president of the company would like to talk to you.

I say, but what.

And got in, got interviewed and hired on vacation and came out here, and I've been out here ever since.

We came out here in 93, and we've been here since then.

Nice.

So were you when you were.

So before your parents opened a cosmetology school, did you ha.

And you like coming back from the Marines, did you have any experience with cutting hair at all?

Well, I did because I first went to barber school because they had.

My mom and dad had 11 salons at one time.

My dad was probably the first franchiser that I've ever known about.

So he opened up a school, he opened up a salon.

Well, first of all, he was a barber, and then my mom was a cosmetologist, and they kind of worked together.

One side was.

Cause one side was barbering.

My mom did the chemicals, the perms, because we didn't do a whole lot of color back in the 70s.

And in 75, when long hair came in, my dad had a choice.

Learn how to do long hair or dye on the vine of doing short hair.

He chose to learn how to do long hair because my oldest brother did that and was making a butt ton of money and showed my dad a paycheck.

And my dad's like, I need to learn that.

So he turned around, started training other people and said, I'm spending time and money training other people when I can have my own salon and train people.

Well, then he did that and realized that it cost him too much time and money to train people coming out of school.

And then him and my mom decided to open up a school.

And then it kind of snowballed from that.

So, yeah, I was a barber first.

How long did you do that for?

79 to 85.

Okay, okay.

So five, six years.

All right.

Yeah.

And then when I came back, got my CA license and then started instructing.

Gotcha.

So you were.

Weren't doing.

You weren't cutting people's hair in the Marines?

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

In fact, the first.

If you ever go back to 1985, when they.

Well, actually 84, when they first advertised the Marines, that guy was my C.O.

actually, he was my platoon commander.

And then the C.O.

was there also.

I cut their hair.

Okay.

Not.

Not.

Not for the commercial because I didn't know them then.

But of course, being a male in the industry of hair, yeah, they.

They gave me all kinds of hell.

You can imagine.

And in the 80s, you can imagine yeah, Yeah.

I started doing their hair, so they kind of respected me a little bit differently, if you will.

That's so funny.

Okay, so.

So you get.

You.

You go and you're gonna go into school, and then you become an educator.

And I'm curious.

Tell.

Tell us, like, about Graham Webb, your experience, and also, like, just to give the audience some context, anybody who's never.

Is not familiar with Graham Web school and Rosalind.

I was.

It was always in Roslyn, right?

Yeah, well, it was.

Yeah, it was up higher up in Roslyn.

Okay.

Off of Wilson Boulevard before they moved down into.

So it would be Boston before that.

So it was in the Boston area.

Okay.

Speaking the 90s, they moved to that big part in.

In Roslyn.

Okay.

So when they first started, they were up in Boston.

Gotcha.

Okay.

So.

So that school at.

You know, at.

For.

For a period of time was considered, if not the top school, at least on the east Coast.

I don't know.

They were.

We were the best in the nation.

There's no doubt.

When did Vadal Sassoon's Academy open, do you know?

Like, I really don't.

I'd have to do the math on that, but we never really heard of them.

Okay.

But I think they started on the west Coast.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, you know, Vidal Videl teaches compartmentalizing where Graham Webb didn't.

Right.

I was fortunate enough to work with problem.

Well, I know the strongest team I've ever worked with, they were actually owned by Graham Webb.

And Graham would come in once a year.

He would do some classes.

We would do a hair show.

His daughter would come in.

It was phenomenal.

Had the European model of vacations, time off, all of that stuff.

So got really spoiled.

The team was phenomenal.

I worked with Gerard, Jeff, Dave Miramar, and Irene, who were the guest.

The international guest artists.

So they would come from London and then come in and do some classes for us and then travel around.

And then at that point in time, Graham Webb started introducing his.

His products.

And I just pulled this up just for poops and grins.

But this was.

Was on their.

On their label of their shampoos and stuff.

And it was a brown.

A light brown bottle, kind of like what this is now with this logo.

And they would te.

We would have these products that were blank, and they'd say shampoo, conditioner, whatever.

And we got to try it in the school setting and kind of wrote our pros and cons.

And then they came out with their product line.

When we first Traveled because we would go into smaller ballrooms, you know, like a hotel.

And that's how they first came out, is when we started training, when they started buying the products, we would go to those small ballrooms and educate.

We very, very seldom talked about the products.

And then as Robert Taylor bought the company, it turned American.

Robbie Rich came in and was the director.

It turned American.

And it kind of changed dramatically after that.

So I was fortunate enough to come back and do classes for them because they.

I'm known for men and women short haircutting because of my barbering.

So I would come in and I would do not only classes for the school, but I come in and do classes for their advanced education.

I would say that myself and Myra were the only Americans on their education team.

And I always said because we're the interpreters, you know, their accents were pretty strong.

Yeah, yeah.

So, so were you working in a salon also?

Were you full time educator?

What was that like?

Full time educator?

I worked more at night, so I was, I hate to use the word director of night school, but I worked nights because they didn't have anybody consistent for night school.

So I chose to do that.

And I was part of the student art team where we would compete.

We competed on the ibs.

New York used to have contests all the time and also Chicago.

So we'd go there and compete.

It was kind of fun.

So no, I was full time with them and then as advanced educators on the weekends.

Nice.

Okay, cool, cool.

So, and how long did you teach at Grand Webb before you left?

2 and a half years.

And then tried to go back into the salon because everything was kind of being bought out and it just wasn't what it was.

And I just thought it would be a better, A better fit for somebody else and not me.

So I went into the professional world for a while.

Worked at a salon that was right in Tyson's Galleria area.

And then 97, an opening came up in at Chantilly, did my interview, and I've been there ever since.

Cool.

So I.

I started teaching at Graham Webb.

I think it was 2005.

Five.

I think that sounds about right.

Something like that.

2005.

Some 2006.

And so by then all, pretty much all of that original group of people was gone.

Sarah Leonard.

Did you know Sarah Leonard?

Oh, yeah, Sarah.

At the end I knew Sarah.

Gareth.

Yeah.

So I.

So I knew Gareth and Sarah Leonard.

And Sarah Leonard was.

I love Sarah because her, her laugh.

Huh?

Her laugh, yeah.

Yeah, I love her laugh.

And what I like, she critiqued me as an educator.

And it's that British accent really made it feel like it wasn't as bad as.

Because, like, if it was you telling me, I would have been, like.

I would have been, like, so feeling like you were putting me down.

But she did such a good job at, like, giving it to me in a way, like.

And hardly, like, given to me hard, but, you know, her delivery, and it was just like, I grew so much from that.

Well, Miramar and Irene were the international guest artists.

Whoo.

They were tough.

I mean, they were phenomenal hairdressers, but they didn't give a rat's butt if they hurt your feelings or not.

But they did it for a reason.

Right there.

That's how they were trained.

If you know anything about how they do hair, they're lucky to touch hair their first year.

If you.

If they.

If your hairstylist tells you, go get a cup of coffee.

That's an honor.

Yeah, right.

I mean, that's what G and Davies always tell me.

So when they came in, man, they were.

They were great, but they were tough.

And it was great because we, as educators, didn't have the ego.

If we didn't know something, I would walk over and say to Gee, hey, I got a question.

Or G or Jeff would come in and say, hey, I got a question.

And it was just awesome to have that teamwork.

It was truly the best team I've ever worked on.

Nice.

Awesome.

So you're working at Grimweb, and you go back.

You go into the salon for a little bit, and then you start at Chantilly.

So you've been doing that since you said 97, right?

28 years.

Yep.

Nice.

So.

So tell.

First question.

Wait.

Chantilly Academy on cosmetology?

Have you been.

Have you taught any other stuff or.

Okay, so I still.

I still go out and train or teach hairdressers in salons.

Oh, cool.

Again, I'm known for men and women's short haircutting, but I've taught other things.

But that's kind of, like, my forte for some reason.

Nice.

Okay, cool.

So.

All right, so what I'm curious to know about.

Since we're on, we're up to kind of, like, where you're at currently is kind of, like, your perspective on some things.

So first question.

You've been working with young folks, and you've seen, like, an evolution, I'm sure.

I would assume.

And so, like, what.

How would you explain the.

Like, if you were.

If assuming that.

Well, I am a hiring manager, and we Just hired somebody, and we need to hire somebody else.

So how would you talk to myself or anybody else that's out there looking to hire one of these people of the things that are we might find challenging or the things that might set us up for success, like, you know, any pointers or advice or.

Or.

Or landmines that we need to be aware of?

Well, I mean, the landmines is.

They're young and they've been given trophies for everything, but it's not everybody, right?

I know we're throwing everybody under the bus, but when you look at the group as a whole, they're nervous about everything, or they use the word anxiety, right?

They get anxiety over everything.

So I think that.

That the job shadow that you do is phenomenal.

I've been trying to do that for years, but they're afraid to get out there.

But then once they graduate, they don't.

Well, even though I tell them and show them, they don't know what to expect because they haven't been out there.

The only way to learn is to do it, right?

They don't want to do it.

They.

They want to see it and understand it, but they don't want to do it, if that makes any sense.

From what I see and what I've been told, they all want a million dollars for a day's work, and they don't realize how to build your book takes time.

I have a lot of good hairdressers that leave because they're not building as fast as they thought they should.

But wow, is all I can say.

And I can always tell when somebody changes salons because they start posting on Instagram, right?

So I always tell the kids, it's not hard, it's difficult.

You have to stay with it all the time because if they don't see you, you're irrelevant.

So you don't have to do all these funny videos that I see.

I just wish we would do good hair.

But they can do something and kind of like what they do with your job shadow.

I saw a few of those where they just talk about the salon, the atmosphere, have their guests talk about them and themselves instead of just a picture.

I.

I wish I knew because I could have more people out in the industry, but I'm fighting parents, right?

We still have that vocational word, and they think that because they know a hairdresser that's not making any money or a former hairdresser that's no longer doing hair.

Well, let's do some math.

Let's really talk to them, right?

You And I talked about last week.

I think the average hairdresser makes maybe fifteen hundred dollars a week.

At forty percent, that's nothing.

That's six hundred a week plus tips.

But you're still not making in this area.

You can't live.

They don't want to work hard.

They don't want to work five and six days a week.

Like, I had to until I got busy.

Then I worked my way down, did last, made more.

Even though I show them the numbers, even though I talk about the numbers, even though I bring people in and they show them the numbers.

It's kind of like when mom and dad talk to you, you just hear.

Yeah, you know, I, I, I wonder, like, you know, where, where is this coming from?

Like, I, because I, I don't, I, I mean, let's just say this.

Like, there are people who might encourage their children to become a social media influencer because that's what they want to do.

I'm not talking about that.

I'm talking about like, kind of like from my experience and talking to students, it does sound like their parents talk to them, and they just don't sound like they, like what the parents say, which I can relate to because I didn't want to hear what my dad had to say about, like, what steps I needed to take to, to be successful.

I, I remember saying, like, my dad one time said I was talking about, like, I'm gonna make all this money.

I'm gonna be rich.

And he goes, okay, well, you better learn taxes.

Like, I'm like, I just, like, I didn't want him to tell me what to do.

And, you know, my dad, because my dad isn't rich, you know, so I'm like, oh, what do you know?

Like, so I'm like, well, I'm going to make so much money that taxes don't matter, you know, and now that I'm an adult, I realize that's ridiculous.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It took a while for me to realize that if you don't understand taxes and corporate structures and deductions and like, you know, all that stuff, like, it's going to be hard for you to like, you know, get like, into the stratosphere, you know, like, leave, leave our atmosphere into outer space.

So anyway, I, that said, it does.

It's like, I, I mean, my, my assumption is they're learning about it on social media and, but like, I don't know, like, what experience do you have in any sort of conversations where you're h, you're talking to a student and something like it, that comes up where it's like, oh, well, are they, are they, are they basing things off of things that they've learned, things that they were told by their parents or things that they learned on social media or their co.

Like, anything you can come to mind from what as I'm talking?

Well, I find, unfortunately, and this is not everybody, that the older stylists don't mentor the younger stylist.

There's no secret in this game.

It's hair.

Let's get over ourselves.

Right?

And when you help somebody, you learn it twice.

And I think what happens is some of these older stylists are mean and, and I hate to use the word burly because the way I was bullied is different than how bullying is today.

But they're just aggressive and mean to these kids who are not used to that and they just, they give up, they throw up their arms and they're like, I'm not making enough money fast enough.

And, you know, they want to have a million dollar house their first six months out.

So it's just, they don't see, like you said, they don't see the math, they don't see the taxes, they don't see all the stuff that comes with it.

They just see the end result.

But they don't know how to get there.

Doesn't matter how many times I show them, because I do, I try to do my due diligence.

So I'm not setting them up to fail.

The ones that take it and run with it are extremely successful.

But let's talk about Graham Webb.

How many people that you know of that graduated that are still doing hair?

Yeah, that's a good question.

I, I, I, that I know of.

A small, like a small percentage.

Yeah.

Less than half.

Oh, easily.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

And, and how many people leave this industry within their first five years?

It's because it's not hard.

It's difficult.

You're dealing with people's personalities every day.

You're dealing with somebody crying because it's Tuesday and it's not sunny out.

Right.

There can be a lot of different reasons.

And I try to tell the students, you can't take it personal.

You're only as good as your last haircut.

Right.

But it's so hard for them to understand that because they haven't been, they, they haven't failed.

A lot of them have never failed.

And I try to teach and mentor my kids just like I do in the business world.

I don't teach them any differently.

My pace is Slower.

But I teach the same haircuts I teach.

It's a system.

You know that as well as I do.

You work in a salon.

I try to teach them systems.

And once you understand the systems, then you can run how you want to run.

But if you don't have the foundations of the basics, it doesn't matter how great you think you are, you're going to be lost.

Totally.

So do you think that, like, if you know, as a manager, owner that's looking to hire, you think that, like, would you tell that person that their fear is greater than their desire to be rich quick or the other way around?

The other fear gets in the way.

But we all know what fear stands for, right?

False Evidence Appearing Real.

They don't understand that.

Right.

And.

And you know, and you know as well as I do what drives a train is retail, right?

Because I only make 5 to 7% off of you.

You call in sick, you get.

Right.

You get in a fight with your spouse, your toenail hurts, you go get hungover, you don't show up.

But I make 40% off of retail.

It never calls in sick, late in a fight, nothing.

But they don't want to ask because they're going to hear the word no, even though they don't understand.

No's an acronym for next opportunity.

Right.

And you know as well as I do, you heard no far more than you've heard yes.

Yeah, but as you get more experience, you hear no far less than you hear yes because you know how to, you know the systems.

Yeah.

Well.

So that makes me think of, like, when I hear no, I'm like, oh, I didn't ask it.

Right.

I need to figure out.

I need to.

Okay, hold on.

Okay, let me come back to you.

How long does it take until I get the redo?

Like, three weeks.

Okay, I'll call you in three weeks.

Let me ask you again because, like, I'm like, I'm gonna figure this out, you know, so, yes, I like that next opportunity.

Well, well, the worst thing is when somebody says, would you like.

I don't like anything.

Right.

Shall we get started with that?

Which would you like to take home with you today?

Right.

We, we need to say the same thing, just different words, just different vocabulary.

And you know, as well as either strategy out there, there's, you know, I'm just looking at it.

There's all kinds of programs out there to help you learn that.

And the greatest thing about our industry in the 40 plus years I've been in there, you don't Need a degree because everything is inside our program.

You can go out and get all these classes.

Inspiring champions, strategies, right?

All of them are out there to help us learn our industry.

We're the only industry that teaches us about our industry from the ground up.

It's phenomenal, and nobody takes advantage of it.

Everybody wants education, but nobody takes education totally.

And, you know, I was just talking to Larry Roberts Jr.

And he.

He owns Larry's Barber College, and he does a lot in education.

And he kind of started pretty early in the convers, was talking about the fact that, like, there's this whole safety level that was completely taken for granted.

Like, you know, the license is really licensing you to protect the public.

And we should be able to have conversations about skin disorders and bacteria and fungus and ringworm, all that.

You know, all that stuff.

And as he was talking, I'm like, you know what?

That it's so true.

Like, we learn so much in school.

And, I mean, one.

I think it's kind of hard to retain all of that in one year.

I think it's a lot to learn in one year.

But I do think it's an interesting piece to, like, think about how, like, you know, having some sort of, like, refreshing experience to, like, you know, revisit.

If we.

If some of us take the time to revisit some of our old textbooks, we might find that there's, like, information that we didn't pick up because we were so focused on being good at cutting hair or passing this license or doing color or whatever.

And that's what we focused on.

And we just got.

We just passed the test so we could get to the next step.

Anyway, that was kind of like you made me think of when I said.

When you said that our test is.

Is a joke.

Our practical test is a joke.

I can teach this water bottle how to pass the practical test because it's safety and sanitation.

But let's go back to Covid, right?

Hairdressers should have smiled at Covid because that's chapter five for us.

That's infection control.

We know how to do all that stuff.

We know what a virus is.

We know how a virus grows.

We know how viruses stop.

We knew that because that's part of almost every chapter that we have.

What I wish would happen, at least in a majority of the states, because they're doing it in Virginia.

They act like they're not, but they're doing it under the cosmetology umbrella.

Supposed to be hair, skin, and nails.

We.

We teach it.

But when you Leave my program if you want to be an esthetician.

Oh, sorry.

You got to get your esthetician license.

Why?

Yeah, right.

Oh, well, DPR says, oh, yeah, you're licensed to do SD1.

I'm going to call BS on that because I've had a lot of students that do that, and they have to go and get their license.

Your cosmetology trained.

Now you have that.

So that's a separate license.

Now you have nails, which is a separate license.

So why don't we just have a hair license?

If we're going to go to a thousand hours, why don't we have a hair license?

And we could teach how to cut hair, how to curl hair, how to color hair, how to relax hair.

Right.

Then we could just talk about hair.

Because in SD1 aesthetics, you're going to learn makeup and waxing anyway, so we really don't need to teach that, even though it is part of our game.

But for a makeup license, you don't need a license.

Or for makeup, you don't need a license.

For braiding, you don't need a license.

So we're bastardizing our.

Our business.

And business owners aren't smart enough to grab that, because my mom and dad had a barber and cosmetology school.

So 20 was 2100 hours.

To get both licenses was 3, 200.

Because you had one license, they gave you a thousand hours.

So I didn't have to go for four years?

Well, it was 18 months, basically.

18 months.

I didn't have to go 36 months.

I only had to go, like, 22.

I wish we had enough people to help kind of tighten the ship, because if we want to do hair, let's just do hair.

So, you know, that's.

That's interesting that you're saying that, because Patrick Warneri from the Salon professional academy in D.C.

he talks a lot about this as well.

He's, like, advocating for it, okay, to separate out the licenses, because he says he's got a lot of students that come in and they only want to do this or they only want to do that.

And he's like, why don't we just, like, separate out the licenses?

I did talk to another member of state board in dc.

Dc?

Yeah, dc.

DC Maybe she's on Maryland.

But she was telling me that she thinks.

And I'm not going to name any names, because she did.

It was a private conversation, but she was saying to me that.

That she thinks that we should not separate the licenses because she knows that some people in this industry Will go to get the lowest bar license and then do all the other services anyway.

I mean, I think that that's interesting perspective, but that's a jump, you know?

But they would be.

Yeah, they would.

Simpleton mindset.

Yeah, it's a different mindset.

It is.

Yeah.

It's kind of like we need to make rules to make sure that we don't do anything wrong versus rules to protect people and rules to, like, punish people.

It's like, let's prevent people from making their own bad decisions, kind of thinking, in my opinion.

Well, why do you think a lot of states are deregulating us?

Yeah, why do you think?

You know, I think we're.

We're.

It's a.

We're.

We're already kind of talking about state of the industry.

So why.

What do.

What do you think?

Well, because they don't understand the safety and sanitation that goes with it.

Right.

So they think if they deregulate it, still let anybody, you know, do hair.

I Learned it from YouTube.

Well, the libertarian in me says, all right, let competition lead competition.

Right.

If I went to grime web and got my license and you got it on YouTube, you're most likely going to screw somebody's hair up a lot faster than I probably will.

So you're going to get sued, lose everything you have.

I've been trained.

I have a professional license.

Right.

Because I think they'll still leave the schools alone, but at any time, you can be like, okay, I'm out now.

I know enough.

Okay, well, if you don't know safety and sanitation, if you don't know how to recognize a skin disorder or if the hair is strong enough to get a relaxer of color, that's on you, brother.

You made that mistake.

Right.

So I see both sides, but, man, that's a.

That's a slippery slope because the legislatures don't understand the chemicals behind what we do.

They just see the after look of what we do.

But I guarantee, if you ask their wives or the females that are in the legislature, they know how important we are.

Yeah, for sure.

Right.

It's the guys that go to, you know, excuse the expression, they go to a chop shop, pay 20 bucks.

Well, I just pay 20 bucks.

That's not that big of a deal.

Okay, but go ahead and get a manny and petty for somebody who's not licensed and certified and doesn't clean their bowl out and you get staph infection and you lose your toes.

Yeah.

I had a friend almost lose his toe because he went to a place that didn't clean the throne.

Well, did you hear about that place in the Midwest that was doing these facials?

The ones where they take your.

They draw your blood, they put in like a spinner and it pulls the Pl.

Separates the plasma, and then they re.

Inject it into your face, and it's supposed to be incredible.

And.

But they weren't.

They were reusing the needles and someone got hiv.

Can you imagine?

Hey, I'm gonna go get a facial and I get hiv.

I would be very upset.

Like, you know, and.

But these people are licensed, so, like, I don't know what the.

I don't know how you deal with that.

I don't know.

Okay, how many salons have you walked into that you're like, are you kidding me?

I.

I have walked into salons that I felt that way.

Look at your barber side jar.

That thing hasn't been changed since Jesus was a baby.

You know?

I mean, it's just like, that's what we're supposed to know, right?

That's on you.

Yeah, right.

I mean, that's on you.

If you.

You know, they used to call me Mr.

Clean because I always kept my tools clean.

I didn't care how busy I was.

My last client would come in and go, like, were you not busy today?

I'm like, why?

Your station's immaculate.

Yep.

That's just for you.

But if you come into my house, you think I'm not cleaning up.

And that's.

It's hard to teach people that, oh, I'm busy.

Okay.

That's your problem.

You don't have two minutes to clean your stuff and get everything ready for your next client.

That's kind of sad.

Well, yeah, I think you're managing your book poorly.

That's what I.

100%.

If you can't clean up in between yourself, you either need to have pay somebody to be your assistant or you need to manage your book better.

Well, yeah, see, I came from Nebraska, so we're much smaller state than Virginia.

I've been doing hair.

I've been here over 30 years.

I've never seen an inspector in my school, in my salons, anywhere.

So they use the word, we don't have money.

I'm going to call BS on that because we have money, but you're just putting it somewhere else.

You're not putting it.

Why aren't you in those SD salons?

In barber and cosmetology, we're dealing with people every single day.

It is so easy to spread a disease or disorder so quickly.

I.

I Just, I don't understand why they're not there.

In Nebraska it was at least once a month.

Now granted it, you know, it's a small state, people wise, but from corner to corner it's four to five hours.

Right.

Why don't you have enough people?

You have people on the board.

Why aren't they out there doing it?

It's, you know, I'm tired of the money crap.

They can find money if they need money.

Yeah, there, Yeah.

I, I, I don't, that's a whole other rabbit hole.

Yeah.

But you know what, I was, I was, I was also like thinking, you know, the, the free market side of me says that buy insurance and protect yourself and let the, let the customers decide because they already do.

Let's just face it like the customers already decide who is good and who they're willing to pay through trial and error.

Also through reputation.

And so like you have a reputation of being like taking care of your people.

Well, a health issue will definitely devastate that.

So you're incentivized to prevent that.

And I don't think that this is the solution.

I'm just saying like these are the two sides.

It's like let's have more health inspectors to stay on top of this.

But also like at the end of the day like incentives and like are going to drive the behavior.

And we have high end salons, we have, we have you know, low price salons and they are not equally like that has nothing to do with how clean, insanitary they are.

I've walked into like a haircutter or like a mom and pop barbershop charging you know, 10, 15, $20 for haircut and they are cleaner than a high end salon that after I walked through, you know what I mean?

So anyway, that, that was, that's kind of one of my, my, my thoughts on that one on that topic.

Yeah, I, I could see that.

Right.

I self regulation is always important, but that's management, that's ownership, that's management.

Right.

And I'm tired of well you need to hire somebody.

No, that's your job.

That's your 5x5, that's your 5x5 show every 30, 40, 50 minutes.

How do you want that presented?

When somebody comes to your house, I'm sure you clean up.

So that's your house, that's your five by five.

How are you going to present that?

Well and also like when we were, I remember I was roommates with my brother and he, we had an agreement before we moved in together.

I Was like, okay, like, I can't do this, like your stuff in the common area thing.

Like if, if we like, we pick the furniture, we pick the stuff together that goes in the common area.

But all your, your personal stuff needs to be in your room.

And if you got a problem with that, I'd rather live in my by myself or move into someone's else's house under their rules.

But I'm not gonna like get a place with somebody unless I have this conversation.

And he said, yeah, I totally agree.

Well, I mean, he was like leaving his mail out, leaving his jacket draped over the chair and, and he would like, had a plant in his room, like a big one, not like a tiny little thing.

And he was like, know, he put that out in the living room and it's like.

And so like after like a, like a week or two of this, I'm like, so do you remember us talking about not leaving your stuff in the common area?

And he goes, yeah.

I was like, well, you got your mail there, you got your jacket there, you leave your plan out here.

Like, what's that about?

And he got so pissed and he's like, he like grabs the stuff.

He's like, fine, I'm going, take it.

I didn't think it was like that big of a deal, you know, and, and so I think that there's, there's something there to like, learn.

Like, you know, you're, you're, you're the reason why one that's like choosing partners and roommates, like just know.

So, you know, you should not just take someone at their word.

I mean, that's a good way to pre plan, but like, definitely, like, I would put that in writing and I would also have some damages money set aside.

Like in hindsight, if I was going to be a roommate and let someone move in, I would need to take some sort of deposit so that I can cover it when I kick them out because they didn't follow the rules to get a new person to rent.

Which I would say is the same for business.

But on another note, the reason why I wanted him to keep the place clean was because I was single and young and going out a lot.

And you never know if you're going to meet somebody, you want to bring them home.

And I'm like, I don't want to walk in and like, like your crap's all over the place, you know?

So I feel like the same thing goes for like when you're, you know, doing hair, it's like, what if you had a Walk in.

What if.

What if, like, you're.

What if you're finishing up and you're like, I'll leave that mess till tomorrow.

And then someone calls you in the morning and asks you if you can do, like, a certain, like, service before your client and be like, yo, I'll pay you triple.

I gotta get on a plane.

What are you gonna.

Like, now?

You gotta be like, okay, you gotta rush over there.

You gotta clean up before they get there.

You gotta.

Or you gotta do the thing where you're like, okay, stand out here for five minutes and then you can come in, you know?

But, you know, okay, you've been in salons, so I'm not.

I'm not telling you something you haven't seen or no.

Hairdressers, for the most part.

Not everybody.

I'm throwing everybody under the bus.

Or slobs.

They're slobs.

Look at the.

Look at.

Look at where they put their color bowls and their.

And their brushes.

And the barber side.

We just talked about that.

They're brushes.

Open up their drawer and look at their brushes.

More hair than I have on my head in a brush.

It's not saying much.

I have four strands, but whatever.

But you know what I mean.

It's just.

It's.

It's.

I'm busy.

I hate that phrase.

I'm busy.

So is everybody else.

So you're telling your client that they're not good enough for you.

It's like when you're late, right?

I hate late.

So when you're late, what are you telling everybody?

I'm more important than you.

Totally.

And I never got that until I got in the Marine Corps and they beat it out of you.

So I hate being late.

And Gerard and Jeff and Dave, anytime I did classes with them, they're like, yep, we'll be on time.

Wayne's there.

Our classes ran on time always.

Because I respect people's time.

And it's not that they didn't.

It's just they're great hairdressers and they're.

I mean, they take a quarter inch subsection, right?

We look at it.

If we can see our guide, that's our subsection.

So I try to Americanize them as they tried to, you know, Europeanize me.

So it's phenomenal team.

It was the best time of my life.

This is.

This has been such a great conversation.

It's been a pleasure to hear your story and also to talk.

Talk about the industry, and I definitely look forward to talking to you more and.

And also working with you as well.

And, you know, helping the, helping the local DC, MD, VA students get access to opportunity and education in the.

Before.

But, but right before we wrap up, I want to give you a chance to, you know, if you have any, like, last minute statements, maybe advice to a student or a salon owner or anything you want to say before we sign off.

Well, I think the biggest takeaway is to be patient, right?

We've, look, we've lost our patience.

And I think that's everybody from top down, right?

But the salon owner, the stylists need to be patient with the new ones, right?

They're trying to grow.

Remember where we started, right?

Always remember where you began.

And the newbies have no idea where the bathrooms are for the first six months.

So we need to help them.

We need to teach them everything because we all started there.

And I think what happens is as we grow, we forget where we started from.

So wherever you start, remember where you started and help the next person out.

Because when you help somebody out, you grow just as fast as they do.

There's no secrets in this game.

I always say, you're not my competition.

Nobody's my competition except me.

I'm only as good as my last client.

And they're only my client when they sit in my chair.

It's up to me to keep them there.

And if not, you shake hands, you move forward, you move on.

And I think that we're so afraid that we're going to lose a client.

Both.

Everyone.

That leaves two more show up.

If you do the right thing, do you show up on time?

Is your.

Is your book clean?

Meaning do you run on time?

Are you there on time?

When you're young, you need to be early, stay late.

Right?

There's an old saying, a great athlete becomes great when nobody's watching.

Same thing in our industry.

Watch videos, cut hair, practice on your models.

Practice on anybody that has hair, dogs, cats, who cares?

Practice on everybody so you can hone your craft and become great.

Love that.

Awesome.

Well, thank you so much again for joining us and I definitely look forward to the next time we talk.

Absolutely.

Robert, I appreciate your time.