Her Story
About Jennifer
I've been in the salon industry for 20 years, and my journey has been shaped by both professional growth and personal transformation. I started as an independent stylist, building my clientele base and completing an internship. I became a salon owner, but when my personal life went through some changes and I went through a really rough divorce, I realized that I needed to make some changes in my life to ensure that I was being the best mom that I could be for my kids, while staying in the industry that is part of who I am and engraved in my soul. I sold my salon and put myself through cosmetology school, then became a cosmetology educator for 7 years at Trikoche University of Beauty Culture. From there, I joined Haircuttery Family of Brands, progressing from standalone salon leader to multi-unit leader, and now I've been an area leader for going on 4 years. I oversee 9 salons, traveling between 3 to 6 salons a week, doing business analyzing, coaching, and training. I'm also a business leadership trainer for our entire company of 500-plus salons. My passion is growing, developing, and empowering salon professionals to be the best version of themselves and be authentically who they are, because the world would be a boring, crazy place if we were all exactly the same. What keeps me going is truly my kids - they're the ones who keep me wanting to keep going, to keep doing more, just so I can provide a better life for them.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Jennifer
01What do you attribute your success to?
Truly, my kids. They're the ones who keep me wanting to keep going, to keep doing more, just so I can provide a better life for them, and honestly, eventually, you know, retirement, so I can enjoy life. But it's truly, truly for my kids. Beyond that, I think my most notable achievement is just being able to continue to grow myself as a person, but as a woman in business at the same time. I don't feel like there's one significant thing that I can throw out there, besides believing in myself and having the grit to keep pushing through, so that I can be the best mom for my kids, while being able to support the professionals in the industry at the same time.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I would just tell them that they are gonna get the most out of this industry as they're willing to put into it. It's not gonna happen overnight. It's about continuing to learn and continuing to grow every day, because not only is the world ever-changing, but this industry is ever-evolving and ever-changing, and new products and new techniques continually come out. So the best thing that they can do is just keep up with their learning and their ability to accept feedback and grow from it. When we stop learning, we stop growing, and we stop pushing ourselves to be the best version of ourselves at the same time.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
Right now, we're definitely seeing some challenges with face-to-face communication, because everybody lives in the world of social media and technology, so communication with another live human being in front of them is definitely causing a learning curve for some of the younger generational stylists that we're hiring. The other thing we see is everybody's into filtering their pictures, so when people see a beautiful hair color, like 9 times out of 10, it's gonna have some sort of filter on it or be edited in some sort of way, so there's a lot of having some unrealistic expectations because of those filters that are out there. On the opportunities side, I definitely think some of the biggest opportunities that we have right now is just continuing to keep the industry professional and elevated. We go to school for 1,500 plus hours, usually taking roughly a year depending upon what state you're in. We go through so much more than just how to cut hair or how to color someone's hair - we go through anatomy, chemistry, we learn electricity, because those are all things that we utilize in the industry that people sometimes don't realize. One of the biggest things that we learn while we're in school is proper sanitation methods to make sure that we're not only keeping ourselves safe, but we're keeping all of our guests that come into the salon and into our chairs safe at the same time to prevent any cross-contamination.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
I think values like being open and honest and transparent are most important to me. Just being respectful and responsible in everything I do.
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