![\"When](\"http:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/who-owns-the-client-no-text-1024x512.png\")
<\/h2>\n<\/h2>\nAfter talking with a lot of salon owners about this, I can tell you that some have a very strong opinion on the subject: Clients belong to the salon. These owners figure they\u2019ve spent good money on marketing, promotions and keeping the salon afloat. The client is theirs and staff members are blocked from the client contact list, end of story.<\/p>\n
I receive many panicked calls from salon owners asking me to immediately shut down a stylist\u2019s account and block their access when they find out that stylist is leaving. The team member is leaving and the owner is worried they\u2019re going to take all their hard won clients with them!<\/p>\n
I hear you folks, you put a lot of effort into building your business. But I\u2019m sorry to tell you you\u2019re wrong.<\/p>\n
The salon doesn\u2019t own the client.<\/strong><\/p>\n The stylist doesn\u2019t own the client.<\/strong><\/p>\n The client owns the client! \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The client is the only person who can decide who they want to see for their hair. You can help influence their decision, but the decision is theirs and theirs alone.<\/p>\n This realization is critical to properly handling salon staff departures. In fact, understanding this can help you run a healthier, more successful business.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Blocking access to client records and contact details when a staff member is leaving may seem like a good idea, but it\u2019s not as effective as it sounds. You are clearly demonstrating to your staff that you don\u2019t trust them, and this leads to a lack of \u201cbuy in.\u201d \u00a0If your staff are not invested in your business, they are more likely to leave.<\/p>\n From my observations of business success at salonMonster I have noticed that the highest failure rate of multi-chair salons is amongst businesses that do not allow staff access to their clients\u2019 contact records.<\/p>\n Blocking the stylist\u2019s access after they have given notice might make you feel better but it doesn\u2019t stop staff from getting client details. People are resourceful. They\u2019ll often copy contact details before they give notice, or photograph or copy it out by hand from the front desk or with the help of a co-worker. \u00a0The only impact blocking access will have is to create a negative work environment.<\/p>\n Another common \u201csolution\u201d is to not tell the client where the stylist has gone. You tell them you \u201cdon\u2019t know,\u201d but clients aren\u2019t that naive. \u00a0This is a surefire way to show them that you don\u2019t respect them. \u00a0You\u2019re withholding information from them. \u00a0You are clearly demonstrating that you don\u2019t have their best interest in mind, and you\u2019re as likely to push them away as to make them stay with you. \u00a0After all, it\u2019s not hard for someone to Google their stylist\u2019s name and find out where they\u2019ve gone.<\/p>\n Get ahead of the news. Notify all of the stylist\u2019s clients that the stylist is moving. Send them an email or letter, or update them by phone. Show them that you have their best interests at heart. Acknowledging that neither the salon or stylist have exclusive \u201crights\u201d to a client can help tackle the challenge of staff departure more effectively. To believe you have exclusive rights to the client \u00a0is to delude yourself.<\/p>\n The client is in the driver\u2019s seat when it comes to deciding where to spend their money. \u00a0Knowing this, we can do our best to earn their trust and continued business.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tara Main from SalonSkipper.com<\/a><\/p>\n With today\u2019s technology, you\u2019d be a fool not to think that your staff has already friended their clients on facebook, Instagram and whatever other social media platforms they use. Your clients and staff probably exchange texts and perhaps even emails. As owners, we should be encouraging relationship building. I preach transparency, it\u2019s the only way to have your team feeling an integral part of your business. Blocking them from seeing client records means they may not be able to access pertinent information or reach out to their clients to follow up or encourage a return visit. It\u2019s your job, as the salon owner, to make sure your salon is an environment that neither the staff nor clients want to leave. Once you\u2019ve achieved this, you\u2019ll really have no reason to be worried about a walk out or client \u201cstealing\u201d.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Brenda Perham from Bamboo Consulting<\/a><\/p>\n Thanks Stephen for throwing this topic up for debate! Here\u2019s my ten cents worth\u2026.<\/p>\n \u201cReason, season or a lifetime\u201d is a quote that I really like. In reality stylists will always come and always go from your business \u2013 don\u2019t forget as a salon owner you left the salon you worked at before you started your own business!<\/p>\n Essentially the clients do belong to the salon and their contact details were given to the salon so if a stylist is accessing them they are breaching privacy laws (that\u2019s the way it is in Australasia \u2013 not sure about other countries laws) BUT in reality like Stephen says by the time they give you notice they have probably connected with their clients (especially via social media) and you are probably the last person to know that they are leaving. The horse has bolted.<\/p>\n The three solutions that Stephen has suggested are perfect for reaching out to the client in a professional manner but lets step back a bit further as I think there are a few things we can do to prevent the situation rather than trying to cure it after it happens.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s something to think about\u2026..what if the stylist that was leaving wasn\u2019t a very busy stylist and maybe not really making you any money? You probably wouldn\u2019t be so worried about it, you might even celebrate as they were essentially the \u2018weakest link\u2019 in the team. The real reason you are concerned as a salon owner is you can see that potentially big $ will be missing from your weekly turnover, meaning that your salon won\u2019t be as profitable and you might not be able to make ends meet or even take a cut in your own income.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s some points I think are worth considering, as stylists will always leave you (that\u2019s a no brainer) but you can to a degree minimize the impact that is has on your business financially.<\/p>\n Ensure that everyone in your team delivers an amazing client journey, for every client, every time. You need to create a culture of care within your salon that a client doesn\u2019t want to leave. If that culture of care is only coming from their stylist they won\u2019t trust the rest of the team to look after them when their stylist leaves.<\/p>\n Don\u2019t let stylists become superstars! Don\u2019t you love awesome stylists that are naturally motivated and great at what they do. It\u2019s easy to show favouritism towards them, maybe bend the rules for them and book all the new clients into them because you know they will come back. You need to mentor and grow your stylists so they are all operating at the same high level \u2013 the split between technical and client journey education should be 50\/50. Always have a pecking order for new clients so the less aggressive stylist don\u2019t get trampled while they are trying to build their clientele.<\/p>\n Make sure that your salon is future proofed by ensuring that if you lost a stylist and their clients it wouldn\u2019t endanger the future of your business or you personally. I have had many a salon owner say that losing a top performing stylist was the best thing that happened to them in the big picture, as they looked into every corner of their business to save money and realized they had been running a pretty loose ship!<\/p>\n So in summary my recommendation is the \u2018girl guide method\u2019\u2026.be prepared! \u263a<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What\u2019s the best way to handle things when a staff member leaves your salon? I\u2019ve got a bird\u2019s-eye view of the different approaches from working with so many salons through salonMonster. I\u2019ve seen that some can lead to business success and others can be destructive and counter-productive. After talking with a lot of salon owners … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6679,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6661"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6681,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661\/revisions\/6681"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Here\u2019s what not to do when a stylist leaves<\/h2>\n
So, what should you do when a stylist leaves?<\/h2>\n
\nLet the client know you have another stylist you think would be perfect for them. Explain how this stylist\u2019s experience and skill set would be great match for their hair\u2019s needs.
\nOffer them a discount for the next visit. If you can get them back into the salon and working with a new stylist your chance of retaining them as a client goes up exponentially. Giving them 25% off now is cheap compared to losing them as a client.
\nWhile none of these things will guarantee you won\u2019t lose any clients, together they will increase your chances of retaining them for the long term.<\/p>\n![\"tara](\"http:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/tara-main.jpg\")
Tara\u2019s Thoughts<\/h2>\n![\"brenda](\"http:\/\/salonmonster.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/brendaperham.jpg\")
<\/h2>\nBrenda’s\u00a0Thoughts<\/h2>\n